It’s been a few weeks since I’ve let y’all into the woodshop at work.  We’ve been building the “simple bench”.  If you’ve been reading this blog long, you know I love building benches – butterfly benches, green benches, small benches and long benches.  My boys have been working off this pattern:

And I give them lots of flexibility in said pattern.  We started with three 3 foot lengths of 1×12 stock.  The students then cut their bench seats to any length as I rip the rest of the stock into 3 1/2″ strips for the aprons and 5 1/2″ strips for legs.  Then, they cut their aprons and legs to length as I rip the seat to finished width.  The left over stock from that rip becomes the stretcher.  A few bridle joints (I think that’s what they are) and we have ourselves a rock solid base.

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It’s taken nearly five weeks to cut and assemble the benches (~25 hrs of classtime).  Next week, the students will be able to either stain or paint their work.  That should take less time – maybe a day or two.  I’m expecting this project to be complete by the time report cards come out.

Make it safe & keep the rubber side down.