Workbench upgrade

[Copper head]

My current workbench in my shop (actually it's a 24x24 attached garage), is made out of 4x4's, 2x4's and 3/4" plywood for the top. It's in an L-shape, roughly 24" x 84" on the long side, and 24" x 42" on the short side.

I'm wanting to plate the top of this work area with steel, so to make it more durable and easier to weld small items on.

I priced some stainless steel plate a while back and the price was WAY MORE than I wanted to spend.

What I have in mind is to use is,.... 3/16" mild steel plate. I plan on tig welding the L area where the long & short side match up (aprox 24")


Any thoughts or suggestions,......?!

 

[Kevin54]

Copperhead.....welcome to Garage Journal. You'll get a lot of ideas and replies, but if you also do a search for workbenches, or benches, you will also find a lot of ideas from Masonite to steel, to stainless, to cutting your own tree down and custom making something.

BTW..... to let you know, when it comes to modifying, building new, buying old, building old, buying new, and generally anything but what you look like when you get out of bed in the morning......Pics are required We like pics, and like to see what you are working with. It helps to get others mind juices flowing. Also we like to spend other peoples money. O know that with a few of my questions, of building a simple wall, or adding a bathroom, by the time you get done reading through the replies, $50,000 is about the minimum you are allowed to spend on any project. From tools, to toolboxes, to putting in a *******. $50g's. Anything over that and you are on your own. Under that, and we'll all band together and get it done for you.

Again...Welcome And truthfully, we really do like pics, and pics do help.

 

[Copper head]

These are the only pics I have at the moment,.......

They're a few years old, but pretty much the same except I now have a 2-post lift on the right side.

 

[RunninOnEmpty]

Personally I would only consider stainless. What prices did you find? I haven't looked for specialty metal retailers near me, but the metal I've seen at the big stores has not been well-priced. Typically I have found onlinemetals.com to be better, though I would likely be able to find better prices locally if I cared enough to look harder.

You can sometimes find metal for very little money on Ebay and Craigslist, too.

3/16" seems a bit excessive to me if you want something inexpensive. Though I suppose going relatively thick would keep it from denting as easily...

 

[John in OH]

If you plan to weld the joint between the steel sheets, consider using only short tack welds. Anything more and you could create some very undesirable warpage of the steel.

 

[Jagmandave]

I don't know what you considered too expensive, but I had a nice SS top made for mine - 2' X 8' with a 6" back splash, a 1 1/2" turndown on the front and a 1/2" return lip, plus an end cap on both ends, welded corners.....$209.

Seemed pretty reasonable to me.....

View media item 34314

 

[Copper head]

If you plan to weld the joint between the steel sheets, consider using only short tack welds. Anything more and you could create some very undesirable warpage of the steel.

Considering the fact that I'm going with either 3/16" or 1/4" plate, I don't see warping being an issue,.......especially when Tig-Welding it.

I don't know what you considered too expensive, but I had a nice SS top made for mine ....$209.

Seemed pretty reasonable to me.....

Yeah,......
BUT,.....how thick is it?

That's normally the kicker.


I do some heavy duty stuff on my bench, so I want to do it once,.....and do it right.


Yours does look real nice,.....I have to say.





If I remember right,......
My local steel supplier said about 100 for mild steel,....... and IIRC, about 450-500 for stainless.

 

[Kevin54]

Considering the fact that I'm going with either 3/16" or 1/4" plate, I don't see warping being an issue,.......especially when Tig-Welding it.


Yeah,......
BUT,.....how thick is it?

That's normally the kicker.


I do some heavy duty stuff on my bench, so I want to do it once,.....and do it right.


Yours does look real nice,.....I have to say.





If I remember right,......
My local steel supplier said about 100 for mild steel,....... and IIRC, about 450-500 for stainless.

For stainless that thick....$450-$500 is not a bad price. If you are good friends with him, and buy steel off of him regularly, see if you can get it for his cost. You may save a few dollars there.

Do you get on CL and do a search under "Materials"? A lot of times, you may have to drive a few hundred miles, but you save a few hundred in cost. So if you search on CL, check places within a 200 mile radius. Check out online auction sites, where a place is going out of business. Not too long ago, I just missed out by a few dollars at the last minute, on aluminum and stainless plate. I was out of town when the auction ended, and someone got all of it for a stupid low bid of something like $125. There was probably a few thousand bucks worth of plate material.

On the other hand.....GREAT LOOKING GARAGE It appears you have VFT on the floor. How long have you had the tiles down, and how well do you like it? And downsides to having it that you have ran across?

And with a garage that nice, I would think that there is at least ONE nice toy that goes in there. Pics my friend. If you have toys in the way of two, three, or four wheels.......Post 'em up

 

[Copper head]

And with a garage that nice, I would think that there is at least ONE nice toy that goes in there. Pics my friend. If you have toys in the way of two, three, or four wheels.......Post 'em up

Oh yeah,......

http://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=283985

 

[willy (traer)]

I used 3/16 cold rolled for my top but I had access to a 12' brake for bending the front and rear. Two 10' sections tigged together in the middle. a little wd40 on if every now and then and no rust or anything sticking to it.....

 

[Mark in Indiana]

How about a used, stainless steel commercial food prep table? They seem to go cheap on CL.

 

[NitroSun]

Nice shop Willy!

 

[jesse72]

I used 3/16 cold rolled for my top but I had access to a 12' brake for bending the front and rear. Two 10' sections tigged together in the middle. a little wd40 on if every now and then and no rust or anything sticking to it.....

Great looking shop and the bench is a great use of those flat files, or blue print file drawers!

 

[jmiller_2308]

I don't know what you considered too expensive, but I had a nice SS top made for mine - 2' X 8' with a 6" back splash, a 1 1/2" turndown on the front and a 1/2" return lip, plus an end cap on both ends, welded corners.....$209.

Seemed pretty reasonable to me.....

View media item 34314

That is exactly what I considered doing. How thick or what gauge did you have it made from? Any issues with denting? I was thinking 14 or 12 gauge might be the right thickness.

I looked at trying to recycle some food stuff off CL but it seems it really wasn't all that much cheaper than buying material; unfortunately I haven't had time to look for a fabricator to convert the material to a counter top so I haven't a clue what that might cost.

Given that steel is almost 1/2 the cost of stainless and the fact that the 1/4" plate I have for beating on hasn't rusted I also considered doing this out of steel but I would still prefer stainless.

For the OP, if you are going to weld on it I wonder if you want to just use steel instead of stainless. It seems that by the time you tack and grind a few times that you might be better off with steel.

 

[Caman]

I don't know what they do to it, but I get "pickled and oiled" plate steel from my supplier. It is pretty cheap (compared to stainless) and very easy to work with. I used it on a welding bench, arbor press table, and a drill press table at work, and minus a few scratches, scuffs, some paint, and weld marks they still look as good as new after a year.

The best part is if they do get damaged repairs are pretty easy with some grinding and I don't have to worry as much as I would have if it were a considerably more expensive stainless.

 

[RunninOnEmpty]

The best part is if they do get damaged repairs are pretty easy with some grinding and I don't have to worry as much as I would have if it were a considerably more expensive stainless.

And the best part of stainless is that you rarely have to grind it to not have to worry about Tetanus.

Mild steel is fine... IF you keep up with it. Just don't let the enthusiasm for doing so die out.

 

[Dan in Pasadena]

These are the only pics I have at the moment,.......

They're a few years old, but pretty much the same except I now have a 2-post lift on the right side.

Off the point of the thread I know but Copperhead your garage looks great. Wish mine looked so good. Congrats!

 

[justme-]

Mild steel will be fine as long as you don't have a humidity problem and/or you paint or oil it from time to time. Most heavy duty work tables/benches are mild steel - like dealer ships have in the mechanics bays. We have one in my shop at work - got painted some time back (years) and while it looks rough from the paint damage/wear of being used daily there's zero rust - and we DO have a humidity problem with water pooling under that bench regularly from snow melting off equipment in the shop or runoff from heavy rain coming under the door next to it.

Also, unless you plan to do some serious beating on that bench - like pretending it's an anvil, or adding mass to keep the attached floor from moving, you're plate thicknesses are major overkill. 10 gauge is plenty heavy duty. Wooden framing under it are going to be a problem for welding even at 1/4" thick. I'd get one of those folding welding tables or similar instead - they work much better than they look like they will.

 

[Copper head]

Just a little a little update,.......



I went with 3/16" mild steel, BUT,..........I used 1/2" concrete board like you use as an underlayment for ceramic tile. This way I can weld on it, w/o fear of overheating the plywood underneath and starting a fire.

I welded a big project this past weekend and it performed great.

I even Tig Welded the two plates together, AFTER they were bolted down. No problems what so ever.


Total cost was around 100 bucks including the concrete board.

 

[Iroc-Z]

You will be happy with the cold rolled top. Stainless is nice stuff but I have had great luck with cold rolled tops.

 

[crab]

You're on the right track, I have all steel benches with 1/4 inch tops. 3/16 should be thick enough, I wouldn't go any thinner. I absolutely wouldn't weld the L together though. Warping wouldn't be a problem but moving it in the future would be. If you have the steel sheared to size at the supplier you should get a good fit that would look and function fine. You want a little overhang with the steel , makes it easier to c clamp stuff to weld. The bare steel will season in time and rust wont be an issue.

 

[Frank Dukes]

lets hear about that lightning! nice shop

 

[Copper head]

I absolutely wouldn't weld the L together though. Warping wouldn't be a problem but moving it in the future would be.

Too late,......



I've already tig'd it together.

Don't really plan on ever moving it. If It needs replacing years down the road, I'll cut it apart.

 

[mark52621]

Whenever I oiled my metal benches a lot of grit would stick to them. It really made it a pain to keep the benches clean.

So I started waxing them. Once or twice a year I rub them down with turtle wax. It prevents all rust, and is easy to clean.