Vegaman_Dan
Well-known member
The auction just listed it as a 'metal stand' and had an opening bid of $5. I could see from the single photo that it was about 2x4, and fairly tall. It appeared to be made of 2" square tubing, and I knew the cost of the metal, so what the heck, let's bid on it. I ended up getting it for $20. That's a good deal in my book!
Got it home, found it was indeed 2x4, 42" tall and had 2" angle iron welded on the top frame- not sure why. Maybe something sat inside.
Ground down the welds holding the angle iron and took it back to a basic 2x2 tube frame. Rather level, surprisingly.
No worries, it's metal! It's easy to cut 12" from the legs, and weld back on the 1/4" thick 3x5 feet.
Since it had those nice holes predrilled in the feet, we might as well fill them with a set of casters with good brakes to keep it in place. Everything in my garage has casters. It just makes it so much easier to clean, reorganize and be mobile. I would rather take the bench out to the work area than buried in one spot. Especially for something that would be used for welding!
Taking heed of tips from here on Garage Journal, I picked up a simple receiver hitch and welded it to one end. I thought about a longer tube instead, but I liked the wide surface area this one offered to weld to. It's a light duty bumper hitch. I might add a piece between the ribs right above the receiver tube to give it more strength, but I'll see how this works for the moment.
A bit of paint and it's ready!
Now future improvements I have in mind include a bare metal stud on the frame, possibly in the gusset for a grounding stud for welding, as well as cleaning the paint off the top of the ribs. Since it's 2" tubing, that's pretty thick to be clamping to, so I might add some angle iron tabs or lengths on the inside of the frame rails to make clamping easier.
I really want to put in a shelf below, get some storage for clamps and such, but all that also really collects the dust and this is going to be very much in a dirty environment with grinding metal. I'm open for suggestions there.
Overall, my total is $40. $20 for the table, and another $20 for the bumper hitch (on sale for $10) and the casters for another $10. The vise and mount were sitting on the shelf waiting to be used from earlier projects.
Got it home, found it was indeed 2x4, 42" tall and had 2" angle iron welded on the top frame- not sure why. Maybe something sat inside.
Ground down the welds holding the angle iron and took it back to a basic 2x2 tube frame. Rather level, surprisingly.
No worries, it's metal! It's easy to cut 12" from the legs, and weld back on the 1/4" thick 3x5 feet.
Since it had those nice holes predrilled in the feet, we might as well fill them with a set of casters with good brakes to keep it in place. Everything in my garage has casters. It just makes it so much easier to clean, reorganize and be mobile. I would rather take the bench out to the work area than buried in one spot. Especially for something that would be used for welding!
Taking heed of tips from here on Garage Journal, I picked up a simple receiver hitch and welded it to one end. I thought about a longer tube instead, but I liked the wide surface area this one offered to weld to. It's a light duty bumper hitch. I might add a piece between the ribs right above the receiver tube to give it more strength, but I'll see how this works for the moment.
A bit of paint and it's ready!
Now future improvements I have in mind include a bare metal stud on the frame, possibly in the gusset for a grounding stud for welding, as well as cleaning the paint off the top of the ribs. Since it's 2" tubing, that's pretty thick to be clamping to, so I might add some angle iron tabs or lengths on the inside of the frame rails to make clamping easier.
I really want to put in a shelf below, get some storage for clamps and such, but all that also really collects the dust and this is going to be very much in a dirty environment with grinding metal. I'm open for suggestions there.
Overall, my total is $40. $20 for the table, and another $20 for the bumper hitch (on sale for $10) and the casters for another $10. The vise and mount were sitting on the shelf waiting to be used from earlier projects.
