Project: The Ultimate Computer Desk

mickey megabyte said:

nice cat
shame about the advertising

Hehe, thanks mickey megabyte - I don't mean to shove anything in your face, ie. advertise, but it seemed reasonable to thank them for supporting the project and sending some stuff my way - it IS nice stuff too

brayway said:

mickey megabyte said:

nice cat
shame about the advertising

Shame? how, he got a sponsor!! congratz!!

Hehe, thanks brayway :)

z3r010 said:

Because it's against the forums rules - Sponsor stuff removed.

Hey z3r010, sorry for not clarifying it with an admin earlier - I sent you a PM just so I don't step on anyones toes in the future.

rider68 said:

I Have to say that your project is well shown and you have given allot of thought in planning out prior to building, if you should ever consider another project consider using a biscuit jointer for the carpentry aspects when jointing, It's quick to learn and a very fast process in which to assemble your work, giving a very professional finish with great strength.

Sorry that I am posting only now but I have not been near the forums for some time, (due to health) but if any one wants or needs advice for any future projects I would be glad to assist if required,

My qualification is that I was a carpentry joiner for many years, forming joints in the old days was taken as an art but with modern tech - and tooling around it's somewhat by passed,

Look forward to seeing to finished job, Great Post
Best regards Peter

Ooooh, very cool job there rider68, I am certainly considering using a biscuit joiner in the future - in fact - some parts of the project may even still be able to benefit from the use of a biscuit joiner, so stay tuned

Last time I left off, with regards to the table surface, I had just finished gluing and screwing it together. I put it on the backburner for about a week to dry while I worked on the drawers, and now I'm going to take it down in preparation for putting the outer trim on it.

Here it is:



All 4 sides were a bit off, with regards to the flushness. This was expected, as the initial sizing cuts were pretty rough, and it's better to have extra material than not enough.



Took out a straight-cut flush bit for the router, and some 60-grit sandpaper for the random orbital sander, and got to work. I did two passes with the router, because since the bit is not 1 1/2" tall, I couldn't trim the whole side of the table with just one pass.











And, after a bit of work, the final result:







The next step is to take a long strip of maple and turn it into trim for the table surface.

D3LL said:

Its looking good so far, Can't wait to see the finished product.

Thanks D3LL! I can't wait until it's done too lol, my current desk is just not cutting it!

Thanks to z3r010, for confirming with me what's ok and not ok with regards to the sponsorship stuff. I won't post links to their websites, but I will of course, post a few pictures of the gear they're sending me, and add a big thanks to them.

There are some really great people in the industry that provide a lot of support for projects like this - so I apologize if some of you feel as though it's being put in your face as advertising, but hey, it's because of people like that that this project (And many others around on the Internet) will be 10x better, and get done 10x faster (Because without them, it'd be months before I could afford the hardware!)

Thanks to all of you who have been supporting this project so far, you're all really, really wonderful and I've enjoyed all of your comments and feedback.

I'll bring you some more good stuff later in the week - it's been crazy busy at work lately, and also too cold to do some work on the desk!

The last time I left off, I had just finished flushing the sides of the table in preparation to add some trim. I found a nice piece of long maple that was just a little over 8 feet long, a little wider than 1.5 inches, and thick enough to cut some 1/4 inch strips from.

I layed it out, setup the table saw and cut myself a test piece.



Looks good!



Here's a pic of the cutting process. I'm afraid I had some difficulty with this. Actually, let me rephrase - the saw had some difficulty with this. I was still using the same blade I've been using the whole project - which needs replacement pretty badly. Asking it to cut through 1.5 inches of maple, for a length of 8 feet was asking a lot of it.



I made it through eventually, but the whole process left quite a few burn marks on the wood.



I glued and nailed the trim around the perimeter of the desk, which was a pretty straightforward process.



And then took out a hand plane to get rid of most of the excess material and bring the trim down flush with the desk surface. Some neat pictures here.





After some sanding with some 60-grit on the random orbit sander to get everything smooth, I went nuts with the wood filler.







At that point I stood the surface up in the back of the shop and called it a night.

Next update in the loop, I setup some dado blades in the table saw, mmm mmmm, that was fun!

Have a good weekend everyone!

Looking good!
If your blade is burning the wood, it's mostly from not moving the material fast enough, try lowering the blade and make a few passes to cut through it so you keep the material moving. it takes longer to cut through but it will save alot of sanding time. Cleaning the blade will help too, if you can't get it sharpened right away.
Keep up the good work, can't wait to see this.

Burn marks only add charactor great work i want more updates lol.

Fascinating !

it must be one hell of table, when will it be ready