I'm building my mondo workbench/assembly table. I'm using torsion box
design for the bench top and am currently trying to figure out how I am
going to mount my vices. These are the vices I'm currently looking at:

http://www.rockler.com/ecom7/product...erings_id=2147

Right now my bench top is 4.25 inches thick. What I am concerned about is
how deep the 'back' of the vice is. In other words, if I mount the vice
to the underside of the bench top, will the top of the vice be flush with
the bench top? Can anybody point me to some drawings with dimentions for
such a vice?


--
Frank Stutzman

The link says they are 3"deep?


"Frank Stutzman" wrote in message
...
I'm building my mondo workbench/assembly table. I'm using torsion box
design for the bench top and am currently trying to figure out how I am
going to mount my vices. These are the vices I'm currently looking at:

http://www.rockler.com/ecom7/product...erings_id=2147

Right now my bench top is 4.25 inches thick. What I am concerned about is
how deep the 'back' of the vice is. In other words, if I mount the vice
to the underside of the bench top, will the top of the vice be flush with
the bench top? Can anybody point me to some drawings with dimentions for
such a vice?


--
Frank Stutzman

It's usually best to have your hardware in hand before hacking up the
bench. If you can find a copy of The Workbench Book, there's a lot of
good info there to be read. Do you think a torsion box will be strong
enough to mount a vise upon? Tom

"tom" wrote in message
ups.com...
It's usually best to have your hardware in hand before hacking up the
bench. If you can find a copy of The Workbench Book, there's a lot of
good info there to be read. Do you think a torsion box will be strong
enough to mount a vise upon? Tom


Sure - fill in the web in that area with solid wood.

Australopithecus scobis wrote:
Make your wooden faceplate(s) as tall as necessary to reach the top of the
table. The iron doesn't have to go all the way up.

Well, one of the features I want in a vice is a pop-up bench dog. If the
vice is shorter than the thickness of the vice, it would make the bench
dog less functional.

--
Frank Stutzman

Mike Richardson wrote:
The link says they are 3"deep?

I read that to say that the jaws are 3" deep. The mounting surface would
be something over 3" from the top of the vice. The question is how much
more?

--
Frank Stutzman

tom wrote:
It's usually best to have your hardware in hand before hacking up the
bench.

Probably true.

Do you think a torsion box will be strong
enough to mount a vise upon? Tom

Yes. I plan on filling the web where the vice will go with a soild block
of wood. Maybe even some of the surrounding webs.

--
Frank Stutzman
Bonanza N494B "Hula Girl"
Hood River, OR

"Frank Stutzman" wrote in message
...
I'm building my mondo workbench/assembly table. I'm using torsion box
design for the bench top and am currently trying to figure out how I am
going to mount my vices. These are the vices I'm currently looking at:

http://www.rockler.com/ecom7/product...erings_id=2147

Right now my bench top is 4.25 inches thick. What I am concerned about is
how deep the 'back' of the vice is. In other words, if I mount the vice
to the underside of the bench top, will the top of the vice be flush with
the bench top? Can anybody point me to some drawings with dimentions for
such a vice?


--
Frank Stutzman


why build a torsion box if the design does not have any torsion loads ???

mike hide wrote:

why build a torsion box if the design does not have any torsion loads ???

Uhmmm, I'm no mechanical engineer, but where did I say that there wasn't
going to be any torsion loads? There may or may not be. This bench is
going to be used for a lot of things.

However, the reason I'm going with this design is because I need this
table big (4 ft by 16 ft) and free standing. It also needs to be
exceedingly flat and as level as possible. A torsion box design seemed to
be the most economical way of accomplishing all this.

Sigh. Ya just gotta love usenet. Ask a question and get a half a dozen
questions back that are only tangentially related. Could someone just
take a tape measure to their vice and tell me the dimention I need?

--
Frank Stutzman

"Frank Stutzman" wrote in message
...

Sigh. Ya just gotta love usenet. Ask a question and get a half a dozen
questions back that are only tangentially related. Could someone just
take a tape measure to their vice and tell me the dimention I need?


Ya gotta just love some of the questions. The answer, already given, is the
same answer as any other "how big" in woodworking. Make it fit. That's
what the sport is about.

Sure helps when you have the iron at hand and available for a couple of test
runs so you don't put wood in the way of stabilizer bars and such, BTW.

Be sure and have blocks in the web for your dogs before you laminate the
skins.

Australopithecus scobis wrote:
Good point. Consider, though, that you could put a couple of holes in your
face plate for removable dogs. I don't like the metal dogs in vises; too
harsh for the wood, but ymmv.

Thanks, thats an item I hadn't thought of.

What are you doing about dog holes in the middle of the bench? I can't
readily visualize how one would do that with a torsion box.

More solid blocks filling in the webs. My webs are 5.5 inches square.
I'll fill in every other (maybe every third) web in with a solid block
that I will drill for dogs.

--
Frank Stutzman

Glue solidly top, bottom and to the webs. You'd want to make it as much like
a solid piece as possible.

"Australopithecus scobis" wrote in message I
wonder what happens inside a torsion box. In my complete and utter
ignorance it seems you'd want to nail/screw your blocks dead center: one
nail per vertical face, through the center of the web segment. Engineers:
what's OP's best method to attach these blocks? Would pressure on a dog
cause the block to rotate in place, munging up the thin web?

Well, I did what I should have done first -- called somebody and had them
take a tape measure to one.

The folks at the nearest place that might have one (Rockler in Portland,
200 miles away) were very tolerant of my inane question. The 9 inch Pony
vice they had on hand would fit a bench up to 2 1/2 inches thick. My
design is currently 4 1/4 and I'd like to make it 4 1/2. I'm going to
have to think about how I'm going to do this a bit more.


--
Frank Stutzman

On Thu, 22 Dec 2005 06:02:36 +0000 (UTC), Frank Stutzman
wrote:

mike hide wrote:

why build a torsion box if the design does not have any torsion loads ???

Uhmmm, I'm no mechanical engineer, but where did I say that there wasn't
going to be any torsion loads? There may or may not be. This bench is
going to be used for a lot of things.

However, the reason I'm going with this design is because I need this
table big (4 ft by 16 ft) and free standing. It also needs to be
exceedingly flat and as level as possible. A torsion box design seemed to
be the most economical way of accomplishing all this.

Sigh. Ya just gotta love usenet. Ask a question and get a half a dozen
questions back that are only tangentially related.

Well here's another one A freestanding bench with vises and dog
holes wants to be as heavy as possible. 3 sheets of MDF ripped in
half will get you 2-1/4" thick with no less work getting it flat and a
lot less work getting it put together. Inlay some hardwood where the
dog holes will go and you're done. 4 sheets gets you 3". Mine is
only 2'x4' 3 layers and it laughs at anything that tries to move it.


-Leuf

On Fri, 23 Dec 2005 16:06:24 -0500, Leuf
wrote:


However, the reason I'm going with this design is because I need this
table big (4 ft by 16 ft) and free standing. It also needs to be
exceedingly flat and as level as possible. A torsion box design seemed to
be the most economical way of accomplishing all this.

Well here's another one A freestanding bench with vises and dog
holes wants to be as heavy as possible. 3 sheets of MDF ripped in
half will get you 2-1/4" thick with no less work getting it flat and a
lot less work getting it put together. Inlay some hardwood where the
dog holes will go and you're done. 4 sheets gets you 3". Mine is
only 2'x4' 3 layers and it laughs at anything that tries to move it.

Oops, I was thinking your bench was 2' by 16'.. double my numbers on
quantity of sheets. Okay maybe you're on the right track Maybe
even half the bench torsion box, half solid might work.


-Leuf