Magazine wood working

My workhorse. It is so heavy, I havent move it in years.

Workbenches are for working.

Over the past few years, a lot of people have asked me to shoot a video on how to make a workbench. Ive always set that on the back burner because I already have a workbench. Well, to be certain, I have four.

They all are made with the same down-and-dirty construction: 2x4s and plywood. They are strong, sturdy and made to be abused. They are benches intended for, well, work.

The Mere Mortals annex 

It recently dawned on me that really my shop has expanded into my driveway. I assemble projects and finish them outside my shop on almost everything I build, yet every time I need to haul out a pair of wobbly sawhorses and flop down whatever old board I can find to use as a bench top.

The sides of my new bench.

This weekend I decided to build one more workbench: one dedicated to my "expansion" shop in the driveway. It will be the same simple construction Ive used on all my other workbenches and will have casters so I can roll it into my shop on rainy days. Not only that, its going to be the same height as the tailgate on my truck. That will aid in sliding out sheet goods and rough cutting them.

But the design can be scaled to any size you wish.

To a lot of woodworkers, the workbench is the centerpiece of their shops. A "proper" woodworking bench can cost a thousand dollars to build. They are beautiful examples of workmanship and I admire them. Well, who wouldnt? But in my shop, a workbench needs to fill two needs: it needs to be sturdy, and it needs to be willing to take abuse. If I want to quickly screw a jig into it, I dont want to worry about ruining its finish.

Show me your workbench!

I want to see what you are using for a workbench. More specifically, I want pictures of your workbench to post here. Mostly what I want to see are workbenches that get the job done. Maybe its something you slapped together 20 years ago and are still using. What do you like about it? Why does it work so well for you? If you were to make a new workbench, what features would you add? Post your pics on the Mere Mortals Facebook page. Or, email them to me at zrammedia (at) gmail (dot) com. Send a description with it!

This set of free bookcase plans stems from a furniture project that went into my home office. My wife needed a bookshelf to store some of the kids school things, but it needed to fit on a certain wall in the room. It also needed to be pretty tall to maximize the amount of storage space available.

As I was developing the bookshelf plans, I tried to make it simple to build. But I also wanted it to have a little more character than just a box with a bunch of 3/4" shelves in it. The result is now sitting in my office, packed full of stuff, and I think it fits the bill pretty well.
Size As I mentioned, the bookshelf needed to fit a certain wall in my office and be as large as possible. An overall width of 28" and height of 82" worked great.

Often, bookcase plans call for a depth of only 12". This seemed too small to me. I extended the depth to 14" to accommodate even the largest of books. The plans can be adjusted to nearly any size you like, as long as the shelves dont become too long to support their load without sagging.

Normally I suggest avoiding shelves that are more than 36" long. In this case however, you should be safe extending them to 48". The addition of a panel (or valance) along the front edge of the shelves serves to stiffen them. It also gives the bookshelf a bit more character than plain old 3/4" shelving.

Design A common practice with simple furniture designs, like bookcases and dressers, is to extend the wall ends to the floor. Then, a slightly recessed toekick is installed just below the bottom shelf, between the wall ends.

I like this look and it helps prevent the unit from tipping forward. So, I included it in the bookcase plans.

This bookcase could easily have been built as a simple box, much like a cabinet. But the recessed toekick gave me the idea to add the same detail to the top and to the adjustable shelves. You can leave off the valances, but they do add a nice detail without a lot of extra effort.

By adding the valances to the adjustable shelves, you also add a great deal of rigidity to the shelves. This allows you to build a bookcase with longer shelves and they wont sag under the heavy weight of books.

In this case, the extra strength is not needed. So the added valances are really just for looks.

Materials If youre at all familiar with any of my other plans, you wont be surprised to learn that I built the bookcase out of white Melamine. Its durable and easy to work with, but any 3/4" panel will work just fine.

If you choose a wood veneer plywood or particle board, the valance panels at the toekick, top, and adjustable shelves can be made from solid stock to match the veneer.

Something I discovered as I was assembling the bookcase was that I had failed to edge band the top edges of the wall ends. For an 82" tall bookcase its not a big deal since you wont ever see that edge. If you shorten the bookcase plans so that the top is below eye level, then the top edges really should be finished.

Assembly Im kind of in love with my Kreg jig, so thats what I used to assemble the bookcase. If youre not familiar with pocket hole joinery, I encourage you to check out these videos. They do a pretty good job of demonstrating the basics.

In this case, pocket hole screws are particularly useful for joining the valances to the top, shelves, and bottom. I also used them, along with Melamine glue, for attaching the top and bottom to the wall ends. An alternative would be to screw through the wall ends into the top and bottom, but I didnt want visible fasteners in the wall ends.

The "nailers" are sort of a throw back to cabinet construction that serve to help keep the unit straight and square. Theyre glued and screwed to the wall ends, top, and bottom.

Drawing File Overall, its a pretty simple project. With the addition of the valances, and the right material, it will be equally at home in a casual office setting or the front room of your home.

Wherever you decide to put it, to view the plans just click on the link below. If youd like to download a copy to your computer, right click then "save-as". Either way, youll need the Adobe reader to view the file.

View or Download "Bookcase Plans"

Return from Bookcase Plans
to Furniture Plans

Click Here and Start WoodWorking

I set out this week to make this years a New Years Eve noisemaker. I decided to make a horn or some other kind of wind-powered instrument. After making a couple of these whistles, I decided they wouldnt exactly make for much of a video.


I researched whistles and was reminded of the classic wooden train whistle. My son loved these as a boy and they arent too difficult to make. Its essentially the same whistle as the one above, but with four tone holes and a cap to direct air into all of them.

I took notes on the ones I made and you can download my measurements to try out. Its surprisingly easy to get good tones. Just take some time to fool around with it and come up with something that sounds good to you.

Bongo Cajón

I received an email from Ted Derryberry recently showing me a plywood cajon he made for his percussionist friend. I made a regular cajon a few years ago, but had never heard of a bongo version. As with its larger, deeper sounding cousin, cajónes are traditionally made with plywood, and have a thin tapa (top) made from 1/8" plywood which acts as a drum head. Some, such as the one Ted made, include snares inside that press against the tapa. I left them out of mine.


Wood

If you have trouble finding 1/8" plywood, it is often sold at lumberyards as a "door skin", and I presume is used to dress up a drab door. I have also found small sheets of thin plywood at some craft stores. You will only need a piece that is about 7" x 16". And if you have no luck finding 1/8" ply, I suspect 1/4" ply would sound pretty good. In larger cajónes, the thin plywood flexes to allow for a deeper sound. I used 1/2" plywood for the rest of the drum. Its sturdy, yet lightweight.

Construction

I jointed my pieces together with rabbets on the edges of the front and back, into which the sides fit. I cut dadoes (grooves) on the inside of the front and back to hold the divider, which gives the drum its two tones.

On standard cajónes, the tapa is screwed in place. This allows the player to adjust the tightness of the screws to create different tones. Due to the smaller size of a bongo cajón, I felt screws were unnecessary so I simply glued the tapa into place.

Playing 

I angled the two short sides in at an 8 degree angle. This makes the drum more comfortable to hold between your knees if you play it that way. There seems to be no "right" way of playing a plywood bongo. I also added curved cutouts on the bottoms of the sides so the sound would resonate out if the drum is played on a firm surface.

Free Plans

• WWMM Bongo Cajon (pdf)
• Sketchup version

Super simple version

If you dont have a lot of tools or space, you can easily make your own plywood bongo drum! Cajónes were originally built by resourceful individuals using crates or old drawers. I like that the tradition of using an inexpensive material like plywood remains. It is somewhat ironic that music stores sell such expensive ones! So if you are a musician, make your own: its way cooler.

Use a handsaw to cut the plywood pieces to size. You might even be able to get them cut to size at your local home center. If you can find free wood, all the better! (Be interesting to try this with pallet wood.)

You will need:

• 3 boards that are 16" x 6"
• 3 boards that are 5.5" x 6"

To assemble it, just butt the pieces together and glue them. You can even use regular white glue. You will need to clamp the boards together to dry. If you dont have clamps, you can nail or screw the pieces together. Still use the glue...the fasteners will act as clamps. Let the glue dry for a couple hours and youve got a bongo cajón!

It will sound good if you play it on your lap so the the sound can resonate out the bottom opening. You can also experiment by cutting some sound holes in the sides and see how that sounds.