Flip top vs nesting tool stands

Joined
Mar 23, 2014
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57
Hi All,

I have a small hobbyist shop where my car currently lives :( and am looking to organize and maximize floor space.  I already have a flip top stand for my planer and ridgid spindle sander.  It was housing my miter saw but I decided to swap the sander and saw so I could build a miter saw station. 

ANY WAY...

I am debating on using the flip top as it feels like more of a pain than it should be.  It was one of my first shop projects and the holes for the lock pins are tighter than I'd like.

So I was debating on scraping the fliptop for a nesting rolling stand, where the sander would be on the outer stand and the planer would be nested underneath on wheels.  This feels like it would maximize space and I could easily be using both tools if the need ever arises without having to flip a table?

thoughts?

Oscar
 
Could you simplify this and just create a 2 level stand with the planer on the inside "shelf"?
 
I thought about that, but the planer weighs 100lbs(DW735x) and I'm afraid it would tip over the stand.  I'm willing to try that though if others have done it. 
 
I think I'm not understanding something.  I was envisioning a 35" high rolling stand/cabinet (20"Dx20"W) with a middle shelf at say 20" high with the planer and the top of the stand at 35" with the sander at the top.  Between the 2 machines, you have 160 lbs on the stand with most of that weight lower to the ground giving you more stability.  Rolling it around should not be a problem.  Any instability is generated by feeding heavy stock into the planer which could tip the cart toward the infeed or outfeed without added support, but if you have something that heavy, you really need additional infeed/outfeed support anyway.  Just make sure the casters are capable of supporting the whole thing.  Typically a high quality 3" caster will support 250 lbs/corner, so that should be more than enough for what you're doing.  Just make sure the cabinet built adequately to prevent racking and support that planer shelf. 
 
I would tend to agree that having the heavy planer on a low shelf would make the overall unit fairly stable.  If necessary, you could make the footprint of the cabinet a little larger than necessary to hold the planer.
 
Something like this?

The center shelf is about 17" off the ground which puts the planer bed at about 20" - a little tough on the back if you plane a lot at one time. It's pretty stable, not tippy, but you could clamp a  leg to the outboard edge of the extended table if you were pushing the planer.View attachment 1View attachment 2
 

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