Howdy,

    I'm a wannabe who has done too much reading and not enough
sweating.  Although, I've cut myself plenty of times, usually right
after sharpening my chisels.

    How much of a wannabe?  I've got tools... one wood and several
metal planes, hand scrapers, knives, chisels, Japanese, European, and
bow saws.  Layout tools, lumber, water stones (can even sharpen well,
if not fast), 5 or 30 books, even Hoadley's "Understanding Wood".
Half done projects, a bag of plane shavings for some guessed at use
that'll probably never happen, great varnish brushes, even a brush
spinner...  BUT NO WORKBENCH!

    My only consolation is that so many woodworkers make the same, I'm
fascinated with tools, mistake.  The other side of my mistake is
idealizing a workbench, then wanting to build it myself, with hand
tools, out of pecan.  How does a person square up long stock for a big
bench without a bench to work on?  A friend of mine has a great
normite workshop, maybe I'll just get it out of the way.  But I'd
rather not, using hand tools to build my first bench holds a strong
allure.

    I have a few nice R&L bench planes, 3 of them bedrocks, which I
bought from Larry Poffenberger. I see he is quite ubiquitous in
OldTools, though I've lost touch with him.  When I began looking for
planes friends in the Green Country Woodworkers directed me to Mr.
Poffenberger, also a member then.  I'm not sure if having a dealer in
bedrocks and other wonderful old tools in the same city is good for my
wallet, but it sure was handy.  Larry, please accept my apologies if I
drove you crazy and I'll try to forgive you for shipping all of those
bedrocks to Australia.

    Finally, I'm returning from a two year hiatus from woodworking
caused by my employer which needed all of its programmers' time to get
out a new product.  (Of course we all know whose choice that was.)
Originally I was a Civil Engineer who loved/loves surface water.  Its
incredible what can be done to recover a horribly abused or
straightened river/stream.  The techniques and knowledge are very much
like working wood from something rough to a thing of beauty.  Mostly
did flood work for the Corp of Engineers though.  Controlling flood
waters in real time was very interesting engineering.

Jim Holliman

Jim Holliman wrote:
>
> How does a person square up long stock for a big
> bench without a bench to work on?

i'm just finishing this "bootstrap a workshop" procedure.  it ain't
easy, and i hope i never have to go through it again.  i've thought of
posting some info (on the web) on what i've learned, but don't know if
there'd be much interest.

first - do build your bench by hand using "classic" joinery.  you'll
learn more in the first 10 minutes than you will from all 30 of your
books.  you may never again have a chance to chop 1" by 4" wedged
through mortices.  or want to.  

i started w/ small projects that i knew i'd need to make the bench,
and then built upon them.  first was a wooden mallet, which is a must
have IMO.  a combo square or similar straight-edge/right angle is also
a must.

then i made two saw tables from stock 2x4's, by hand, using the same
joints as i'd be using for the bench (can you say practice swings).
they're not pretty, but can hold a ton (maybe literally) and are
stable enough laterally.  these are used for sawing (duh), and can be
stacked and clamped together to a height of about 3' for a small
makeshift work surface.  i can plane pieces about 3' long on mine.

planing can be done by rigging some angled stop blocks, wedges,
C-clamps, etc. to make pseudo-bench stops.  doesn't work great, but
only the sections where you're actually cutting joints need to be
completely true (tip from the timber framers).

one thing i wish i had thought of finding before starting is a tenon
saw.  cutting mondo-sized (big, Jeff) tenons with a small X-cut backsaw
is tedious, and there are a lot of tenons in a bench.

-SM-
Redwood City, CA