Trondheim Makers Folding Workbench

This is a part of the interior of Trondheim Makers Mobile Makerspace, a 25" long trailer with workspace for 16-18 people, 3D-printers, PCs, Dev-kits etc. This is a trailer that we lend out to schools, youth clubs, libraries and other organizations here in mid-Norway.

We had some special needs for our workbenches; they had to be easy to move (in and out of the trailer, inside the trailer if we would like to reorganize the placement, ++). As the space inside the trailer is limited, we have to use the benches for several different tasks; they have to house a pc, soldering stations, electronic equipment, but there should also be room for drawing and building. And it should be easy to hide the mess you are creating while doing projects :)

So we ended up with the following benches, with help from Skurktur (two product designers in Trondheim) who did the cad-work.

Step 1: The Workbench

As you can see from the pictures, the workbench does not only have a folding lid, but the feets are also foldable. This makes the benches easy to stack on top of each other for storing.

Step 2: In Use

Here you see some early pictures from the makerspace, with no hardware installed. And one picture with the Pc, screen and solderingstation in place. We had some extreme luck when buying screens and mounts; The screen and mount togehter build so much, that when we close the lid it`s about 1mm from the surface of the bench to the screen. So you can`t place anything on the table where the sceen will end up when it`s closed. We are also trying do find the best way to mount the PC on the bench, so it doesn`t move when we are lifting and moving the bench. The soldering station is now placed in a alucase as seen in the first picture.

Step 3: DXF-files and Mounting

Here you will find the DXF-files for the workbench

You will need 2 bolts, 4 washers, 2 spacers and 2 nuts for the mounting. And yes, of course, a lot of screws, a few hinges and some glue :)

Good luck :)