~DIY~ Bench Grinder Attachment For My Work Bench ~DIY

I’ve had this bench grinder floating around the garage for years. It’s never really found it’s place. I picked it up from some guy on the corner of an orchard while I was working in California. He had a full spread of random tools laid out on bed sheets. It was like he was holding his own Flea Market right there on the corner… $20 later and it was all mine. Not a bad deal considering it has a sweet light on it. wink:wink.

This bench grinder would be a nice addition to my Lineman work bench that I built a while back. Slowly this mobile work bench is coming together. Tool organization, router table attachment, vice… and more to come. Eventually it will be a one stop place to do basically all my DIY projects. I think building a bench grinder attachment would be a nice addition to the Lineman Work Bench, plus finally give this old bench grinder a home.

Initially I was going to make a stand for it that I could move around. Add some wheels to it, so you could tip it back onto the wheels and move it around. Sounded like a cool idea but I decided to scrap that idea and go with making it into another attachment instead.

Me being the pack-rat that I am, I know I have some metal brackets and metal hiding or laying around somewhere. In my drawer full of various metal brackets I found these L brackets that should work pretty well.

The end of my work bench has long all-thread bolts that stick out about 6 inches on one side. These bolts are used to mount my router table to the workbench and will work great for this too.

I first lined up the top of the bracket with the bottom of the table top and marked the center of the bolt. Then measured the width of the bracket and marked the center.

Drilled out a hole in each bracket…

Then slipped them over the bolts and tightened the nut to secure them.

The bench grinder isn’t wide enough to span the two brackets. So I grabbed this sheet of 1/8 inch steel I have had for years and measured out a piece to span across the brackets.

_{don’t mind those circles… those were screw-ups from an old project}

Grabbed my grinder with a cutting wheel and got to cutting

After smoothing out the edges with a flapper wheel, I laid it on top of the two brackets.

Centered it up…

Then threw a couple tack welds on it to hold it in place

Time to bust out the $80 flux core welder and make a mess of this project. I’m terrible at welding and the slag that flies around with a flux core welder is annoying. One day I will get a decent welder but this will do for now.

Blob a little weld here…
Blob a little weld there…
Maybe some here…
And some there…
TA-DAH
Welds that look like a bird crapped all over my project… perfect.


Mmmmm ya, It will hold…

Now that the mounting plate is welded up, it’s time to mount the vice to the plate. Take a couple measurements… measure again to make sure and drill a couple holes

Throw a couple bolts in…

and it lines up perfectly!!

I then placed it on my lineman work bench before tightening the nuts down to make sure everything fit how I wanted it too.

_source
Snug up those last couple bolts and this project is done.

It feels pretty solid but I may need to add a little triangle piece gusset to stiffen it up the brackets a little more. Just in case I have to lean into a piece of steel when grinding on it. I will have to see what I think later when I use it but I may just add one anyway. It doesn’t vibrant or shake and runs real smooth so I’m pretty happy with it.

It’s really easy to take on and off which was exactly what I wanted. Just two nuts on the end of the long all thread bolts that go through the whole table. Simple and easy.

It only took me a couple hours to whip this little project together. Most of the time was spent looking for bolts to mount the bench grinder to the mounting plate. You know, dig through the old coffee can full of nuts and bolts…

Look at me…
I even cleaned up my mess afterwards
It’s a miracle!!

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