Build Log: Constructing the Ultimate Computer Desk

[ultimatedesk]

Drawer Trim

MMOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

at first when I saw the thread title i was expecting a dinky little desk put together with some 1/2" ply and 2x4's, but this is definitely sick. It looks like it's coming together really well! I love all the pics you've been taking, especially the artsy one's haha. Can't wait to see the next update! Stay warm up there

Hehe, glad you're liking the pics and updates, believe me, there's LOTS to come in the next couple months!

^Yha we cooled off this week. Hit minus 20C this morning. Makes me really glad I work from home

Yeaaaaaah... it's been a bit chilly - I've taken up winter biking this year, and... well... it's COLD. !!!

I got a chance to do some work on the drawer face trim - this was my first time doing solid wood trim.

I cut a nice piece of maple into 1/4" strips, glued, and sanded. I only did one piece this time, as I am not totally sure that this is the way I would like to go.

Something about the trim not meshing quite well with the plywood.

First, I set the table saw to the right width:

Measure 3 times, and you get a nice solid cut:

Made a few strips:

Cut, glued, and clamped on the initial pieces of trim. The trim pieces were about 2/16's of an inch wider than the plywood, which is great, since there will be no voids, though, I'll have to do quite a bit of sanding:

Took the sander to the top and bottom:

Overall, it looks pretty good. I'm still not 100% certain about it, however. I'm thinking there is a strong possibility I will go with solid maple for the drawer faces.

 

[Peter.Cort]

I think you should do solid maple drawer faces. It would be a bit more expensive but it seems like that isn't the highest of your priorities, and it would definitely give a cleaner look rather than having a molding on plywood.

or what you could do is get a thin piece of veneer and pop that over the front. It would certainly be less work, and in my opinion better looking, if you went with a solid maple front

 

[JamesT1]

I really like this build. I've been contemplating doing something similar for some time and I think this has convinced me.

Also, we have the same table saw!

 

[ultimatedesk]

I think you should do solid maple drawer faces. It would be a bit more expensive but it seems like that isn't the highest of your priorities, and it would definitely give a cleaner look rather than having a molding on plywood.

or what you could do is get a thin piece of veneer and pop that over the front. It would certainly be less work, and in my opinion better looking, if you went with a solid maple front

I agree Peter.Cort. I went ahead and finished the rest of the drawer faces a week ago or so and I'm still not particularly enamoured with them.

I really like this build. I've been contemplating doing something similar for some time and I think this has convinced me.

Also, we have the same table saw!

Thanks JamesT1 - hehe, awesome saw, it's stable, powerful, and does the job good!

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.

 

[ultimatedesk]

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:

 

[ultimatedesk]

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?

 

[Trotter]

As long as the filled holes are not on the front you should be good.

A little late now, but you could have mitered/routered the inside edges of the sides to make the seams only show on the bottom and back, and then used brads from the outside of brackets on the inside. In other words, have the bottom inset as well as the back of the drawer. The front could be a single think piece with channels routered in for the sides/bottom and the secured from the inside with brackets.

Maybe next time.

 

[ultimatedesk]

Nice idea there Trotter, you're right though, maybe next time

No update today, but in the next few I should have some new pics for everyone - been busy with work lately!

 

[JamesT1]

You could have also countersunk all of the areas where you had nailed the sides together and then glued round plugs over the nails.

Either way, I admire your work.

 

[ultimatedesk]

You could have also countersunk all of the areas where you had nailed the sides together and then glued round plugs over the nails.

Either way, I admire your work.

Thanks JamesT1, I had not thought of making plugs - all of the holes are indeed countersunk, so that would have been a nice option. Next time!

Received a nice package in the mail a couple weeks ago that I've been meaning to show off...

What could it be?

Woohoo!!!

That's:
4 x 2 GB of 1600Mhz CL7 Ballistix RAM from Crucial and
2 x 2 GB of 1333Mhz ECC, Registered RDIMM RAM from Crucial!

So it looks like for the main system I will have some options. Currently I'm thinking either a socket 1156 Core i5/i7 or a newer Sandy Bridge socket 1155. The only issue that may occur with the Sandy Bridge is that those Crucial Ballistix are rated for 1.65 Volts, which I understand is a bit over the recommended voltage for RAM for the 1155 boards. There is a possibility of looking at an AMD AM3 system as well with a Phenom x4 or x6 - I have not made up my mind entirely yet.

For the server system, I am almost definetely going with a Xeon processor - which motherboard is still in the air.

Aren't they so nice?

Can't wait to open them up and test them out! It'll have to wait for now, however.

So here's a distraction - my cat! She's going to have some kittens soon!

Big thanks go out to Crucial, who are officially the first sponsor for The Ultimate Computer Desk



Stay tuned, lots of updates in the pipeline!