What do you do when the project is far from you workshop? Bring to workshop to the project! With these mobile workspaces, you will have the right tools for the job , wherever it may be.
To address the problems of limited workspace and flying sawdust, Club member Norwood Ecklund of Turtle Lake, Wisconsin, built this mobile platform for his benchtop table saw and stand. It has the added benefit of providing extra storage space. The platform perimeter is constructed with 2x4s mitered at the corners and grooved on the inside to accept the 1/2-in. plywood base. Norwood used 6-in.-dia. lawn mower wheels and 1/2‑in. threaded rods to make the platform mobile. To minimize lateral wheel movement, he cut narrow wheel slots and put fender washers on both sides of each wheel. The saw remains stationary when he’s cutting because the wheels run parallel with the front of the saw. To be safe, he also wedges shim stock between the wheels and plywood base.
Club member Gene Burke of LaConner, Washington, came up with this ingenious method for transporting benchtop power tools. He bolted the legs from a folding table to a 1-in.-thick sheet of plywood, added a handle at one end and an axle and wheels at the other, and bolted his table saw and miter saw to the table. (To prevent problems when cutting sheet goods, be sure to mount the table saw so there’s clearance over the miter saw.) Now all he has to do is fold the legs and roll the setup from his vehicle to the job site.
To make working at remote locations easier, Club member John Woodzick of Kenosha, Wisconsin, created this portable vise setup. He used a 48-in.-long scrap of 2-in.-sq. hollow tube, onto which he welded a 12-in.-sq. plate of 1/4-in.-thick steel. After mounting a combination vise onto the steel plate, he had the ideal portable workstation. The hollow tube slides perfectly into his truck’s receiver hitch, and because the tube is 48 in. long, John can still lower the truck’s tailgate without removing the workstation.
