September 7, 2014
Workbench
Last summer, as we ripped walls out of our kitchen to make it bigger, we knew we had a plan for the pile of 2x4 studs getting removed. We wanted to send as little as possible to the landfill from the destruction and construction of our kitchen/bath remodel and garage building project. We even made a choice to not get a refuse dumpster and deal with each material as best we could, the rest fitting in our regular trash bin. We did upgrade to a larger size bin for a few months and ended up filling it full almost every week. It's amazing how much debris is created in construction so it was good to be conscious of what could be reused. The project produced a pile of lumber, used boards or new scraps, that we've been using for other projects since.
Those 2x4 studs, though, we had immediately earmarked for turning into a workbench to put in the new garage. As we removed them, we used a marker to circle places where nails were cut-off and still in the wood so that they would not end up causing trouble in a saw later. Last month, we finally got around to finishing the workbench project.
This is the top after staining, but pre-polyurathane.
Rick cut, glued and clamped, and sanded eight of the boards to make a butcher block type of top. He used other 2x4s and a piece of plywood to create the base and "back splash". My job on this project was the finish. For the top, I used a mahogany stain that I've had sitting around. It matches a stain I used for a couple large hanging shelfs in the garage that store camping equipment, the same stain I used when refinishing a couple stools that now fit under the workbench. After staining, I protected the top with a few coats of polyurethane. For the base, I used a grey paint that we had bought on clearance to try out on the exterior and ended up not using. It ended up matching the grey of a vintage side table we are using as a battery charging station. The only thing we bought to make this table was wood glue and the leveling feet. The coordinating colors in the garage have become red and grey!
We designed the workbench table to fit perfectly over two tool cabinets we got to organize tools and hardware. The cabinets are on wheels so that we can move them out from under the table and have more legroom and more work surface area.
Tags
building (6), diy (9), garage (1), home (3), remodel (2), sustainable (7), tools (3), wood-working (7), workbench (1)
Arianna Helen