It is generally accepted that a workbench is a cornerstone of any respectable workshop. And the Roubo style is often regarded in high esteem. Though I’d never undertaken a project so ambitious to date, I was inspired by a video from Stumpy Nubs.

The process began with laminating the top. I did so in batches, gluing up just a few new boards at a time. At the time, I didn’t have clamps that could be used to glue up such a wide piece, so I used some that I borrowed from my local tool library. During this process I had to take care to align all the slots for bench dogs, and for the double-tenon legs.

Once the top was dry, I glued in the legs. One or two took quite a bit of ‘convincing.’

The double tenons weren’t all perfect, but they came out extremely strong.

As for the flattening, I first had ambitions of flattening it with hand planes. However, the grain was so difficult and my irons not sharp enough (I had a long way to go on my sharpening process), that I needed to resort to other methods. I made a trolley and flattened it with the router, riding the tram across two flat boards made to be parallel.

The finish is not so smooth with this process, but it is easily mended with some sanding.

In the end, it came out very nice, and sturdy.