Garden potting bench

Wayne

The Easter Weekend project, a Garden Potting bench with old Sink (made for a family friend)
So I started with the sink that the friend had dropped off to me then worked out the overall size from there, no plans as such just a mental vision and the criteria of having the sink and a bottom shelf.
Torn between going out and buying perma pine timber for the frame or try and use timber that I had on hand, with a limited budget to work with I went for the latter.
The frame was old weathered Jarrah fence rails that were not uniform size and had twists and bows, I set about trimming them up on the table saw and ended up with an oddball dimension of 56mm x 32mm, it took ages and placed my table saw under considerable stress but finally I managed to get about 12 varying lengths to be matching dimension.

I had on hand some Veneered MDF 30mm sheet and whilst not ideal for an outdoor project I figured with some hardwood edging and lacquer finish it would last a few years. So I cut the Benchtop big enough to accomodate the sink then applied some edging which is glued and nailed. That gave me the size for the bench framework.

I used Dowels and glue to join the framework, but also 100mm allen head screws for the side rails.

The assembled the frame skeleton, you can see how the saw struggled with all the burn marks on the timber.

I screwed a couple of cleats along the inside of the rails so that the slat ends would be concealed by the side rails, then brad nailed all of the slats to make the bottom shelf.

Then screwed down the benchtop.

I routed the hardwood edge flush with the frame on front and sides but it chewed out a big chunk on one end so I glued some aluminium angle to the ends.
I really didn't know what to do with the back, possibly a lattice panel but that can be added later if required, the budget had been well blown by this stage.
So a couple of steel brackets and two Oregon planks make up the top shelf, I am sure it will look better when a few pots and other things are on the shelves.

So apart from watching a bit of footy on the TV and having a couple of easter eggs that was my Easter weekend.