Superbench - a massive 6" top wooden bench with a steel base

[craig9]

Craig, before you fix your vice, i recommend that you cover the top with a hardwood which does not splinter easily, eg oak. Don’t know if you have beech there. Flooring laminate would be ideal. With the softwood lumber you have used, you are likely to be forever picking splinters out from beneath your nails, especially if it is for heavy metal or mechanical work. I agree that a good workbench is the first tool that’s needed and I apologise if you are discouraged by my comment

Thanks Philip - you're absolutely right - if I were going to use this for metal or mechanical work, I'd need to do something like that, but I have a steel topped bench for that kind of thing. This bench is solely for cabinet making and woodwork. I've made it confusing (I realise) by putting a steel base under it. I had the steel in stock for the base, and I realised that there's no dovetail joint like a fillet weld, and I thought I'd try something different.

The vise I want to fit to the front-left is a flush mounted 9" wide record carpentry style vise (an Australian made clone of a record vise anyway).

Once the top is in use, if I notice undue wear, it will surely be on the corners first, and it's a small job to let in a 25x25mm piece of hardwood on the front top edge.

I've been pretty easy on my workbenches in the past, and I'm usually putting a pad down in places where I might chop through a mortise, or saw through something and were otherwise about to dig into the bench top. This is the case whether it's pine or oak or even exotic super-hard flooring, because a handsaw or a chisel will chew any of them up.

Thanks for your message!

Cheers,
Craig