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Medium sized surface plate height?

lucky7

Titanium
Joined
Sep 6, 2008
Location
Canada
Need to make a stand for a 30" x 48" surface plate. I'm 6' tall. I find ideal height for my work benches is 36" tall. Should a surface plate's height be the same or lower? Thanks for opinions.

Lucky7

(And no, a commercial stand isn't ideal for me)
 
On page ten of the catalog it states that the granite top is 36" form the floor. If your going to frequently use a height gauge then having to drop your head to eye level, may make you want to have the stone a few inches above standard height. Should you be having to do a lot of lifting of heavy parts such as when scraping castings, you may conversely want to have the surface well below the elbow for ease of lifts and lowering.

http://www.starrett.com/docs/other-downloadable-resources/tru-stone---bulletin-807.pdf?sfvrsn=4
 
I find HIGHER to be better.. My plate is on casters, so it can be moved and is at 45"... My
license says I'm 6 feet also, but in reality its 5'11-3/4.

Its been rolled out into the shop the past few weeks, I've needed it a TON lately, and honestly I wish
it was at least 3 or 4 inches higher.. I still have to stoop down a bit to get my eyes where they need
to be. Its not too bad, but at 36" I think I'd need a back brace.. And I have 2 tool carts that are at
39" and they drive me nuts because they are too tall, I'm going to chop those down to 36 one of these days.

I'm not scraping anything, just using it with a height gage and parts and blocks and pins and parts and stuff.
 
The other responses are good.

I am 6' also. I have 1 plate at 36" which works well as I usually looking down at the part checking flatness. My CMM is at 41" which works well since a sit on a chair at it. The plate out in the shop will be getting casters and will be at around 40". I don't do much layout work. Most of the time I am looking down at the plate using a surface gauge or height master (which is easy to see since the reading is at the top).

Bill
 
Putting 1200 lbs Avoir on a scissors table or die cart didn't seem like a good idea "at the time'. Nor since. Humans, however, are more flexible, even when at an age their BACK is not.

Mindful of reading HG & such, a Torin "Big Red" gas-strut mechanic's stool takes the backstrain "mostly" off the radar. Lower SELF rather than elevate table.

Otherwise.. OEM table, and it IS at about the right height for general use.

2CW
 
Thanks gentlemen, just re-drew for 42" height. I'd worked in shops with lower than 36" height surface plates so wondered if that was logical. Mine's going to be on casters as most things are in my small shop, and with adjustable feet for those few times a level top is needed. Bonus is as 42" I can fit one of my Kennedy chests underneath and a bunch of other stuff.

Lucky7
 
If there's any doubt make the thing a little on the tall side. If you build the table so the lower cross members are a few inches
above the caster pads it's a simple job to flip the thing over and shorten the legs a bit once you have a better idea of what works
best for you. I've also built numerous tables like that with telescoping legs--experiment and set the height exactly where you
need it...
 
Mine is at bench height (32" or so) it's a good height for about 1/3 of the work that I do with it. Most of the time I have to "take a knee" when using a height gauge.
 
If there's any doubt make the thing a little on the tall side. If you build the table so the lower cross members are a few inches
above the caster pads it's a simple job to flip the thing over and shorten the legs a bit once you have a better idea of what works
best for you. I've also built numerous tables like that with telescoping legs--experiment and set the height exactly where you
need it...

Fooks sake.. I'd need an hour of rigging work to lift the ... what 1450 lb Avoir? Herman Grade A plate OFF the silly thing, first.

Make it LOWER, if not adjustable.

Any ignorant garage floor jack, and you can put grillage UNDER the shorter legs - or cross-members - if/as/when need be.

2CW
 
Thanks for thoughts, Monarchist, but I've got overhead I beams in my shop. Lifting something under two tons is no problem. I just want to make the stand only once.

Lucky7
 
Thanks for thoughts, Monarchist, but I've got overhead I beams in my shop. Lifting something under two tons is no problem. I just want to make the stand only once.

Lucky7

So do I. That's how I got the plate back onto the OEM stand after repairing its casters & such.

The nuisance is A) positioning, UNDER the beam, and B) rigging it so as to insure the surface plate doesn't try to "roll" on me.

Now - as it IS back on the stand, I am able to lift the stand, or just the plate by jacking from below. FWIW, it is up on cross-timbers as we speak so I can paint the stand - move those, and set it back onto its proper support-point disks after the paint has had plenty of time to cross-link/cure/"dry" & such.
 
Fooks sake.. I'd need an hour of rigging work to lift the ... what 1450 lb Avoir? Herman Grade A plate OFF the silly thing, first.

Make it LOWER, if not adjustable.

Any ignorant garage floor jack, and you can put grillage UNDER the shorter legs - or cross-members - if/as/when need be.

2CW

Nah - pallet jack. I keep a pile of timber blocks about the place. If I want a bench or something a bit higher, I lift it on the pallet jack, place the blocking & lower.

You can always put blocks on the pallet jack tines for a second lift.

Makes moving stuff around dead easy as well. A lot of my less-used tools (T&C grinder, cylindrical etc) are kept out of the way until needed, then moved & levelled.

PDW
 
Nah - pallet jack. I keep a pile of timber blocks about the place. If I want a bench or something a bit higher, I lift it on the pallet jack, place the blocking & lower.

You can always put blocks on the pallet jack tines for a second lift.

Makes moving stuff around dead easy as well. A lot of my less-used tools (T&C grinder, cylindrical etc) are kept out of the way until needed, then moved & levelled.

PDW

I almost bought a pallet jack last month.. Then again, no damned storage space here as it is. Treated meself to a pair of new 5-T "toe" jacks instead, so I no longer have to chain lifting points onto a machine higher-up where my pair of garage "trolley" jacks can git under.

Then again, new arrivals here soon get permanent machinery skates per-machine as a bit of "musical chairs" has been called for from the outset.

I like to be able to "make a hole" and store the XJ8-L indoors when off to sunnier climes for the worst of winter.

With ONE PAIR of skates attached at mid-balance point, the Vestil 10T swivel skate goes under, mass is biased onto it, jack screws retracted to load the skates, machine coaxed between storage and operating zones, jackscrews spun down with air or electric to UNload the skates, leveling optional, but "usually".

Newly arrived Cazeneuve wants SIXTEEN inches of 'crete under, ten inches longer and wider than itself.

No Fine Way!

My 10EE are 12-15% heavier, and they live on three skates at their three points, jackscrew thru the center of each modified skate.

The French gal is prolly going to have to settle for 4" x 6" timber "sleepers" over the 3 or 4 inches of right-decent concrete I HAVE, with good sound well-compacted 21A subgrade under.

It is, after all, the "early" model HBX-360-BC wth the massive all cast iron, not sheet-metal, base.
 
Would this be sitting or standing elbow height?
Bob
Standing elbow height. In my experience this allows you to stand while working the surface with well supported arms or sit on a reasonably sized stool and get down low where my eyes are ~6" inches from the surface. For me at 74" tall, that puts the work surface about 44" from the floor.

Sent from my SM-G930R4 using Tapatalk
 








 
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