[Tutorial] How to build a timber bonsai bench

[Raging Bull]

Home again, and as promised a couple of pics of my very simply constructed benches. My first original bench is the small reddish coloured one on the far right. It quickly shrunk to a very small size.
Cheers, Frank.

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[melbrackstone]

It's amazing how much more space we need....

[greg27]

Now for the fun bit where I pretend to know what I'm doing!

Seriously though, if I can build this I reckon anyone can. My woodworking skills don't extend much further than splitting firewood and knocking up grow boxes out of old pallets.

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[nathan987]

Now for the fun bit where I pretend to know what I’m doing.
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You have a work bench, clamp and circular saw - you got this. My standard line is that ‘a real man should be able to do any job with just a hammer and a screwdriver’ (so I just change light bulbs and hang pictures with sticky hooks).

Keep us updated. I am collecting ideas for some benches of my own (to be built for me by a real man with tools and everything).


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[pureheart]

Now for the fun bit where I pretend to know what I’m doing.
Sent from my Pixel 4 using Tapatalk

You have a work bench, clamp and circular saw - you got this. My standard line is that ‘a real man should be able to do any job with just a hammer and a screwdriver’ (so I just change light bulbs and hang pictures with sticky hooks).

Keep us updated. I am collecting ideas for some benches of my own (to be built for me by a real man with tools and everything).


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[greg27]

You have a work bench, clamp and circular saw - you got this. My standard line is that ‘a real man should be able to do any job with just a hammer and a screwdriver’ (so I just change light bulbs and hang pictures with sticky hooks).

Haha yes I do have some fun toys... just not necessarily the skills to go with them. I'm sad to say the drop saw is on loan from a friend - that thing is awesome.

Despite weather, work and child conspiring against me I managed to get the frame finished over the weekend. I'm oiling the decking prior to screwing it on, so I'll probably work on that during the week and hopefully be good to attach it next weekend.

One change I made to the original process (at the suggestion of my wife - she's a legend) was to attach 3 extra 200mm joists at the bottom of the back legs. Initially the whole structure was very wobbly and nothing would've been rigid until pretty much the end of putting it all together, so this gave a bit of rigidity earlier on and meant I didn't have to keep checking that the legs were all level.

If you're going to build something like this I'd 100% recommend a drop saw (guaranteed straight cuts make life easy) and an impact driver for driving in the coach screws. There were three screws I had to drive in by hand (I could've gone through the other way with the impact driver, but that would've required longer bolts and I only had short ones left!) and that was pretty annoying. Impact driver = quick and easy.

Overall the frame seems very solid with the 70x45mm timber rather than the 65x65mm as used in the original design.

[pureheart]

Looks good indeed


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[greg27]

And it's done. Not too bad for dodgy DIY I reckon!

[Matthew]

And it's done. Not too bad for dodgy DIY I reckon!

looks good to me and seems level

[pureheart]

And it's done. Not too bad for dodgy DIY I reckon!

That's beautiful! good job! can you make me one?

[greg27]

That's beautiful! good job! can you make me one?

Could be a new business venture for me, web development / custom bonsai benches

[pureheart]

That's beautiful! good job! can you make me one?

Could be a new business venture for me, web development / custom bonsai benches

Definitely and we can talk about web development too

[Brekel]

I just put one together but changed the design a bit, as well as the dimensions to fit a space in the yard.
I'll add another shelf down low too.

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[jeremy_norbury]

Great to see that there's still interest in these plans after 11 years.

I'm planning on replacing the planks on mine with Composite planks over the Christmas holiday period - the Bankirai I used has now rotted in many places. That's what you get after standing in our cold wet weather and getting wet for 4000 days...

I'll post photos when I'm done.

[greg27]

Great to see that there's still interest in these plans after 11 years.

Many thanks for your original plans Jeremy. My wife was skeptical until I showed her photos of your finished product; after that I had permission to proceed