Refurbishing My Old Reloading Bench

[45workhorse]

Nice job!
Should last at least to the great great grand kids, maybe more!

I put fiberglass resin on my top. Don't know if I could afford it again.

[steve urquell]

Nice job!
Should last at least to the great great grand kids, maybe more!

I put fiberglass resin on my top. Don't know if I could afford it again.

Thanks. That resin should be tough.

I'm ready to get the finish work done on this and hoping it looks as good as
I envisioned it to.

[JimB..]

I'm ready to get the finish work done on this and hoping it looks as good as
I envisioned it to.

Lol, if it doesn’t, it’s a bench. Paint it a dark color and in use that will wear away producing a nice patina look.

[steve urquell]

Lol, if it doesn’t, it’s a bench. Paint it a dark color and in use that will wear away producing a nice patina look.

I normally wouldn't care but my wife is kind enough to let me have this in plain view in the house. It's in our dining room lol.

[steve urquell]

The census is low at my hospital so I got to take the day off. Pressure washed, sanded, primed and painted the frame with Rustoleum Hammered Bronze. The Minwax stuff just looked like brown paint.



Got one coat of poly on the underside and top of the top. Stuff has a 4hr dry time between coats, UGH! But it's nice to get here on it.

[country gent]

Bet the top is really soaking up the urethane

[steve urquell]

Bet the top is really soaking up the urethane

Not so much. That maple is so dense and hard it felt like a granite countertop after finish sanding

[steve urquell]

Little bit of an upgrade.

[45workhorse]

To purty to use now!

[steve urquell]

To purty to use now!

The first scratch is always sooo painful.

[steve urquell]

I hit the dry poly with 0000 steel wool and laid another thick coat on it and let it flow out. It's looking good. Can't wait to get it all put back together.

[nagant]

Looking great, the Lee divot threw me till i saw the hole pattern.

[steve urquell]

Looking great, the Lee divot threw me till i saw the hole pattern.

Thanks. Yeah Lee put the bolt holes waaay out on the edge. You gotta give the bench a little divot if you want the holes anywhere but right on the edge.

[steve urquell]

Finished and back in place. I have a 2 drawer filing cabinet set on the bottom shelf as well as a little more area with the wire rack. Other than me not leveling that bottom channel 30yrs ago when I built it I'm pretty happy with the outcome. I need to repaint that ratty looking RCBS press though. Any ideas for paint that looks close to factory?

[nagant]

Nice, back in production.

[steve urquell]

Nice, back in production.

Felt good to get it back in the house. Loading in the garage in 100F heat yesterday was no bueno.

[TNsailorman]

Steve, take that press to an auto paint store and they can match it perfectly. Or give you some choices that you might like better. james

[steve urquell]

Steve, take that press to an auto paint store and they can match it perfectly. Or give you some choices that you might like better. james

I have an RCBS trimmer that is not so faded I can take. Thinking about taking it to an RC shop and match up with model paint.

[15meter]

Rust-Oleum Hammered Green is as close as I could find for off the shelf paint match for RCBS. It is not far off the current shiny, deeper green on current production tools. It is not the old seafoam green from the 60's-70's.

Tough part will be finding it, when I repaint my Rockchucker several years ago, it was almost unobtainable. Several dozen hardware stores/big box stores, plus online searches before locating a single can in my local hardware store. Never thought they would have it their paint selection at times leaves a lot to be desired.

Hopefully they have put it back in production, I even emailed Rust-Oleum trying to find it.

Edit: just looked at Rust-Oleum's website, they don't show it as available anymore. Finding old stock may the only solution.

[Shawlerbrook]

We have some talented individuals here.