New Welding/Shop Table Ideas

[MRCONCDID]

Everyone has one or at least some place to work, well I have desided to stop working on the floor and make-over my shop this winter starting with moving my stand up compressor outside and running hard air lines around the outer walls and building a new welding table.
I got lucky the other day at the scrap yard and picked up a 6ftx6ft 1/2 steel sheet along with some thick wall 2x2 angle.
I have some 4x4 1/4 wall box for the legs and the angle for horizonal supports and framework then I will cut down the plate to 6ft x 5ft and attach for the top.I will be working on 3 sides of this table one side against the wall

Some of the things I have been thinking about are;

Adding casters to roll the table out into a bay for larger projects like bending tubing.
insetting the legs 6 inches all the way around, so not to get in the way of c-clamps and the mounting of a vise
Runing electric up through the middle of the table top in conduit to a double sideds outlet box to plug in grinders and saws ect.
buliding a swing out seat from underneath the table soulds like overkill but i dont have any stools yet and would be handy when welding something on the table.

I would love to hear from everone on there shop tables and how you have customized them. thanks
Oh in keeping with my cheap canopy project,so far i have less than 80bucks in the table.

[Kubota 2350]

That thing is going to weigh a ton, but it should be a nice table.

[Scotty370]

I built a bracket for a heavy duty vise that is welded to a 2"x2" 18" piece of square tube. Originally I used it to slide into a trailer hitch receiver. When I built my bench, I added another receiver just under the surface of the table so that I could slide it in on one corner of the bench. That way if your working on a large flat panel ie 4x8 plywood or sheet metal, you can slide it out, and off, out of the way! ~Scotty

[RPW]

1/2in. plate is going to be heavy. I just picked up a 6in.x24in.x1/2in. and it weighs in at about 30lbs. It will be very stable. Go for it.

[jenkinsph]

Since you have such a nice piece of steel for the table get something better for the rails. I would look at a minimum of 3x3x5/16 rails, the rails need to be very ridgid and should be larger than the legs in most cases. I would rather see the rails in the 4" box tubing and the legs in the 2" material, reason being the rails are loaded perpendicular but the legs are loaded on end.


A nice thing to have on your table is a section with heavy bar style grating, this allows you to have a place to cut out pieces with a torch on your table without it all falling thru.


Steve

[Western]

I used a full sheet of 1/2" also.

My legs are heavy 4"x4". For the rails I used 4" heavy "c" channel. Level was my concern since I was building western art type stuff. What I did was add some 1" all-thread with bolts welded to legs for leveling, this after building the top flat and level. I though about casters but didn't want the possibility of much movement when using a vise or cold/ hot bending stell. heavy table, but will be here after I'm gone.

[Topstrap]

That sounds very similiar to my welding table. I used 1/2" steel for the top, found an old ROPS from an old D9 dozer to make the legs from. Think they are about 5" square but at least 1/2" thick walls. I cut up the tongue from a mobile home for my cross pieces for the frame between the uprights. I think it was about 12" or 14" tall and made a great frame. It is very heavy but I can prob have my skidloader on it and it won't move or collapse.

One thing I did that my neighbor (full time heavy equipment mechanic) showed me on his was the height, it is 27 1/2" to the top of the table. I'm glad I went with that height, when you're working on something it is almost always the perfect height now. Most everyone builds a welding or working bench too high. Another thing he talked me into was making legs on one end shorter, I then put 8" hard plastic casters that do not spin around under those shorter legs. I just slide a floor jack under the end with full length legs and raise it to move the table around to where I need it.

Nothing like having a good solid bench to fabricate and weld on and not worry about it moving around or collapsing.

Topstrap

[jjcc246]

I put and axle and wheels on the end bottom of the legs of mine and grab handles on the other with legs on the ground. A little heavy but moves around pretty easy. Just lift it about 1" off the ground on the grab handle side and roll it.

[SLOWMANDOWN]

I have to agree with Topstrap that the hight is important, if your welding with rod or mig you'll want it to be at a comfortble hight, and if you tig you probably want to be able to have a stool to sit at. The problem with my table is that it is just a few inches to high especially with the caster I had to add due to it's weight. A table can get very heavy with a bottom shelf full of odds and ends, welding clamps, magnets, supports, vise etc.... put casters to be able to move the table if not just to clean around it. also put on one side a way to adjust the level_ like the idea of casters on one end and levelers on the other but instead of car jack I think I would add a trailer jack to move and level the table, I need to do this on mine this winter once I readjust the hight of the legs. Hope this helps.

[glh]

a table idea.
with removable pieces for clamping odd shapes and setup
made with c-channel laying on top. and a smaller c-channel bolted under so it cant move side to side. this way any top piece can be removed for the things that might need to drop past the top of the tables for better clamping and spaced apart for clamps to be able to go between the channels
here is a drawing or kinda what i'm talking about

tell me what you think ..
gary...