Bathroom Cabinet Project

This project came about from mostly necessity. My condo bathroom is small and the only storage was under the sink. Unfortunately I've filled that area with all sorts of random things and I had nowhere to hide all the extra soap and TP and such. So I decided to hang a cabinet in the big empty space above the toilet.

Before:

As you can see, there's a ginormous empty wall space there. It made the whole bathroom look weird because it looked like something was missing.

So I went and checked out what scrap wood I had laying around and miraculously, I had enough wood to make myself a 2ft wide by 3ft tall cabinet + doors and shelf.

Let's do this, quick and dirty style. First you need to cut some wood. 3 pieces for the top, bottom and shelf, and 2 for the sides. Like I said earlier the dimensions were about 2ft and 3ft long with a depth of about 9 inches.

 Now start gluing and screwing things together to make...

A box! In this project I didn't worry about making a back for the cabinet. I may add one later with a thin sheet of MDF.

I jumped ahead of myself and mounted the permanent shelf before taking a picture, but it's self explanatory anyway. I screwed the shelf in about 1ft from the bottom and proceeded to cut the doors to cover the top portion.

Dry fitting the doors. They fit! After determining the fit I installed 2 standard flat hinges on each door. Not the best choice for a hinge but I had them laying around.

Take it all apart and paint it. I chose a satin brown called Funky Monkey which I also used to paint the bathroom walls when I moved in.

<--Door

You can see the type of brass hinge I used here.

<-- Frame

Screw a block to the wall for the cabinet to hang from and make sure it is level. Again, aesthetics was not a biggie for me and the doors will be closed most of the time anyway.

Set the frame on top of your mounting block and screw if from the top. Drill pilot holes so you don't end up breaking off the mounting position. Put the doors back on and tada!

It's wall mounted bathroom cabinet that you can do over a weekend or less! 

Note: Later I came back and covered the visible end grain on the front of the frame with stick-on wood veneer and painted to match.

Gate Leg Table Project

This project came about while I was building my bar(another project). I realized, what good is a nook to make drinks if there wasn't a place to sit down with people to drink them? Of course it may also be used as a dining table... but like I said, the bar brought up the question.

A gate leg table, is basically a morphed drop-leaf table. Rather than having a small permanent table with small "leaves" on either end to crate length, a gate leg table has a small center island with one or two really big leaves to create a large surface area. The term "gate leg" refers to the skinnier legs that support each leaf, because they swing out under the leaf like a gate to prop it up. With both leaves dropped down the center island's footprint is very compact and can be put away when there's no need for any table at all.

There are many variations on how to configure this type of table but for my purposes I chose a very small island with large leaves. It's just easier to store.

So lets begin with the materials. What? In case you haven't noticed this entry is a how to, or rather, how I built a gate leg table. You can make this however big or small you like so this time around I'll not focus on exact measurements.

Materials:

- 1 sheet 3/4" single side finished birch plywood(standard 4X8, cut into 4 equal pieces)

- box of 2" screws
- box of 1 1/4" screws
- 4 surface hinges for leaves
- 4 brass plain cabinet hinges for gate legs

- 1 qt black latex paint

- 1 qt polycrylic clear finish(whatever sheen you like but I used satin)

- small paint roller and pan and small sponge brushes

Tools:
- drill w/ 1/8" and 1/4" drill bits and a phillips head bit of course.
- saws. I used a power jigsaw and a manual Japanese pull saw. (wish I had a table saw...)
- some kind of powered sander with 100 and 300 grit papers. 300 grit sanding sponge for hand work.
- carpenter's square

If you were paying attention you'd remember that we have 4 equally cut pieces of ply from the single sheet. Take one piece and cut 4 equal planks for the center island. I want somewhere in the 8 1/2"in range if I remember correctly(probably not).

Now just screw those suckers together with the side sections sandwiched between the top and bottom. You want it that way so the sides can bear the load of peoples' drinks and elbows when the table is finished. And for the love of Bob remember to predrill your holes with the 1/8" bit so you don't go splitting ends. Make sure you get the finished sides on the outside. Now you roughly have a 4X4 cube for your island. Oh, did I mention this was meant to be pub height? Well I just did so there you go.

Now take one of the other pieces of ply and dry fit it over your square island thing. Make sure the siland is square as you do this. Trim it so the sides are flush to the sides of the island. Your going to need 2 of these so stack 2 pieces and cut them at the same time. This view is basically what you'll have with a leaf in the down position - except not laying down on the floor like that.

With your 2 leaves trimmed flip your island upside down and butt your leaves flush to the top of the island(remember we're upside down). Finished side down this time. Grab your 4 surface hinges and screw them in over where the leaf meets the island. Get the pin centered over the seam. Now you have your basic gate leg table without legs. YAY!

So now we need legs to hold up those leaves. measure the inside height of the island and translate that to you last piece of quarter sheet plywood. Mark out about 3" wide and cut 4 pieces. 2 will be for the outside legs and 2 will attached inside the island for the legs and hinges to attach to.

In hindsight, I should've made the gate legs like a 2 rung ladder but I skewed somewhere and... well I was forced to make it work. Really you should cut 6 of those out instead of 4^. You'll also cut the rungs as described in the next step.

You'll put together something like this(with 4 complete sides of course). Yeah... this just before I brain farted and rather than make things simple I sandwiched in 2 short legs between the 2 shorter pieces instead of just making a simple 2-rung ladder thing going. Guess I was thinking too hard there. But anyway, you do that and sort of ignore how my legs look.

That said, you'll have 2 complete legs that, when closed, will be half of the inside width of the island. Measure the 2 shorter "rungs" to acheive that length. The 2 remaining long pieces will be mounted in the island.

Like so-ish. I got excited and forgot to take pictures of the in-between steps. Pop those 2 long pieces in on either side, and using the completed gate legs, mount them in with screws so that the legs will fold completely flush with the front of the island and be  out of the way when the leaves are down. I can see you face but I know you'll get it! Take a look at this other angle with the leg in open position and hinges installed:

You may notice I had to notch out for the legs, but again, that was my brain farting. You don't have to do that if you followed my corrected advice.

EDIT: Well, fighting my urge to skip ahead some steps here is a view of a center support... painted.

...*cough*...So now it's time for us to paint! Pretty self explanatory here so just do it. It may be easier for you to take apart the leaves and paint them separate from the island. Slap on 2 coats of whatever color you choose and let dry overnight.

 

Make sure your paint coverage was even and coat again if not. If everything's ok you can start your clear coat. I used satin polycrilic and rolled on 4 or 5 coats. I had a sponge roller and that gave it a nice texture.

Last note: in the finished pictures you can see that I've added support beams inside the bottom of the island. They are the unpainted portions. This cleared up a bad wobble problem when the table was fully set up.

 Only 8 1/2" thick when collapsed.

Guitar Wall Project: Day 3 - update

Cleaned out the music shop on string swings again. I just need 2 more!!!

[fixed!] Uhh... really bad phone cam image. I'll get a proper shot next time.

Guitar Wall Project: Day 2

     All these delays... damn. Well I finally found some time and here's the as-finished-as it's-gonna-be-for-now wall.... only because the store ran out of string swings.

This is what I managed to get from the music shop. 8 for now and I'll get 6 more when the order comes in.

One swing on the wall. I measured the inside width of the wall and divided that by 5 to get the space for each guitar. Then I divided the width of a space in half to get the mounting points for each individual swing. As for height, I just eyeballed the first one and held it in place with a guitar in the hook and marked it. From that one swing I used a level extended to the next mark, slapped a swing on, and traced it. And so on... Repeated for the top row.

Testing with a cheap project squier.

Bottom row complete!

Started top row. Crap ran out of swings, now we wait... 2 more swings will fill out that rather bare area in the top-right. The plan is to use 4 to stagger an in-between row to get an overall more pleasing look, though rather more tightly spaced than I'd prefer. It'll work, it'll work...

Guitar Wall Project: Day 1

     Well I got all the materials I needed short of the hangers and started the wall. I've made a major change to the project by omitting any rear paneling. Instead I'm just going to paint the area on my wall inside the black framing red. I'm hoping it comes out alright... I'm worried about the wall texture bugging the crap out of me when it's painted. The open back also makes installing the hangers easier. Here's what I have so far:

angle cut corners of unpainted pine molding

wall before

installed bottom, leveled of course. molding painted black(took longer than expected)

progress

...and now there's a big ass square on my wall. WEEeee!!!

colored between the lines

Guitar Wall Project: The Mock-up

     I'm excited to finally begin my guitar wall project after months of having to do other crap. Well I still have to do other crap but the more important stuff has been taken care of. I hope to be buying the materials starting this weekend and ordering string swings from eBay just as soon as I find a decent vendor that will give me a discount for ordering 10 hangers.

     Materials planned so far:
     - 2 sheets single ply mdf paneling/veneer - ~$20
     - 1 or 2 quarts deep red paint ~$10
     - kilz primer - already have
     - 1 quart black paint - already have
     - molding/baseboard/poplar stock for edge and latticing - $??
        - 30ft for outside(probably standard baseboard), 30ft for lattice work(probably 1/4 in" poplar stock)
     - 1 quart satin clear coat - already have

     Other expendables:
     - sand paper
     - dust masks
     - roller/brushes
     - paint trays
     - 2 ply plastic drop-cloth
     - possibly some liquid nails construction adhesive
     - painter's tape

     The whole thing will be 7.5ft sq., less than an inch thick, and probably pretty light. I plan on having the string swings' mounting screws going through the paneling into studs or anchors so I don't have to worry about unsightly screws in the  red background. I haven't measured the placement between string swings so anything that doesn't hit a stud gets 2 beefy drywall anchors. If I find drilling into the red for extra support is required(likely) I'll counter sink the heads, putty, sand, and repaint over them. I'll only use the clear on the whole thing if I can't get a good result from the red paint alone.

     Here's the full scale photoshop mock-up:

     Later I'll add bumpers to the bottom parts behind the guitars so they won't knock into the red. We'll see how that goes. I used a real picture of my wall for the bg and simulated the carpet and ceiling.

Pallet into Snack Table

     So I was talking to the my bud and facilities manager at work one day and freaked out on him when somehow he mentioned that the company just threw away pallets from incoming shipments. I was like, "What the hell? That's mostly good lumber!" So I immediately claimed the next quarter pallet, not even thinking about what I was going to do with it.

As soon as I got home I started deconstruction. It's a lot easier than said however, due to the nails used that are DESIGNED NOT TO COME OUT! And damn, there were a crap load which I had to smack out with a hammer. The entire process took me just under an hour and a half.

After chugging a bottle of gatorade I went back and started sorting and lining up the good pieces. Look at the image below. I bet you would have thought the exact same thing as me. Me: "That would make a good table top". In the end I had myself 10 short planks and figured 6 for the top, 4 for the legs. 3 were less than perfect.

After figuring out each board's best face I clamped the first few together. The boards were not necessarily the same thickness though, so I used my level as a straight edge to make sure the top was as flush as possible.

To keep it easy and quick I decided to fasten the boards together by using an improvised pocket screw method. I drilled into the end grain about 1/4" in straight and then angled my drill about 45 degrees with a 1/4" bit just to create the pocket. Then, following the angle of the pocket, I used a long 3/16" bit to drill the pilot hole. I just used 1 and 3/4" screws to finish the job. Yeah it the end grain and that IS a crack in that second pic but the pilot holes prevented complete failure of the wood's integrity. Good enough in my book. Besides, there will be more reinforcement later. Repeat on the other side.

Different clamping method for boards with different thicknesses:

Here's that extra reinforcement I was talking about. I took one of the not-so-premium boards and drilled each plank in though the bottom. I used 3/4" screws so they wouldn't protrude through the top. Obviously it was too long so I used my fine japanese pull saw to carefully trim the overhang in place. Flip it back over and we have our rough table top.

The next step was to make a set of simple legs. Again, the quick and dirty works for me so I chose to make X shaped legs like you see on a picnic table. First make sure all 4 pieces for the legs are the same length. Next measure one edge of the top where the legs will be attached. This is how wide you'll spread the legs apart. Take a plank, measure to exactly the center, horizontaly and verticaly, and drill a hole. Line up a second plank under that one and drive a 1 and 3/4" screw into that hole. Not you can use that as the pivot point for the leg spreadage. 

Spread that first set of legs to the same width as the table top edge you measured earlier. Make sure you go from outside edge to outside edge. After you get it exactly right just drive another screw near the pivot to lock it in place. I used a chalk line to snap a cutting line. This creates edges that will be even with the floor and bottom side of the top. (forgot to take a pic of the cut legs)

Do that again for the other side and this is what you get - a very wobbly table.

Take another less than optimal plank and make a leg reinforcement. Super quick and dirty. Measure the width of the top, cut your plank, drive into the outside legs like so. I used 1 screw at first just to hold it in place. Square the legs up using a... square, and drive 2 more screws to lock it up. Same on the other side.

There it is, a table! But wait, it's spintered, full of holes and looks like crap... First get the top nice and smooth using a random orbital sander with 100 grit paper. Now here's the part that's really really fricken important that almost everyone forgets or doesn't know about(and forgets to take pictures of). Use a brush to paint on regular old tap water. Get it nice and wet but not waterlogged. When its dry you'll find that the grain has raised significantly and is no longer smooth. There's a bunch of sciency stuff to explain - expansion, blah but I don't want to explain it. Just do it and run your fingers over it and you'll see. Hit it with the 100 grit until the surface is even and then 300 grit to finish. Smoother than a baby's ass.

Now for those holes. Self explanatory stuff here. Get some STAINABLE wood putty and putty away.

Can you guess what's next? Yep. 100, 300. If you're using elbow grease I feel for you. I've been there. But seriously, get a 5" orbital sander for less than 30 bucks(18 clearance at osh. Sweet.). From here you can sand everything else in the same manner. I didn't bother puttying places where people won't see anyway. Using a rubber sanding block and 100 grit I rounded the top edges and under the legs to avoid scratching my deck and my arms. Hmm.. missed a spot - putty putty putty...

With this some people would be satisfied and just slap on a clear coat. Not me! I want stain! And would you have guessed, I have some left over "gun stock" colored stain from a previous project. NOOooOooo, it wasn't for an actual gunstock. It's just the color name, ok? Only one coat in my case, let dry, 300 grit light sand. Boom! Color.

Double clear coat polycrylic or spar(that's what I used), sand 100 grit just till smooth, another coat. For the 4th and final coat I sanded the surface with 100 until I just felt the texture smooth out using very little pressure,   and brushed on a very light finish coat.

And here it is. I call it Snack Table. I dig the single coat distressed look.