Workbench depth

[Lippyp]

I'm planning the workbench I'm going to build in my new garage when we move in (OK, OK, still two weeks to go but hey, a mans gotta dream!) It needs to be one of the first things I do so I have something to work on fairly quickly.

What depth do people generally build their benches to? Obviously two foot makes a lot of sense as then I can just buy an 8x4 sheet of one inch ply and rip it down the middle to get two lengths for the top but is this deep enough? Just general garage stuff going on really, it will have a vise mounted on it and the frame will be the usal 2x4's with 4x4 legs, the back will probably be bolted to the wall rather than on legs and its likely to be L shaped to go around a corner. The shorter part of the L will most definitely be bolted to the wall at the back as it has to clear a narrow cast concrete feed trough at the bottom of the wall so no legs (it was originally a cowshed I think!)

The idea is to have a shelf underneath with sliding doors to hide all my **** in.

 

[Falcon67]

I usually do 24" because of economy of material. Most of the work surfaces (like my desk at work) seem to run 30". My new one will be an 6' x 8' L. I have mine penciled in at 24", but I may do one leg at 30". 24" is a bit narrow for some things.

 

[GarageEnvy]

I can only tell you what I did and why I did it. I don't think there's a real hard rule on this. I made mine 27" deep. I have a 2" lip on my footing and I like to clamp things to my bench so I wanted a couple of inches of overhang. I also want to put tool chests that are 22" deep underneath it at some point so the 22" plus the footing lip and the overhang is 27". Also my local metal supplier sells 5' wide sheet metal so at some point I can have a 5' wide piece cut in half and bent over the front edge. Also, my welding table is 30" deep and it's a bit too deep for some things.

 

[Jackfre]

Depends upon what type work you are going to be doing. If it is a woodworking bench you want to keep access all around for clamping purposed. If the bench is wall secured all the way around you can have some issues there. How do you secure the work. Are you going to hang your tools behind/above the bench? If so, spend a little time figuring your reach. In my opinion, to wide a bench is more of a problem than to narrow. As it is a wrap around, you can make a work station right at the corner and make one side narrower than the other. Maybe even make it a short T with a vice there. Tempered hardboard makes a nice cover for the 1" ply and it can be easily replaced.

No matter what you do...you are going to change it anyway going forward It is the nature of the workbench, at least in my experinence.

 

[rickairmedic]

All of mine are 24" and they work just fine . Remember the deeper ,bigger you make it just means more **** you can pile on it you will have to move to actually work on it .


Rick

 

[FJ 432]

My vote is for 24" as well for reasons stated. I made mine 30" recently with a 6" lip to mount a vise. If it's going to be up against a wall.

If it's more of a work table than I say the sky's the limit.

 

[Lippyp]

It'll be more car stuff than woodworking although I do do the odd bit of wood hacking. I do need to make some new doors for the garage and workshop and various other outbuildings but I may well do those on some trestles (they'll be ledged and braced barn style doors with tongue and groove timber planks on the front)

There'll probably be some shelving above the bench and some small parts drawers on the wall. I'm not a fan of pegboard as I'd rather keep my tools in a toolbox than out where they can get covered in dust and ****. I have two vises I need to mount up somewhere, one smallish one I tend to use for most stuff and a whopper of an olympia with a swivel base and both normal and pipe jaws on it. Not sure if they'll both end up on the bench.

I've got a shedload of metal shelving to go in there including two 7' tall vintage steel sets with 30 metal parts drawers in each set of shelves. I have some of the plastic parts bins with wall mounting louvre panels and a tall steel cupboard thats going to have some extra shelves put in and will hold all my power tools, bolted to the wall for security and padlocked. The storage under the benches will probably be for some plastic crates I have that hold stuff like all my household electrical parts, plumbing bits and pieces and so on. Its this kind of stuff at the moment I have scattered around the place, some in the garage, some in the understairs cupboards and so on.

 

[Krusty]

I built a basement workbench once that was 36-1/2" deep. The reason was that I wanted to store tools and such in "Akro-bins" that are about 14" deep. The bins made the tools handy to reach and easy to put away. Probably not everybody's cup of tea, but it worked for me.

Krusty

 

[rockchucker]

I usually do 24". This being said you can always start with 3/4 Cabinet Grade Plywood then if you want to make it larger run your 1" on top of that at any width. 3/4 Ply at 16" OC Framing for the Bench is pretty stout as it is. Adding anything on top of that will make it even better. You can never go too stout for a Bench.

I am going to overlay my Bench with 18ga Stainless with a 1" lip and 5-6" backsplash right up to the window in my shop.

Here is what I did though.


http://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=59818

 

[regguy1]

If you want to hide junk this bench idea might be of use, you could adapt it to your needs

The bench is homemade, for more info go to this page and scroll down to post No. 268
http://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=50406&page=14

I went with 30" x 8' very happy with it........

 

[Lippyp]

Thats a nice workbench, I think mine will be a bit more shall we say, rustic!

 

[regguy1]

Thats a nice workbench, I think mine will be a bit more shall we say, rustic!

 

[larry_g]

I built a basement workbench once that was 36-1/2" deep. The reason was that I wanted to store tools and such in "Akro-bins" that are about 14" deep. The bins made the tools handy to reach and easy to put away. Probably not everybody's cup of tea, but it worked for me.

Krusty

I have followed the same thinking as Krusty. I have small storage bins and a tool box on the back of the bench so I went deeper, 32" if I remember correctly. The down side of this is that I am not real fastidious at keeping things put away so sometimes its a hassle getting the drawers open.

lg
no neat sig line

 

[Steevo]

A lot of folks seem to go with 24", if only to get the most out of sheets of plywood.
I am working on benches that wrap around the corner in my shop, and am going 30" deep with 12ga steel cap over 1-3/4" thick solid core doors on a steel frame.

 

[machine_punk]

I personally like 28" deep...just seems to work for me. I move my benches, though...I like to be able to move the bench to where I want to work, or store it against the wall. I also added wheels to the legs on one end, so I can move it like a wheelbarrow...
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[Porcupine]

machine_punk, I really like that wheel idea and I may just incorporate that into my next workbench build. Are those 4x4 legs?

 

[SGKent]

mine is 36". It gives me room for bins at the back, for hardware, and plenty of room to work on mechanical things. Nothing like trying to work on a head or manifold and not being able to turn it any angle I want.

 

[machine_punk]

machine_punk, I really like that wheel idea and I may just incorporate that into my next workbench build. Are those 4x4 legs?

They are double 2x6 legs (I guess that would make it 4x6 dimensional...that leaves about 3x4.5 inches sitting solidly on the ground with the legs with wheels and 3x5.5 inches on the legs without wheels. I wanted solid when I built it...)
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This is the only picture I have on GJ of the rest of the bench...it is the wooden bench in the lower, left corner of the picture. When I built it, several years ago, there were just a couple of inches to spare between the sides of the bench and the 4' x 8' workshop I had...so I needed a way to easily move the bench out to the carport to work. It is temporarily my machine bench...will become my primary work bench, as I get the garage sorted and get the bench power tools onto their own, custom-made bench in the future...
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I don't want to hijack this thread...please feel free to follow the link in my signature to my workshop thread.