Finally got around to taking some pics of my new bench. I started work on it over a year ago, more or less finished the top and then promptly got busy building my new shop. Took me another 6 months to make time to put together the base and finish the top.
It is HEAVY! The top is about 3” thick maple with cherry and African blackwood accents. I enlisted the help of a friend to lift it; even then we were not able to move it off the floor. Ended up using my engine hoist to put the top on the base.
Overall, it was a difficult project; I had to glue up the top in several sections; due to the weight and size it was quite a bit of work to get everything flat and straight. The dovetails were the first that I’ve ever attempted in a project, dovetailing 3” thick wood was quite the introduction to dovetailing!
I am quite pleased with the way it turned out. It is a solid bench, it doesn’t flex or move at all with chiseling/planing etc. My old bench (which was my very first LJ project: http://lumberjocks.com/projects/36139 ) was relegated to an assembly/finishing/glueup table.
Cherry, maple, African blackwood with pine base, finished with BLO.