If you have ever tried to hand saw a piece of thin wood or molding you know it’s hard to keep it from moving all around. If you clamp it in a vice you could damage the wood, and the routine of clamping and unclamping can often be time consuming.
A bench hook provides a stable, easy way to hand saw lumber. It’s called a bench hook because it hooks onto the edge of a bench and acts as a fence to hold the piece of the wood you’re working with. To make one for your workshop:
- Attach a 1″ x 2″ cleat to a 12″ x 18″ piece of 1/2″ plywood, screwing and gluing it to the bottom edge.
- Next, on the top edge of the plywood use the same technique and attach a 1″ x 3″ cleat.
Set the bench hook in place so that the bottom cleat grabs the edge of your workbench then place the piece of wood you’re working with tightly against the top cleat to get a nice square cut.
I like to leave a baseboard overhang on my bench hook so I don’t drag my saw into my bench like the demonstrator did. A bench hook is a sacrificial shop jig…a workbench is not.