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WOOD AND SHOP
Portable Moravian Workbench
$4,000.00
WAIT LIST HAS BEEN REOPENED (as of 08/27/2020)
Have you wanted a Portable Moravian Workbench, but haven’t had the time or skill to build your own? Well, you’re in luck because due to a lot of nudging, we’re now selling the workbench!
We’re building these solidly constructed reproduction Portable Moravian Workbenches in small batches, so please add your contact information to our wait list if you want to buy one, and we’ll contact you when it’s your turn! Click the “BUY WORKBENCH” button below to get on the list.
See photos, features, freight shipping estimates, and a video of the Portable Moravian Workbench below.
Description
FEATURES
- Collapsable workbench is perfect for portability without sacrificing stability
- Ingenious angled leg design that allows for heavy handplaning while maintaining a light weight
- Solid laminated white oak top
- Solid oak or maple leg vise with a Maple wood screw
- Strong and low profile wagon style tail vise
- Light, but strong Quartersawn Southern Yellow Pine undercarriage with oak stretchers (like the original antique)
- Built-to-last pegged mortise & tenon and dovetail construction
- Removable and easy to clean dovetailed tool tray
- Bored bench dog holes and several oak bench dogs with a spring catch
- Workbench Dimensions: approximately 6′-4″ long x 24″ wide (13″ wide top + 11″ tray) x 33.5″ tall
- Built by Joshua Farnsworth & crew
- No bolts! Only traditional joinery holding this workbench together!
Details of the Portable Moravian Workbench for Sale
Our Moravian Workbenches will come with a laminated white oak top, which offers greater stability than the historical slab tops that tend to move over time (we may offer slab tops in the future). The workbench tops weigh approximately 90-120 lbs, which many woodworkers are able to easily carry by themselves. A custom-fit, high-end wagon tail vise will be included with the workbench (packed separately for shipping, but ready to mount). This vise was designed by Will Myers to fit a Moravian Workbench perfectly.
Click here if you are interested in purchasing just this wagon vise for $295 (plus shipping). We have also installed it with great success on our two Roubo workbenches and a standard French bench. It should work on most workbenches.
A white oak leg vise (pictured above) will hold your work-piece with a very strong historical maple vise screw. A figured maple vise chop can be substituted for a small additional fee. A metal parallel guide pin allows for easy adjustment when switching to different thicknesses of boards. Note, the above vise is pictured with a bronze garter, but a side wooden garter will be used instead.
The Moravian Workbenches are built using solid pegged mortise & tenon construction, rather than with bolts, which can come loose over time.
Bench dog holes will be bored into the workbench top, and we’ll include a few wooden bench dogs with embedded spring catches.
The long stretchers of our Moravian workbenches are held together with wedged key tenons, which can be easily removed when you want to collapse the Moravian workbench to transport it. We’ve even had someone tell us that he easily transports his Moravian Worbench in an elevator to his high-rise apartment in Manhattan!
The lift-out tool tray is removable for easy cleaning and for collapsing the workbench. The tool tray is joined together with strong and attractive dovetail joints.
While we use power tools to build much of the workbench, traditional woodworking hand tools are used on a good deal of the workbench joints.
This is the original antique Moravian Workbench, in the Old Salem museum collection:
Watch the Moravian Workbench Assembly video:
PURCHASE DETAILS FOR THE PORTABLE MORAVIAN WORKBENCH
- PAYMENT: Payments must be made in full, by check or cash, before construction begins. The price is subject to change at any time (due to changes in material cost and demand), but will be locked in after your payment is accepted. If for some unlikely reason the workbench can’t be built, a full refund will be issued.
- LEAD TIME: An exact completion date cannot be promised since these Workbenches aren’t factory made, but built in a small Woodworking shop. But we will try to finish each batch in 4-6 weeks.
- PICK UP: Workbenches can be picked up on location at the Wood and Shop Traditional Woodworking School , with no additional handling charge (only Virginia state tax). Arrangements can also be made to ship Workbenches.
- SHIPPING: Shipping charges will vary by location, but a rough estimate for shipping to the lower 48 states is approximately $200 – $300. We will give exact shipping charges before payment. Due to the extensive time & effort required to ship workbenches, a packing/handling fee of $175 will be required for shipped workbenches.
- CUSTOM OPTIONS: Currently we offer two customizable options:
- Vise Materiel: The standard vise chop material is White Oak, but a Curly Maple vise chop can be substituted for an additional $50.
- Workbench Height: All of the Moravian Workbenches used in our school are patterned off of the original dimensions, and work well for woodworkers of most heights. The standard height of approximately 33.5-inches is especially suitable for handplaning (even for taller people). If you want a shorter Moravian Workbench, you will easily be able to cut the legs shorter after it arrives at your workshop (or stand on a slab of wood as our shorter students do). But a taller custom height can be special ordered for an additional $50. This must be specified before purchase.
- VARIATIONS: Great craftsmanship goes into these Workbenches, and quite a bit of hand tool use. Therefore, customers shouldn’t expect a factory-looking workbench, but a workbench with signs of handwork and minor imperfections or knots or checking in the wood. Vise hardware is subject to slight changes due to the availability of parts. The type of lumber used in the workbenches is subject to change, due to availability, but will be replaced with very similar material (e.g. the White Oak top & stretchers may be substituted with another species of Oak or Ash, and the undercarriage may be changed to a different species of pine).
