2. Workshop

The Bus

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Here's the new bench after completion and with the beginnings of the first drawer being laid out on top.
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Here's the new bench after completion and with the beginnings of the first drawer being laid out on top.

  • The mortises for the leg vise took me a few days to get right. This is the first time I've installed a vise like this, and there was quite a bit of testing and tweaking before I finally got it flowing smoothly, but once everything was right it became instantly amazing and might be my favorite thing about the whole bus.
  • The mortises for the leg vise took me a few days to get right. This is the first time I've installed a vise like this, and there was quite a bit of testing and tweaking before I finally got it flowing smoothly, but once everything was right it became instantly amazing and might be my favorite thing about the whole bus.
  • Since nothing is square of straight I worked pretty hard at figuring out exactly where my countertop should go using string and a bunch of tweaking. Eventually it went together fairly well.
  • Once the string tricks were done I cut the mortises into the top of the legs.
  • Here's the framework of the workbench all finished and ready for the countertop to go on. I ran a power plug to the front side which is accessible from my driver's seat where my desktop workspace is.
  • The face of the chop for the leg vise uses machine screws tapped directly into the wood, which I had never done before so that was interesting. I had to rework these a few times during the build of the chop but they never stripped out or showed any weakness at all.
  • My bench top bowed a little bit in the humidity before the install, so I made sure it stayed flat on the framework and glued it in place. Here you can also see the vise chop installed, but not shaped and finished.
  • With the rest of the workbench assembled it came down to shaping the vise chop. I did this partially with hand chiselling and partially with a belt sander, and left the top cut for after final assembly.
  • With the rest of the workbench assembled it came down to shaping the vise chop. I did this partially with hand chiselling and partially with a belt sander, and left the top cut for after final assembly.
  • Here's the new bench after completion and with the beginnings of the first drawer being laid out on top.
  • I made the two bottom drawers full width and then divided the upper section into six smaller drawers that I hung from the bench top on wood sliders instead of buying the metal hardware for everything.
  • Past me saved like $600 by NOT buying a router dovetail jig, so now I cut 48 dovetails by hand for my new workbench. Past me knew that this day would come and I'm pretty sure he laughed about it.
  • After hand cutting 48 dovetails and assembling the six upper drawers I cut dados down the sides with a dado blade on the table saw, and then added a coat of finish to everything and the drawers went into the bench.
  • Here's the workbench installed and filled full of tools. At this point I was able to get the old workbench out of the bus, which opens up a ton of space in the living room and makes things a whole lot more homey. We're packing up to move south for the winter now, so I left the drawer faces for later and just installed some scrap handles.
  • Here's the action on my workbench vise. I love it.
  • This is the beginnings of my fridge strap. I cut down a piece of oak to make a cam and a pair of braces.
  • I refined the edges of the cam to make a nice curve and then sanded all the edges.
  • With a bit of finish the fridge belt gets installed and functions perfectly first try!
  • Here's the finished fridge belt. A year and a half into the build we can finally stop using a board to hold the fridge in while driving.
  • In order to get the guitars off the floor we added some hooks on the ceiling and rigged some bungees to hold them in place.
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