We’d love to see how people can group these together to make a more interesting work area. Did you see how I set them up to link together?
I love your ideas about mods. If you look at the legs on both heights you can see a small straight section. This will allow people to get casters, and cut down the legs to maintain height. We’re not
For your other suggestions, such as increasing the width, I’ve designed this table so it’s pretty easy to do that.
Just to be clear, we’re developing this as an open source table, not as a marketable product. We want people to be able to download it an customize it and make their own using SketchUp.
@djkenkel For now though, to keep things more simple we’d love to see what you can come up with for a top.
I’d still like to see a modified version I can make with standard shop tools. I love this concept, but I don’t think CNC would be viable for me. I did find one location somewhat close to me, but I’d like to be able to do the work myself rather than have to pay someone to do it for me.
@gaius619 Thanks so much for the input… So having this totally CNC made makes it a great platform for people to hack on. The idea is to encourage people to design. We made them a stable and sturdy bench, now they can make it their own anywhere there are CNC tools, which is a lot of maker spaces and schools all over the country.
Now I did design the top to be able to be fabricated on a table saw should you want a replacement, or to make your own and customize it. I could see someone cutting out the top and putting holes and slots in it with regular tools for different tools and things.
If you did want to make these yourself and didn’t want to pay a lot of money to get it done you could always have patterns cut out by someone with a CNC. Then you could use a hand router to make copies. You could take your originals and modify them too with regular shop tools if you wanted to change things like the height, width, etc.
If you were patient enough you may be able to print out the plans full scale at a local print shop for just a few dollars and use a regular band saw to make the shapes too…
When I initially designed these benches I had tossed around the idea of a chop saw stand of some sort, but I never fully worked it out. You outdid what I had in mind.
Can you post that model in the 3D Warehouse so that I can add it to our collection of submissions? I’d like to look at it more closely too so I can help get it into a fabrication when the time comes.
Some modification on the chopsaw bench is needed. A wooden fence, as high as in the model, can’t butt up tight against the saw fence. The upper part of the saw fence slides off to either side when doing compound miter cuts.
For people without a CNC, they still can print out a few full-scale details of just joinery. That should be able to be sized to fit on desktop printers. Use spray adhesive to glue the details areas to the wood substrate. Cut out one nice piece and use that as a router template to be used with a flush cut router bit. Make several templates as needed, and a frugal maker can get the same bench as someone with a CNC.
it’s just a concept. you’ll also notice the way it’s drawn will restrict the angle which the saw can rotate. the angle on the top plywood should match that of the angle on the saw’s table as to allow full range.
idk, I just grabbed the saw off the warehouse but I own one of these to get actual measurements off of if I draw it again. thing is, if this were to be made, it would have to be made for a specific saw unless some sort of height adjustments etc were added in order to accommodate a wider variety of models
It’s just that a surprising number of shops I worked at forget/ignore the clearance requirements of the saw’s fence because the vast majority of cutting jobs work best when the upper fence is moved in tight.
I just bought an older model DeWalt 12" sliding compound miter saw from a co-worker. The 2 rails are aligned vertically which allows the motor to be mounted higher. That provides height clearance to set up a jig for 7 1/2" crown miter cuts.
Also need a way to attach additional side tables/wings/extensions to easily work with longer length material that require the use of stop blocks.
I’m currently mulling this very issue to set up my saw in tight work spaces with limited storage but with high expectations of using my saw the same way I use the ones at work. So I feel for you. There’s a lot of effort and thought that go into these benches.
Maker Desk, Maker Station Cape Town, flat pack using crate clipping system, this is to allow for easy transport, and customizing things like adding doors to create a tool locker, plus changing and hacking the top.
We are looking to build some for our makerspace and to make the kits available to members. the next thing is to make multi purpose school furniture.
The clip system allows for any worn or broken parts to be replaced, or for interchangeable work-surfaces for different tasks, without loosing structural integrity or requiring any tools
Lots of great creations! Mine is a little bit different, but I was taking the approach of having many removable table tops… and having to store them.
So, I created a shelf system where you could vertically store the table tops (with customizable heights) and pick and choose the one you need. Maybe useful where space is limited or in an environment where you would need to lock your table tops (and tools) in a cabinet. Support structure:
Gaius619:
Anything you can cut on a cnc mill you can cut with traditional shop tools. Just a matter of how long it will take you.
Also, this is open source, design a version that uses dimensional lumber.
I have two simple ideas.
First is a simple router table top. I have not drawn a router as you can adapt to your choice of router plate or lift.
The fence is a contractors clamp and a bandsaw fence with some MDF added. http://www.ptreeusa.com/clamp_progrip.htm
My other idea it for a Kreg pocket hole jig top:
My drawing is quite crude but add a couple of stop blocks and maybe a drawer for bits and such, and it would be quite useful.
Those are both great submissions! If I get time I’ll try to build them before we depart for Maker Faire.
@devanholt01 Take a look at the first post in this thread. There are hacking instructions. Right now we want people to stick with just modding the top. If you want to mod the overall size of the table for yourself feel free, but we won’t make it for Maker Faire.
For those of you interested, I built the first prototype:
