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00:05 Speaker 1: G'day, knuckleheads!
Uncle Knackers' here.
Big day today.
Finally, after eight long months, I'm gonna build myself a workbench for my garage.
But the first thing I had to do was clean the garage out.
What a nightmare!
I have to have a garage sale.
Seriously, it is doing my head in.
Anyway, let's get this show on the road.
Now, for my workbench, I need two, maybe three requirements.
It's gotta be tough, it's gotta be sturdy, and it's gotta be cheap.
And I think I have just the plan that covers all those areas.
So, let's get this build kicked off by making the legs.
[noise]
00:55 S1: Now, when making the leg for your workbench, there's no hard and fast rule.
You can use any material you like, really.
I've chosen 90x35 pine, two pieces screwed together to form one solid post.
Now, put one together and it looks like this.
Now, you'll notice here, one of these pieces is 90 mils shorter than the other, and there's
a good reason for that.
A lot of guys just bolt the rail to the side of the post.
There's nothing wrong with that, but you're relying entirely upon those bolts to hold
the rail in place.
This method, the rail, sits in that checkout, making for an extremely strong joint.
Now that's my type of workbench.
Now, there's one more thing we need to do to this post to finish it off.
We've got our checkout here for our front rail to fit into, but we also need a checkout
for the side rail to fit into, just like that.
02:02 S1: So, it's a process of removing this little section of timber here.
Now, before you say, "Ah, that's too complicated!"
It's really simple, and I'll show you how to do it right now.
Because the rails we're using are 35 millimetres wide, we need to set our circular saw to a
depth of 35 millimetres.
Now, just a quick little circular saw tip before we start cutting, You'll notice that
the blade is right here.
It's not plugged in, by the way.
And it's a large section of base plate from the blade to here and a little section of
base plate from the blade to there.
You want this section, the big section of base plate to be on this bit of wood here.
You don't want it to be hanging over the edge of your timber.
Otherwise, the circular saw isn't gonna sit right, it's gonna tend to tilt.
And you don't want that.
So, let's cut this timber out now.
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03:07 S1: There you go!
It's all cut!
That wasn't hard, was it?
Now, all we need to do is to chisel this stuff out.
Now, you could just bash it out, but if you want a really neat finish, this is what I
do.
And especially if you haven't done this before, is get a square or something straight, and
just where those cuts finish, draw a line with your pencil.
And what that does is it gives a nice reference point for us to put our chisel, therefore
ensuring a really clean, straight cut.
Now, just take your time; there's no mad rush.
Just line your chisel up and just gently tap away, working along that line you just marked.
[noise]
04:07 S1: So there you have it, a beautifully cut and checked out workbench leg.
Now all you need to do is to drop your rail into those checkouts, and screw it off.
Now, the beauty of this join over the other method of just bolting the rail to the side
of the post only, is that you finish up with a join that's nice and flush, that's nice
and clean, and it's extremely strong.
So, for the extra bit of time that it takes to do it, it's well worth the effort.
So, we've cut the legs, now it's time for the rails.
Now for my particular workbench, I need to cut two long lengths at 1880 and two short
lengths at 570 millimetres.
Now you'll also notice that I've cut my rails on a 45-degree angle.
There's a good reason for that, and I'll explain it shortly.
[noise]
05:08 S1: Now very quickly, before I screw those rails together, I just wanna show you
why I like to cut the rail on a 45-degree angle.
You finish up with a really nice, neat corner, as opposed to just butting the two rails together
like that.
It's just as good but you have that end grain showing which I don't particularly like.
Anyway, like I said, it's all personal choice.
Now I like to keep all my screws in a nice, straight line.
So, I line my boards up, then get my square, and just run a line through.
Just a light line, all the way through like that.
And that way all my screws are going to line up nicely.
Next what you'll need to do is to pre-drill the holes with a countersinking bit.
It'll stop your timber from splitting.
With the screws partially started, let's finally screw this thing together.
So, put the two pieces together and screw away.
Beautiful.
[noise]
06:52 S1: So there you go, a frame made.
It's time to put the legs on.
And now it's time to install the legs.
Just simply drop it in place, it should be nice and flush with both surfaces.
And you'll notice that I have two screws here and one screw there.
And shortly, I will be putting in two more bolts right here.
So, next thing you need to do is to make sure that your leg is nice and straight, nice and
square, like that.
You could clamp it in place if you want to, and now, just screw it off.
One.
Two.
Three.
And there you have it, all screwed off.
Now all you need to do is put two bolts through here and repeat that process for the other
three legs and we're done.
07:57 S1: To drill the hole for the bolts, I've got a 10 mil timber drill bit.
And now, you set the bolt.
And then put on the washer to nut.
So here it is, the basic frame, fully assembled.
And I'll have to say, it's feeling really solid.
And I think that's due to a type of joint that we used to attach to these posts, so
I can highly recommend it.
08:51 S1: The next thing we need to do is add some extra support for our bench top and
you do that by adding these noggins that is fitting like that, and you screw it off.
I've pre-drilled some screw holes with my countersinking drill bit, now all I need to
do is screw these babies off.
[noise]
09:29 S1: So, there you go.
It's all screwed off.
Now, that's going to make the top extremely solid.
Now, I wanna add a shelf down here, which will serve two purposes.
It'll brace the legs and make the bench more solid and also, it'll give us some extra storage.
[noise]
09:58 S1: With the shelf frame now in place, it's now time to install the ply to the top
of the workbench and to the top of the storage shelf.
Now, I'm gonna cut this ply 40 millimetres bigger all the way around on the frame.
And you'll also notice that if you wanna cut a nice straight line over a long distance,
it's good idea to clamp down something like a level or a straight edge, or a straight
piece of timber, clamp it off, and then run your saw along that edge, and you'll finish
off with a beautiful, clean straight cut.
[noise]
10:53 S1: Alrighty, we're on the home stretch.
It's time to glue and screw these shelves down.
Now before you glue anything, I like to dry-fit the whole thing first.
So position your shelves or position your ply, and mark where our screws are going to
get.
So following the noggin screws that we have here, just run those across the ply using
a square or a level.
Now the overhang that we have is 40 millimetres.
So, what I've done is I've cut a block, 40 millimetres wide, and I've clamped it to the
edge of the ply.
That way, you just push the ply across, and when the block hits, we have our 40-millimetre
overhang.
That's a good little trick.
[noise]
11:59 S1: Okay, let's get some glue down.
Okay, let's put this board on top like that.
Lovely.
Get the gap at the end, which is 40 millimetres.
That's it, hard up against the edge on those blocks like that.
Okay, it's time to screw off.
[noise]
12:53 S1: Check it out!
All done!
Now, that's what I call a work bench.
Let's check this rig out a bit more closely.
Now, you see that, all the screws line up nicely, and I've also added a trim that I've
nailed to the edge of the ply top.
That's just to protect the ply from any damage and it looks better.
Got the corners all nicely mitred at the end.
And down at the shelf, done the same thing.
Put a trim on the edge, just there, just to protect the edge of the ply.
So, there you have it.
I finally have my own garage work bench.
13:50 S1: What a top little project!
Great tip, knackers!
And as per usual, if you found this video useful, subscribe to my channel, the button's
down there.
Thumbs up, the button's down there as well.
And don't forget to look me up on Facebook at DIY For Knuckleheads.
Now also, I've left a list in the description box down below, of the materials and some
of the dimensions for this project.
And don't take off just yet because there'll be a couple of photos flashing backwards and
forwards of this little beauty in various stages of construction.
So, till next time, happy building.
I'm out of here.
Cheers!
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