New electronics workbench build

Replacing the old par­ti­cle­board desk­top with a new bam­boo coun­ter­top and adjustable leg workbench.

Electronics shop workbench
Moving some equip­ment onto the work­bench before shelve install

I had quick­ly run out of room for all my test equip­ment on my orig­i­nal desk­top table that I used for elec­tron­ics work. Leaving me around 1.5 sq/ft of usable area for my projects.
With the win­ning of an Ebay bid for a vin­tage Tektronix dig­i­tal oscil­lo­scope, I was out of room.
I looked at the Ikea counter tops that many peo­ple have used for work­bench­es in the past, but we do not have an Ikea store with­in rea­son­able dri­ving dis­tance and Ikea’s ship­ping was over twice the cost of the actu­al counter top.
Lumber Liquidators sold counter tops, and had a local store that they would ship to for free. So I decid­ed on a 1 1/2″ thick 72″ X 36″ bam­boo counter top from them.
Ikea did get some of my busi­ness as they had rea­son­able prices and ship­ping for their OLOV series black adjustable legs.

Bamboo workbench counter top
Bamboo counter top after fin­ish­ing with tung oil

After sand­ing, and apply­ing tung oil fin­ish to the bam­boo I let the work­bench dry for sev­er­al days. The Ikea adjustable legs were easy to install, but I do rec­om­mend pre-drilling for the screws to attach the leg base plate. I end­ed up off­set­ting the front legs to accom­mo­date two mul­ti draw­er cab­i­nets that I want­ed on either side of the workbench.

Bamboo counter top and adjustable height legs

I was very hap­py with the qual­i­ty and look of the bam­boo counter top, and would rec­om­mend Lumber Liquidators as a source.
At 1 1/2″ thick the work­bench is very stur­dy and should stand up to large heavy equip­ment placed on it with­out sag­ging. It was a nice sim­ple week­end project, but will require two per­sons to move the counter top as it is quite heavy.

Phase 2 of the project will be cut­ting down some exist­ing 80/20 T‑slot alu­minum extru­sion for equip­ment shelv­ing sup­ports, and rip­ping some 16″ wide ply­wood for the shelves. The last part of the project will be adding some adjustable LED light­ing strips under the first shelve.

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