The welds for the round bar don’t interfere with the sharp edge of the table clamp, so it always lies flat. The total cost was about $60, not including the bench which I already had. The whole thing packs away into a small space, and is very portable, and the bench is still itself when you lift the weld surface off. This convinced me it was time to buy an angle grinder, which is an essential welding accessory anyway. The biggest part of the job was cleaning the mill scale off the surface. The nuts are the same thread as the clamping tools on my mill – 3/8″ coarse – so I can use the same bolts to clamp vices and stuff to the table, and I can also use the mill hold-downs. Tack the nuts in place, remove the bolts. Drill some 3/8″ holes along the middle, and tighten up 3/8″ coarse thread bolts and flange nuts in the holes, with the nuts on the back. Add four bits of round bar with the outside edges 4″ apart to match the jaw opening. The steel yard will cut it for you, so you don’t have to have cold sweats about spending 3 hours with a hack saw. Purchase some 1/4″ hot rolled steel, big enough to overhang the table by 3″ when the jaws are open 4″. The Skil has a quick adjustment and aluminium jaws the the Workmate did not, and happened to be what the big-box store had in stock when I was looking for a new workmate.
#3115 xbench portable
I think mine is the Skil XBench Portable Work Station 3115 but I used to own a Black and Decker Workmate and it is much the same idea and would probably work too. I have one of those folding workbenches with the expanding clamp for a top surface. It beats the heck out of kneeling on concrete in the side yard. The fact is though, a table is a huge help in welding. So we don’t want to spend a pile of money and time on a table before we start doing the fun stuff.
But we didn’t buy the welder to build welding tables and welding fixtures, did we? We bought it to build motorcycles, repair cars or make garden ornaments. There are examples all over the Internet of beginner’s tables. Every welding video or book implies that the first thing you want to build is a welding table.
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