Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire durable finish for work shop table????

For the garage where I do mechanical and machine work I covered the 2 x 6 bench top with a piece of 1/8" steel with one bend for the front. Works great.

For a gun and hobby work table in the basement I use a piece of 3/4" plywood with 4 or 5 coats of spar varnish. I put a piece of cardboard on top if I'm doing something that can scratch or damage it. It's a work bench...

Spar urethane, multiple coats over stain is what I put on my loading bench. Looks good and holds up fine for associated oils and stuff. The clear poly and acrylics will probably wear better with hard use as mentioned above.

It is a table on castor wheels with leveling blocks for mostly reloading an gun work

I used this stuff about 7 years ago on a 2 foot deep long work bench of birch plywood, oak trim. Pleasant to work with being water based I followed a hand rubbed rifle stock type treatment using 0000 steel wool to wipe it in really well. Then wipe any excess lightly with a shop towel and let cure. It dries quick so you can build up coats fairly quick I probably put 8 or 10 on, the same treatment repeated. Its lasted well you can see fine scratches in the finish if you look close in good light but looks great from 4 feet away. lol It would be easy to lightly scuff sand and add some more coats to make it perfect if wanted. Disclaimer- I put cardboard down if I'm working on something steel, heavy with sharp edges. But other than that I work right on the bench lots, its held up better than I would have thought.

Also, the first coat makes wood fibers stand up like any treatment so I sanded with 220 I think after the first coat. No sanding after that, the steel wool and wiping off excess keeps it building nice and smooth without sanding. So I had that goin for me. ..

^^^^ This

I've got one bench I covered with a 3/4" dense rubber sheet, easy to clean and doesn't damage parts. But depends on what you want to use it for.

Phil

This is a good solution - easy to install and to replace if need be. I have two benches so covered and they work as Rocky described. I keep both a sturdy steel plate and a Delrin plate handy to put on the surface when I need to hammer, cut or grind something.

Have also used the epoxy floor paint mentioned by others - worked great.

Use formica can be picked up usually cheep if a corner is broken from most retailers....will holdup to just about any chemical....cleans up easy and looks good....

I used Masonite because my Great Uncle was a engineer for them and I got it for free....about 25 years ago picked up for almost free a 10' x 3' x 2 1/2" with rounded corners panel with formica on it been the top of my reloading table it has a 3" x 3" x 1/4" tube frame...

Looking for small dark gun parts on a dark, mottled surface is a pita. Last thing I would do is stain it. At this point I would either bleach or pickle it as light as possible and use clear gloss, water-based urethane or polyurethane.

Hunting for small pieces on a light colored surface is far easier especially when it is easier to see the shadow.

So you have a sheet of plywood sitting on top of two 2x10?

If it were me, and I'm going to do this with mine pretty soon, I'd by some pieces of 1/16 - 1/8" steel to mount the big boy press on, otherwise that plywood will eventually fail. I'd recess the steel into the plywood, paint it white, and cover the whole thing with epoxy. I have three old C-H presses. Two singles and a three position one. I first mounted it straight to my two layers of 3/4" plywood. First time I tried sizing some 7x61 from 7mm Mag the table was flexing. Added the steel, no more problems. Good luck.

https://www.youtube.com/c/BlacktailStudio This guy does some pretty amazing stuff with epoxy and a ceramic coating. It's the path I'm planning to go down with mine when I find time to clean it off.

Deft looks promising for my workbench

Horse stall mats.