Hi Curtis

Unless you have access to a very cheap supply of scaffold. you would probably find it just as easy and more practical to buy some square box section. If you are in the uk this is available delivered from plenty of local suppliers.

This welds easily, can be clamped together anywhere you wish with simple G clamps. and also doesn't have the problem of being galvanised, like the majority of scaffolding and clamps which will make the welding more awkward.

To position your laterals, cut a short piece of angle, clamp that to the leg and rest the box on it while you tack weld.

Hope this is helpful.

Kind regards

Brian.

Curtis,

​All my workshop bench frames have been built up from Dexion angle and topped with flooring grade chip board, a practice I have used for years.

Cross bracing under the machine mounting points give secure clamping points and any gaps between the steel frame and top are made good with sheared off pieces of aluminium sheet. With the feet bolted down to the floor, these have been more than adequate for the job and they remain stable in terms of level as well.

​The slotted angle construction leaves plenty of scope for extending or altering things as the workshop grows.

Regards
Brian

Didn't we just have a thread about benches last week? One of my lathes came with a bench made from two tower scaffold sections shortened and spaced with angle iron. That was probably more trouble than starting from scratch but may have been available free.

If it is fixed in a garage just make brick piers and ply top for a general bench and if for a lathe perhaps a more solid block, hollow filled with concrete, under the headstock. see this thread

Fence posts and kitchen worktop at this end.

Rik

The bottom of this page might interest you.

**LINK**

The value ones are ok for 300kg and the dearer ones 400kg. If you want more stiffness you could sheet in 3 of the sides. They are strong units.

John

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The front leg of that wooden bench looks like it is held by a couple of dinky little screws and neither horizontal rail is over the leg. Definitely need a welded version…….

Interesting stuff and worth remembering – dexion on steroids.

The problem with the wooden bench is bracing the legs against side to side movement of the bench. A shelf or two with a fairly deep support all screwed in place can fix that in the same way as I did on the one I posted a shot of.

Just sheeting in the side wont achieve the same thing unless it's extremely stiff.

Yes I under hung the top shelf. Most have been feeling perverse. More likely couldn't get at the screws when I made it.

John

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Edited By Ajohnw on 22/11/2016 09:28:55

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John,

If that's a response to my post:

1. I said nothing about 'just sheeting the side' …
2. May I suggest that you read-up on triangulation; and more particularly, on the use of diaphragms to provide 'infinite triangulation' in a plane.

MichaelG.

The frames of my wooden benches are bolted together using 10 mm galvanized coach bolts, the tops are made of 40 mm x 200 mm pine, the legs 100 mm sq, NZ Oregon, this is much less dense than North American Oregon, our trees grow too quick, a 50 year old tree is ready to fell for timber, where as in its native America, the same size tree would be at least 200 year old. while the bench is solid, it really needs a harder surface toi work on, on top. The cost of a wood framed verses a metal frame was very similar 30 years ago, but I had all the bolts needed, and a saw mill a mile away, so wood it was.

Ian S C