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Regarding benchtops, how flat is flat enough? When I use winding sticks on my top, they line up, but it cups down its length by about 1/16″ at its center. How anal should I be with this?
– Jason Myre
Benchtop flatness seems more important for hand work than for machine work. If you work mostly with power tools, I’d say a 1/16″ cup down the middle is fine. Your machines (a planer and a jointer) will help ensure your wood is flat. You’ll mostly be clamping your work to your bench to rout it, biscuit it and so forth.
In handwork, the benchtop is more of a reference surface, so I’d get it as flat as your skills allow.
It’s not difficult with a No. 7 handplane, commonly called a jointer plane. Set the iron to take a decent bite , you want shavings that are as thick as two sheets of typing paper. Work directly across the grain of the top to bring the high edges of the top down to the valley in the middle. Then work diagonally with the plane , work 45Ã?° one way and then the 45Ã?° other. Then finish up with strokes with the grain.
It’s quick work.
What is interesting to me about this question is that benchtop flatness doesn’t get discussed much in the early texts. I wonder sometimes if we make too much of it (like we do with plane sole flatness and the like). Or perhaps benchtop flatness was so important that it was unspoken. There is indirect evidence that a flat surface was key. George Ellis’s “Modern Practical Joinery” gives plans for a “panel board” on page 38. It is essentially a workshop jig that sits on top of your benchtop and holds panels and thin work for planing. Ellis notes that it is useful for providing a “clearer and truer surface than is provided by the ordinary bench top.”
My personal habit is to flatten my benchtop once a year or so. Not only does a flat benchtop make my handplaning more predictable, but it also clears off the stains and gunk that accumulate on it, which reduces the chance that the gunk will get on a piece of pristine work.
This letter also prompted me to go out and check my benchtop with a straightedge. I also am developing a cup down the middle. My cup is the thickness of two sheets of paper. I might be due for a quick flattening session/mild aerobic workout.
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I’ve got about 1/8 cup down the middle and it’s causing me problems. I am just not sure how to get the flattening done any better. It’s only 1/8" in a few places, the rest is more like 1/12" or so but it is a pain to work with. Help me 🙂 Thanks, Tim Macking St. Petersburg, FL CCNA – Visiting…
Until I saw Rob Cosman’s "Rough to Ready" video, I too thought that a flat benchtop was a lot of work for little reward.
However, in that video, he shows that he uses his benchtop to rub against a workpiece he’s checking for flat — the high spots are burnished.
I thought that was incredibly clever and I may actually have to go flatten my benchtop one of these days.