Customer Reviews

CobraCo WBN500 Fire Pit or Garden Bench

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I ordered two of these put them around a tree and love them! They are darker than the picture though. They are more of a mohogany color. Very easy to put to gether. I might order more to form a complete circle around the tree. Hopefully they will last.

As one of the few curved, wooden benches, we were really hoping to like this product for our firepit. The first thing I noticed was the cheap appearance. It appears to be cedar, which is fine, but it appears to be dyed an orange color... guess we'll find out if that stains people's pants down the road once we start using it. And while following the poorly written instructions (with several mistakes), we discovered they forgot to drill out some of the holes that attach the bottom half to the top, seat layer!

If you are looking for a nice solid, wood curved bench, I would keep looking.

I bought two of the firepit benches . The benches arrived within a reasonable amount of time .I like the size and color of the benches. The actual benches are just like in the picture . The benches were easy to put together and the directions were easy to follow . It took about 15 minutes per bench to complete . The only issue I have is that there is a crack in each bench on the seat . The boxes arrived in pretty rough shape- so I am not sure if the cracks happened in shipping or not . The cracks do not impact the structural integrity of the benches - but they are noticeable on the seat . I regret having the cracks on an item that I paid $90 each for and probably would have exchanged them if I had purchased them at a local store . Minus the cracks , the benches look great around our firepit and I am somewhat happy with the purchase overall . The product was represented well in the picture and description, arrived on time, was reasonably priced in comparison to others I have seen and were easy to assemble.

I purchased three of these for our fire pit area. Here are my reactions:

Assembly: It took me about 25 minutes to assemble each bench. As others have noted, holes were not pre-drilled where the center brace meets the ends of the bench. This only happened on one of the three benches that I ordered (which made it confusing). The hardware pack includes 8 of the longer bolts, but you will only need 6. There is a separate pack of two shorter bolts that are floating in the box somewhere -- you need these to finish assembly and cannot use the longer bolts (which is why you end up with two extra long bolts). This is also where the instructions are off -- they don't mention the two short bolts, but it will be clear that you need them to secure the center vertical brace to the horizontal curved pieces. One last note, the screws that they provided to secure the top of the bench to the frame weren't quite long enough. If you have extra decking screws of various sizes lying around, they might come in handy.

Quality/Appearance: This is not a heavy-duty bench (you can lift and move it around using only one hand). The wood is softer than most, but seems durable enough for light use. We were unpleasantly shocked at the color -- they are stained with a cheap-looking shade of orange. Although they appear to be an oak shade in the photo, they come out of the box coated with a peachy-orange stain (almost looks painted rather than stained). I definitely plan to re-stain them before using. They are also a bit smaller than I was expecting, so be sure that the dimensions will work for your situation. Two people can fit snugly on a single bench.

Value: We didn't expect a high-end bench, but at the same time, it feels about $10-20 overpriced. I'd estimate that we might get 2-3 years use out of them before they start to fail and/or look too weathered.

Overall, these generally fit the bill for what we were looking for -- a simple curved bench for an informal fire pit area that is a short walk from the house. They should work fine, but I would caution against using these as "showpieces" in any higher-end applications or high-use areas. You would be disappointed in the durability, color, and overall quality.

I recently built my own fire pit with the left over retaining wall blocks I had after I built the wall. I wanted to put some round seating around the pit and prefered wooden benches to anything else. I ordered two of these benches and they arrived very quickly and were a piece of cake to put together. The color is a little darker than that in the picture but it's seems to be very sturdy and everyone has complimented me on them. Wish I had ordered two more of them the first time to finish the circle. I'm just ordered two more so the seating will be complete.

I purchased 3 fire pit/garden benches. When they arrived they were not as expected. They were made of an inexpensive Chinese fir and seemed like they would not last in my outdoor, uncovered area. The color of the wood was darker than the picture. CobraCo WBN500 Fire Pit or Garden BenchI was disappointed and sent them back after opening only one of them.

I would order again however on one of the benches (I ordered 3) 2 holes were not drilled, but it was easy to fix

The item has the quality of IKEA products, but just twice as expensive. Overall it's okay. After we placed our order, we were being told it's on back order and we should place a new order later. When we did that, the price was already higher by $20.-! Not justified in my opinion.