Project: The Ultimate Computer Desk

derekimo said:

It was a very interesting job, I miss it.

False drawer fronts would give you a more professional look if you decide to go that route.

Just make sure you attach them with short screws or nails that don't end up coming through the front.

Looking good though, I like watching this come together.

knoppixeu said:

Looks like a fantastic inbuilt desk pc XD.

brayway said:

Looks great so far!

Thanks everyone!

Had another really busy weekend and unfortunately, wasn't able to post the update on the weekend like I originally wanted to...

BUT! Made a new friend - meet Mr.Air Nailer.





Nice and fast, no need to clamp everything down, and I can get a lot more trim done a lot quicker.

I really did a better job of being picky with the trim, and selected cuts that matched the colour a lot better:



Compared to the first drawer face that I tried:



That had to change, so I took my most subtle and elegant tools:





And, replaced the two mis-coloured pieces with nicer ones.

Anyways - this is what my trim production line looked like for the day:



First, I would mark off the lengths on an appropriately coloured piece of trim just using a pencil and holding the trim against the piece:



Take it over to the miter saw and trim it to within a sixteenth of an inch or so on both ends:





See that cedar log in the bottom right? Remember it being longer? Mike was in the shop today turning them into table legs, which partially explains the big mess!



I then took the piece that is being trimmed, as well as the trim, to the little sander. I would sand to a good 90 degree angle, and get the length just right.







Glue down, and nail down!





Occasionally, I'll crack the trim with the nailer... which means it has to be removed, and re-done with a new piece of trim:



After some sanding:



I finished all 3 drawer faces and then got started on the actual drawers. They look pretty decent. Not perfect, but they look nice.

Not bad keep up the posts and good work...

crazyeyeschase said:

Not bad keep up the posts and good work...

Thanks crazyeyeschase, don't worry, there's still plenty to come!

ash30000 said:

looking forward to see the finished product!
PS i have always wanted to build my own desk
Ashley

Thanks Ashley, appreciate the vote of confidence!!

I used a fairly similar process as the drawer faces, I started out by cutting myself some fresh trim strips from this piece of maple:



Hit the miter saw and sander, and lay down some glue:



Then with the nailer. Whoops, one more split.



Here's a before and after shot from the sanding. You'll notice the maple strips got burnt pretty badly when I put them through the table saw (The blade is getting a bit old). After a bit of sanding, they look as fresh as ever:

After trimming all of the drawers and faces, I had to get some wood filler to fill in all of the screw and nail holes, as well as the small voids between the plywood and solid wood. All in all, this process went OK - not as nice as I would have liked.





For the mostpart, I used Elmers Natural Colour Wood Filler. While it did the job, the colour matching wasn't exactly... inconspicious, to say the least. I also tried mixing some sawdust from the random-orbit sander with some wood glue, with not so great results.











You can clearly see, in the end result, that the sawdust/glue filler looks more like glue. It has an almost transparent look to it. I guess I should have used more sawdust?





Anyways, I finished up the rest of the voids and holes with the regular Elmers stuff:





And then sanded it it all up:





Anyone have any tips on how I can further hide the holes? I will have to go over them again with some more wood filler just to smooth them out completely, but even so, I have a feeling that the stain will accentuate all of my filling, which is not the desired effect, to say the least!!

I have ALMOST determined the stain / technique I will be using. I'm getting some very nice, richly coloured red mahogany / cherry right now on my test boards. With that in mind, has anyone used darker wood filler than the natural wood, when staining dark with good effect?

Looks amazing I wish I had the tools at hand to do all of this.

I might be too late but another tip would be to find a really small drill bit and drill your hole before using the nail gun that would help with the cracks and having to redo a lot of work but it does work best wth a hammer and nail tap.

Stain uggh humm idk I'm not to experienced with that I think if you are using small enough trim nails and you might not even need the filler I would just stain without it but whatever works best for you. Stain the drawers first if you don’t like them with the filler then when you put the exterior showing parts of the desk don’t use filler I guess.