Workbench recommendations

sihackett29

Hi all

I'm looking at buying a workbench that I can put in my man cave that is suitable for some basic guitar work - set ups, string changes etc. Is there anything commercially available that anyone would recommend?

TTony

Cheapest option ...

An old office desk!  Those are generally solid, good size, hard wearing.

I got a few, some literally out of a skip, when an office was clearing out some old furniture.  I gave the maintenance guy £10 for helping me get them out of the skip, .and then stack the next ones at the side of the skip tonnage us taking them out!

Get one of those, and put some cork down for a soft surface area, a cutting mat, and ideally some wall mounted shelves / storage behind it for all the tools & bits.

sihackett29

I probably shouldn't chuck out that old office desk I have for sale on Facebook then should I?

SteveRobinson

An old laboratory bench is what I have, liberated from Imperial Chemicals Limited back in the day

Wazmeister

Ive just purchased on these height adjustable and its is excellent…

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B08CBVGXZC?psc=1&ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_product_details

Kalimna

SteveRobinson said:

An old laboratory bench is what I have, liberated from Imperial Chemicals Limited back in the day

I have an amount of afromosia that's about 2 1/2" thick, 7-10" wide, 8ft long that used to be lab workbenches in Strathclyde Uni, Glasgow. Saved by my father-in-law before he retired as he knew I did a bit of woodwork.
It has a few screw holes in, and produces nasty dust, but is otherwise rather nice indeed

Bod

I've got a couple of Ikea Trofast drawer units with a section of kitchen worktop across the top - all picked up for about 40 quid from Facebook Marketplace

BillDL

I have an old rectangular kitchen table with square tapered legs that's probably from the late 60s or early 70s.  I acquired it when an old house was being cleared and the stuff chucked in the skip.  The table had a fairly solid and flat top, but I glued a slab of thick marine plywood to it.  I cross-braced the legs to make it sit rock solid and raised the height by boring wide holes into 4 short lengths of (gum tree?) round fence posts and securing the tables' legs down into them.  The table is now pretty heavy and I also have a large pane of thick reinforced glass that I can place on top of it if I need an alsolutely flat and level surface.  You often see old chunky tables and pretty heavy and tough office tables in skips, and often on Gumtree I see old shop cabinets/counters with solid work tops being sold off cheaply.  My loft is floored with old thick counter tops that were skipped while a large clothing store chain was having their stores refitted.