Concrete bench sighted......

[John Hill]

First sighting of the concrete work bench:-


IMGP9307 by aardvark_akubra, on Flickr

Lifting out of the concrete casting yard!



IMGP9309 by aardvark_akubra, on Flickr

Putting it on the ground!


So we could all stand around and take pictures of it!

IMGP9310 by aardvark_akubra, on Flickr

The surface looks great, weight according to the crane driver is 800kgs.  The mounting holes for the lathe are obvious to see as is the gutter around the table top which hopefully will collect coolant and chips.

The lathe will be above this about 25mm, adjusted level then grouted.  I have considered adjustable rubber feet under this bench but dont really see the need and instead will place the bench on wooden blocks which in turn will on the concrete floor.

[Brass_Machine]

That is awesome.  I am jealous.

Eric

[DaveH]

John,

Wow - now that does look good.

 
DaveH

[dsquire]

John

Pretty cool looking. Not too likely that anyone will walk off with that in the middle of the night. Do you plan on sealing it and painting it before using it? I would imagine that it should be very stable once located and not move around on you. I look forward to seeing more when you get it installed. 

Cheers 

Don

[John Hill]

Yes, there will be a oil repelling sealer on the top. I have considered painting the top but maybe not, I need to check on paving paints that are available.
 
The rest of it I will paint a nice blue colour (blue because I already have some acryllic enamel of that colour )
 
The concrete yard has a wheeled vehicle with an 8 metre extendable jib that can be lowered to almost ground level. We are hoping they can use that to poke it in through the garage door and onto load skates. Then I will move it under a strong point where the lathe will be suspended. The lathe will be lowered on then the ensemble will be moved to its final position and where I will have to use jacks, levers, blocks and wedges to lower the table onto its wooden mounting blocks. Levelling of the lathe will be after that but probable not tightened down for a few weeks.

[Davo J]

Hi John,
Good to see someone to go through with it, instead of just talking about it.

It came out good and it looks like the guys that made where impressed with their work as well with taking pictures.

With the paint, I remember years ago mum buying paving paint for the laundry concrete floor, it looked great at first, but soon wore off after a bit of traffic. Ever year or so she would re coat it but it always ended up with a walk trail. This was the top brands like Dulux, Berger etc paints, so it wasn't just cheap stuff.

This 2 pack gear the US guys talk about sounds like it works good and last, you can even have speckle in it. 

Dave

[John Hill]

Hi Dave, I am still undecided about painting the top, I know it cannot last forever.  Maybe I can find some nice vinyl floor tiles and stick those on?

[BK]

That's different!! would a pallet jack with a couple of pallets on it be the go to place it in the shed??

[Stilldrillin]

By 'ek John! 

That's not going to move much, once it's settled in....... 

As Davo says, it's great to see a good result, from an initial idea. 

David D

[PekkaNF]

Looks very good and you have a PLAN to get everything organized. I'm pretty sure you have paint figured out the same level of professionalism and pride.

Now when it is very good and nice, I would dwell a little deeper than only trusting interweb when it comes to primer and paintting it. I have seen what oil and coolants do to concrete, even painted ones. I have been on sites that put a sealer/primer and then two pack paint to concrete floor and if that can take forklifts, maintenance work, oil and all checmicals of any mill, it might just do on a work bench. The stink it during curing is horrendious.

Pekka

[John Hill]

Hi Pekka,  I think I will be sealing the surface, maybe twice, but leaving it the 'concrete colour'.  I am relying on the concrete casters to tell me about the appropriate sealers as they have a lot of experience including concrete in dairy milking sheds and you know the sort of 'chemicals' that abound in those places! 

Of course if some time in the future I decide the top is getting just too unsightly I will always be able to put a wooden or sheet steel top on it but I doubt it will come to that as this is a home shop, not a serious business operation running 44 hours a week.


The rest I will paint with just ordinary house paint, I have a bucket of a nice blue shade!

[Davo J]

Hi Dave, I am still undecided about painting the top, I know it cannot last forever.  Maybe I can find some nice vinyl floor tiles and stick those on?

Thinking of tiles, that might be the perfect idea to put some sort of ceramic wall/floor tiles on the top. They would be hard wearing, easy cleaned and are not very hard to lay. They come in sizes up to 600mm square and a heap of colours.

Dave

[PekkaNF]

Hi Pekka,  I think I will be sealing the surface, maybe twice, but leaving it the 'concrete colour'.  I am relying on the concrete casters to tell me about the appropriate sealers as they have a lot of experience including concrete in dairy milking sheds and you know the sort of 'chemicals' that abound in those places! 

Very good. That looks very professional establishment and their information will be good. If it can take good wash, accids, disinfectants and general heavy object handling it will do the job. Normal sealers are very often aimed only to prevent the concrete dusting, they will not necessary form very good barrier against oils, water and other chemicals. Many primers are only diluted pva glue or size and they so pretty good work for what they are for, but do little to us without sealers.

I must agree with others, your work is really inspiring.

Are there holes on the table top for chemical anchors are they metal inserts?

Pekka

[doubleboost]

That wont move much
Very well done
As far as paint goes it has to be twin pack to be any good
I painted my boxford suds tray with floor paint the soluble oil made the paint go soft
It did not touch the bed (twin pack)
John

[John Hill]

Dave, I think ceramic tiles would be unsuitable as just a little 'ding' can crack them.  They would sure look nice though!

Pekka, I will need to pay careful attention to the advice they give me about sealers and painting, but I think I need to let the bench 'sit' for some weeks before doing anything to it.  

John, thats the reason why I am uncertain about putting anything other than sealer on the top.  But I am really still undecided.

[BiggerHammer]

The table looks spectacular. Very well done. As to the painting there are several two part epoxies used mainly for garage/warehouse floors. Very durable and oil resistant/proof. I have used one type in a warehouse environment, lots of forklift/pallet use and hydraulic fluids and oil had no effect on it. Not sure how well it would hold up to longer term oil exposure.

http://www.sherwin-williams.com/pro/products/hc_shieldcrete_epoxy_concrete_floor_coating/?referringCategory=interior_paint_coatings/masonry_concrete_products/

something like the shieldcrete epoxy was what we used. Though ours was an Industrial product. Probably the same thing. Been years can't remember the name of the original product. Hope this helps with your decision.

[PekkaNF]

Pekka, I will need to pay careful attention to the advice they give me about sealers and painting, but I think I need to let the bench 'sit' for some weeks before doing anything to it.  

Very true, If you let it cure in peace, it won't "sweat" under paint. I have seen regulary on the mill sites that sealer or such are soread on the floor pretty early, then they assemble all electric cabinets and swithch gear, but primer and twopacks are done very much later, least month or so. I'm pretty sure they would finnish the floor as early as techically possible.

Self cast concrete would need surface ground, I don't know this english name for the weak porous layer that appears over agitated concrete surface, and it has to go off. When I have been on the mill site, some concrete has been chisseld out before groutting under machine feets/plates. Your table looks different, it probably needs very little other preparatio than vacuum cleaning before sealer/primer.

Pekka

[Pete.]

You can consider the concrete 'set' after 2 days where it can bear a load, and 'cured' after 28 days which is the usual timescale for a cube test (where they take a sample of the concrete at the time of pouring, ram it into a measured cube form and then later measure the amount of force needed to crush that cube, giving the concrete strength). some people cube test at 7 days. I think that 7 would be plenty for your purposes after that you're not going to get any dimensional changes.

Keeping it damp and covered will give you the best cure as if the water held inside is all used up before the reaction is complete then curing strength will be reduced. In reality, just making sure it doesn't have the sun beating down on it will be good enough. You might get small cracks in it during the curing but don't worry, just seal them up when you do the surface.

[John Hill]

Pekka, Pete,  the bench would have been poured earlier this week and will be delivered on Monday morning,  so it has about 5 days standing in the yard before they bring it to me.  This is the middle of winter but the temperature barely freezes and right now we have quite damp conditions which I think is ideal for giving this concrete a good start in life!

They mentioned putting on a sealer before they bring it to me but I dont really know anything about that.

I do have a complication in that my shop is limited in size and I have no means of lifting the lathe onto the bench.  What I can do is move the lathe on rollers until it is under a 'strong point' over my garage door.  So I can lift the lathe off the existing metal cabinets then slide the bench under it and lower the lathe on, the bench will be on load skates so I can push the bench (with the lathe on it) into the final position when I will put wooden blocks under the bench feet and take the load skates back to the hire shop.

The lathe will be in the approximate position but on wooden blocks until I can get the mounting bolts installed.  That is the way it must stay until it is time to put the surface finish on and hopefully the bench will be in its stable state and I can level the lathe on it.

I am going to have to be really, really careful to avoid oil spots getting on the surface during the three weeks or so that it is sitting in the shop with the lathe on it (on wooden blocks).  Will sheets of plastic over the top interfere with the cureing process?


Pekka, I have seen reference, when reading the various paint cans, that concrete may have to be etched prior to painting.  I really dont want to do that as it would have to be done in my shop and it apparently requires a lot of water for washing afterwards.  However, as far as I know, the top of the bench is not the top of the casting as it was cast inverted and this surface was against a steel plate so perhaps that weak porous layer is not there.

[Pete.]

You're quite right if it was cast inverted the face will be stronger and less likely to lose dust because the fatty surface is created by the finishing process and fines floating up when the concrete is wet. Covering the bench would not harm the curing but at all since it's a chemical reaction.

Personally, if it were mine, I would dress the edges and seal or paint it now then fit the lathe. Concrete is very tolerant of variable conditions when curing. The 'shrinking' you see talked about is minute (better than tenths of an inch for that size) and most of it is done now anyway. I painted my workshop floor about a week after it was laid with no problems and that was just left to air cure.

[John Hill]

Was that just a regular concrete floor paint or a two part (epoxy?) paint?

I think I will be lucky to find a single part paint that will withstand the effects of coolant?

[Pete.]

Mine was a regular air-drying paint, but epoxy would be much more durable. I've since used it to paint down inside the tee-slots on my milling machine and the wells at the end to make it easier to get the chips out (and it worked better than I hoped) and that has stood up perfectly well though I haven't used much coolant. Make sure you dress at least the front edge of the bench or you'll soon get fed up with it catching your clothes and it's hard on skin too.

[John Hill]

I have thought of screwing a wood edging, especially along the front edge, to give a 'natural' edge.

[AdeV]

John, that is one excellent looking bench, I'd love to have something that... permanant here. I know nothing of concrete - other than it's a b*tch to drill without an SDS hammer drill and is very heavy - if it were mine I'd be tempted to fix a thin steel plate to the top - both to seal it, but also to provide a handy conductive surface for mig welding.

[John Hill]

No welding on this one Ade, thanks for the comments but this is for machines only.    The workshop is part of the house which I am very careful not to burn down so all welding is done in a metal garden shed which is just outside the door.

I do have a hammer drill  which will get a good work out mounting the smaller machines (the holes for the lathe are already in there).