How to make light and easy sawhorses

It's the time of year when adults of all mental ages yearn for the smell of fresh school supplies. This September I indulged the bittersweet craving. I bought a fresh 3-pack of pink erasers. I took them straight home, cracked open the blister pack and inhaled through quivering nostrils.

And then it hit me. My erasers didn't smell right. They smelled acrid instead of soft and rubbery. They smelled like overcooked bacon. I was crushed. Some school supply chemist must've thought up a compound that's cheaper than rubber. Thanks to him, September will now remind children of burnt pork.

The sweet lure of erasers (even the bac-o-bits-smelling ones) is that they offer ultimate power over mistakes. You flub something and you can just get rid of it. Begin again. Make a new start. Not like life, where faux pas linger in the social vacuum with a half-life of 50,000 years.

For example, I still remember the day in Grade Six when I stood up to answer a question and sneezed at the same time. I had a cold. A tsunami came out of my nose. I tried to staunch it with one hand, then both. Nothing helped. Onward it flowed.

There's no way I can erase that moment. Or the moment right after it when Mrs. Letcher said, "That'll do, Maggie."

Horse to be Reckoned With

Yesterday was the kind of day that reminded me of Grade Six. I tried to construct fold-up sawhorses. I've built them before. They're not hard. And everyone should have a couple of these babies around. Standing proudly under a sheet of plywood or an old door, they make a fast, cheap desk or party table. Plus you have an instant, stowable work surface if you lack a permanent workshop set-up in your garage or basement.

But I had problems yesterday. I put the sawhorses together backwards, so the hinges wouldn't close. I had to take them apart and re-build. So here are some tips to help you horse around with impunity.

Materials

You can put sawhorses together for about 20 bucks, less if you use reclaimed lumber and hinges, available at Habitat for Humanity ReStores.

• Eight 8-foot 1x4 spruce boards - 1.75 ea = 14.00 (Use the 2-foot-long cutoffs to make another short set of sawhorses and you've got a coffee table, baby.)
• Chain - zinc, 6 feet @ 1.09 per foot = 6.54 (Get it cut to length in the store if you don't own a pair of tinsnips, or just use 1/8" sashcord instead of chain.)
• 2 pairs of 3" butt hinges = 3.99
• Box of #8 1-1/4" zinc pan-head screws = 2.69 (100 in a box; lots left for more sawhorses.)

Steps

1. Cut four 3-foot long boards.
2. Lay them out so they form a square, but then move the bottom crosspiece up about six inches so you can ultimately use it as a shelf support, giving your desk/table extra storage on the bottom. Use a rafter square to keep the 90-degree angles true.
3. Drill pilot holes, then screw the pieces together. (The boards will split without pilot holes.) Put two screws at each corner. Stagger them a little. (If two screws line up along the grain, they're more likely to split the board.)
4. If your hinges have giant spines, raise the top crosspiece just a little to accommodate the hinge. Otherwise your tabletop will rest on the metal hinges instead of on wood, which will make things as slippery and unreliable as a Grade Six student with a cold.
5. Position the hinges and trace holes with a sharp pencil. Pre-drill, positioning the drill bit precisely in the centre of each circle.
6. Drive the hinge screws partway in, stopping about 1/4 inch shy. This allows a little play in the hinge's position as you then tighten down each screw in sequence. (These explicit tips may not make sense to you now, but you'll understand when you're doing it, and even grin wryly with appreciation.)
7. Build the other side, just like the first. Then attach the two sides via the hinges. You'll have to use a toolbox or pile of books to support the second side while you line up the hinges and screw them down.
8. Attach a length of chain to both legs to keep the unit from collapsing in an embarrassing display of ineptitude.
9. Build another sawhorse just like the first, then throw a slab of board across the top, and voila, you're table-enabled.