This is not a roubo workbench...:)


shaneymack

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7 minutes ago, Eric. said:

I still refuse to call it a bench but that is one bad ass "work area." :D  I wish I had the space for one because after using the scrawny little MFT for less than a year I can say for sure I'd copy your plans and build one just like it.  It's awesome.

Agreed. I just dont know how comfortable I would be hammering on something held in place by the festool quick clamps. They are around $300 a piece, and i am an ape when holding a mallet. Shane does awesome work, so i wont question his judgement on a work bench, but the classic hardware and design is hard to beat for a work bench. However, what shane has made is a stellar replacement for the MFT. I view the MFT differently than a workbench. I have both and i use them for drastically different operations. At the next workspace, Shane's workbench is the absolute replacement for the MFT. It takes everything that makes the MFT great, but improves on it 100 fold. My MFT isnt the most stable thing in the world. I gingerly place things on it to cut. Then, you get into workpiece support and cut capacity. 26-27" cut capacity isnt that much. It also isnt that long to support 7-8' lengths. Shane looks like he addressed all these things in his. With how easy it is to have a top CNC'd to near perfect accuracy, these worktops are awesome. A few track lengths with some qwas dogs/rail dogs and you have an awesome tool. 

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1 hour ago, shaneymack said:

Here is a less expensive option to drill your own mft top.

 

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Thanks for the pointer Shane!  I've always found Peter's videos helpful (I first discovered him in the context of the X-Carve) so I'm happy to support him.  The manufacturer is out of stock right now, but I'll keep watching (ideally, I'd like to find someone in the US who carries it, but I haven't seen that yet).

 

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I still refuse to call it a bench but that is one bad ass "work area."   I wish I had the space for one because after using the scrawny little MFT for less than a year I can say for sure I'd copy your plans and build one just like it.  It's awesome.

Not that I care what you call it but what is it lacking for you to call it a bench? A vise?

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5 minutes ago, shaneymack said:

Not that I care what you call it but what is it lacking for you to call it a bench? A vise?

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I think it's a bench. Just not a traditional one.

That said, some authors advise against innovation when it comes to benches. This is one of the "principles" for building workbenches according to Schwarz (he's quoting himself):

schwarz.JPG

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1 hour ago, dlmorgan999 said:

The manufacturer is out of stock right now, but I'll keep watching (ideally, I'd like to find someone in the US who carries it, but I haven't seen that yet).

I just found out that this won't be back in stock until mid-November.  I guess that just gives me plenty of time to work up a design. ;)

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I just found out that this won't be back in stock until mid-November.  I guess that just gives me plenty of time to work up a design. ;)

There is a version that uses pegboard and is cheaper than both the Parf and LR32.  It is made by a guy named Anthony, and if I remember correctly, it is called the Woodrave or something.  If you want check out YouTube and put Anthony Zeh in a search.

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There is a version that uses pegboard and is cheaper than both the Parf and LR32.  It is made by a guy named Anthony, and if I remember correctly, it is called the Woodrave or something.  If you want check out YouTube and put Anthony Zeh in a search.

Theres also your local shop with a CNC, makerspace, etc that will happily cut a full 4x8 sheet of whatever material you want to your specs. Ive seen plenty of people posting $75-100 an hour to do it. Add in the cost of your material, and you have your top completed. Pegboard might be accurate, but is it thousandths of an inch accurate? This is where I start to question making your own tools. If you mess up the dog grid of Shane's top, the whole thing just plain sucks to me. You would go from having dead on 45° and 90° cuts without breaking a sweat to everything being off a bit.

 

I would borrow a buddy's MFT top to replicate with a template bit, CNC the top, or go the route of the LR32. First choice would be to bite the bullet and get it CNCed to perfection in whatever size and spec you want.

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Theres also your local shop with a CNC, makerspace, etc that will happily cut a full 4x8 sheet of whatever material you want to your specs. Ive seen plenty of people posting $75-100 an hour to do it. Add in the cost of your material, and you have your top completed. Pegboard might be accurate, but is it thousandths of an inch accurate? This is where I start to question making your own tools. If you mess up the dog grid of Shane's top, the whole thing just plain sucks to me. You would go from having dead on 45° and 90° cuts without breaking a sweat to everything being off a bit.

 

I would borrow a buddy's MFT top to replicate with a template bit, CNC the top, or go the route of the LR32. First choice would be to bite the bullet and get it CNCed to perfection in whatever size and spec you want.

I just reconnected with a buddy from carpentry school. We went over to his house for dinner last week and he took me over to his shop. 20 000 sq ft, not too bad. He has a very, very succesful archetectual millwork company. All to say that he has a heck of a cnc. 5'×10' material capacity.

12c8bd6367b48742e770558ed543828f.jpg

8 head spindle

03ac666b637861471da440e6177c062e.jpg

This is the vacuum to provide suction for the material being machined. Its enormous

8f410187b9b6d2b29f2b0b8f1332f444.jpg

Safe to say, all my future mft tops will be done right there for the price of 0$.

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Yeah, that is just plain awesome. For those of us without 20,000SF buddies, I would still suggest going the route of having the top CNCed for a fee. 

 

Funny how he has a $50,000 CNC machine with a $100 dust collector hooked up to it. That man has his priorities in order.

I think it was 150k. He is buying a multi stage edge bander that is 27' long and over 100k. I will take a few pics when he gets it.

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17 hours ago, shaneymack said:

I think it was 150k. He is buying a multi stage edge bander that is 27' long and over 100k. I will take a few pics when he gets it.

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yeah yeah, thats what i said, "$50,000 American Dollars", thats 150k canuck bucks, right? i keed, i keed. Honestly, my knowledge of the CNC and edge banding market is limited to what i see at auctions. I know they go from expensive to very expensive to holy #@!$ expensive. Seems your friend is in the last of those categories. This might sound dumb, but if hes running a millwork shop, why has he dedicated close to 300k towards sheet good processing? Maybe im misunderstanding stuff, but i always classified millwork as doors, casing, trim, base, moulding, corbels-- that sort of thing. Still, must be doing crazy business to have that much cap expenditure. 

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yeah yeah, thats what i said, "$50,000 American Dollars", thats 150k canuck bucks, right? i keed, i keed. Honestly, my knowledge of the CNC and edge banding market is limited to what i see at auctions. I know they go from expensive to very expensive to holy #@!$ expensive. Seems your friend is in the last of those categories. This might sound dumb, but if hes running a millwork shop, why has he dedicated close to 300k towards sheet good processing? Maybe im misunderstanding stuff, but i always classified millwork as doors, casing, trim, base, moulding, corbels-- that sort of thing. Still, must be doing crazy business to have that much cap expenditure. 

Most of what they do involves sheet goods/cabinetry. They build trade show booths and also do architectural millwork. Here's his site, pretty cool stuff

http://www.presentex.com

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  • 7 months later...

@shaneymack I remember looking at this back in the day .. didn't think it was for me. Now I think it's totally for me. Now that I've made the decision to have my workbench be my outfeed table and assembly table to save room. So.. mind if I basically steal it? Only difference is I am going to find a cnc shop to do the holes in the top :)

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@shaneymack I remember looking at this back in the day .. didn't think it was for me. Now I think it's totally for me. Now that I've made the decision to have my workbench be my outfeed table and assembly table to save room. So.. mind if I basically steal it? Only difference is I am going to find a cnc shop to do the holes in the top

 

Steal away !

 

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