Finally, I was flipping channels the other day and saw Katie Couric’s new show and she has a mosaic panel in the background of her set. The colors and style are perfect for this wall unit!

I paused the screen and got out my phone and took a picture.

I started with a Honey Maple Stain over a sealer coat, then, using the pics as a guide, I laid out the pattern.

With the pattern laid out, I gathered all my colors and masked off one color at a time and sprayed, rolled, wiped and blotted the different finishes on the squares.

After unmasking, a top coat of satin pre-cat lacquer finished it off.

I was so excited, that I stayed up late to install it.

I still need to add a light rail to the top shelf (haven’t made it yet)

In case any of you don’t remember, here is the “before” pic. Quite the transformation.

I’ll take some better pictures with my Nikon and post these as a finished project soon.

(Once the light rail is added)

Thanks for following along.

I used a simple jig to drill 5mm system holes for the hinge plates.

Free-swinging Blum CLIP hinges were a snap.
You can see the fabric wrapped frames from the backside of the door here.

The doors are all hung.

It just so happened that my brother and nephew came by today and I talked them into hefting the top shelf in the air for me. It is just sitting on top of the brackets for now.

I couldn’t resit putting the raw mosaic panel in place to check for fit—even though it has no mosaic pattern on it yet.
The TV is just sitting there on it’s stand, but, it will be wall mounted in the final installation.

This is built for a 55” LED TV, but my “little” 42” will hafta do for now.

The mosaic pattern is up in the air again. It almost begs to be a plain Maple panel.

I have since buttoned up the wiring, added magnetic touch latches and added the second touch dimmer switch for the shelf lights.

Just won these on eBay!

I’ll bet most of you gave up on this build!
This will be for the main x-axis which will carry the gantry.

There’s enough resources (read money) left to buy the A xis motor, gear head, chuck and tailstock.
After that it’s back to the waiting-for-money game. :-(

If only the clerk at the 7-eleven would stop selling me the LOSING lottery tickets this would go faster.

Expected delivery March 27th
(I feel like a proud Papa)

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UPDATE:

Score another one for eBay!

This is a 100:1 planetary gear box with a NEMA 34 Stepper motor.
It will become the drive for my rotary A axis. that takes me from 200 steps per revolution to 20,000 steps per revolution. SWEET! And for the auction price of $72, it can’t be beat.

This should arrive in the next week or so.

Since I am working with a large number of 23” X 41” panels, I am having to assemble the 58” X 64” mosaic backer panel using several smaller parts. This will all be hidden by the mosaic veneers on the face, so it only needs to be flat and strong. I managed to re-use all the offal from cutting the doors.

I chose to use 5/16” dowells to ease the assembly of the panel. I did it in three rows, which I assembled first, then glued the rows together.

Here, you can see the last row in the clamps.

While the glue dries I can get busy with the doors. I previously sized them, cut the centers out on the table saw and edgebanded the outside.

I need to add edging to the inside edges that will receive an inset fabric panel.

I’ve found that the gel formula contact adhesive works really well with these small foam rollers you can get at the HD store. By ganging the doors together, I can roll adhesive on all the edges at once.

Maple thintape veneer comes in large rolls and I have plenty leftover from previous jobs.

The doors are now edged, trimmed and sanded – nearly ready for finish. I’ll probably drill for hinges and prefit them on the cabinets before final finishing. I purchased the fabric last night on the way home.

The last row is just sitting next to the rest of the panel. It will have to wait for later to get attached.
The mosaic pattern is still TBD… at least for a couple more days.

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More progress on the doors!

Marking and drill for Blum CLIP hinges.

A 35mm forstner bitin the drill press drills the main cup hole.

A 5/16” drill bit drills the dowell/alignment holes.

Honey Maple smooth coat finish.

Fabric panel inserts are next!

I kept thinking about this giant shelf I am putting above this wall unit with lighting in it. Cleats alone aren’t going to be enough support. I need some brackets.

The Space for the Mosaic panel gives me room for some brackets, but I was going to need to fabricate them.
The local HD had some 3/4” tube steel in 36” lengths and I took it to my dads house where he has metal working tools.

It’s not pretty, but it will work for what I need.

I never claimed to be a welder. Good thing these will be completely hidden inside the shelf.

While I was reworking the support nailers, I added the wiring where it needs to go.

I added a touch sensor into the countertop to control the lights, but it didn’t photograph very well. A black button on a dark top in the shadows… Hmmm… It works cool though.

Here’s a view of the completed floating shelves waiting for finish.

The top shelf got prewired with xenon puck lights. I used some wiring clips typically used for trailer lights. They worked nicely for all these splices.

After a quick test to verify the wiring all worked, the shelf got closed up and prepped for finish.

It’s surprising how much time all that takes.

Next will be the Mosaic panel. My wife and I have narrowed it down a bit.
Looks like I will use the Maple plywood to create a substrate and we’ll (read I’ll) stitch up a veneer mosaic pattern to laminate to the face. I have leftover Maple, Red Oak, Sapele, Wenge, Macassar Ebony and Gunmetal Ebony veneers with which to do something cool.

And that was my weekend.

Well, just an update:
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The top shelf and the floating shelves got finished.
I used a no-wipe stain that I had colored to match the Minwax Polyshades stuff.
This was so much easier and I could coat with Lacquer instead of a Poly product.

The Floating shelves were a nice snug fit. Now I just need to figure out how many guys it will take to lift the 165lb top shelf 8 feet into the air and onto the brackets. The Mosaic panel is on French cleats and will need to be installed before the top shelf goes up. (It still is being re-re-designed.)

That will be a fun time for sure.

The doors are mostly made and the backer substrate for the Mosaic panel is nearly done as well. (Sorry no photo right now.)

I suspect the Mosaic pattern will come down to an actuial size layout before the wife and I agree.

On weeknights I can get 2 to 3 hours of shop time after dinner and I was particularly tired when I got home from work.

With about an hour left in me, I started cutting and assembling the floating shelves that go above the counter.

Part of me feels that if I had more clamps I could’ve put all six of them together before bedtime.

By 10pm I was out of clamps and out of energy.

This weekend should see lots of progress on this project.

I am trying to order a no-wipe stain in the same Bombay Mahoganey color. Even though my local supplier mixes Minwax colors, the Polyshades colors are not in his formulary. This might become a challenge.

More to come—stay tuned.

So, I opened my metal storage cabinet where I keep my finishing materials and perused the cans. I had already made color samples of most of these and decided they weren’t suitable.

Then I saw it. The perfect color sitting right there in front of me. Bombay Mahoganey. It is nearly the same color as my kitchen cabinets and the accent furniture in the family room.
The only problem?

Minwax Polyshades.

I bought this can a couple years ago when I thought it was a good solution to a problem back then. The color sample didn’t work out for that project, but, here it was, staring at me. The perfect color, the worst medium I could imagine.

How bad could it be?

So on it went. I thinned it down some so it would spray nicely in my HVLP gravity fed gun. It looked lovely! I was so pleased with myself that I silently congratulated myself on such a good outcome.

But… Polyurethane takes SIX HOURS to dry. SIX!
That means, once I put it on, there was no more shop time for me today.
I sat in my family room staring at the partially completed wall thinking I should be doing SOMETHING. But there was nothing to do but wait.

After two hours, I went out to check the top. The test scrap I made was still as wet as it was when I applied it.
Then I noticed it. Dirt, bugs and what looked like the death bed of a moth or some other flying critter—there on my lovely top.

Now I remember why I HATE Polyurethane.

There was no help for it except to wait until morning.

So, this morning I got up early, took the DA with 220 grit (A little heavy I admit, but I was pissed) and I sanded out the bugs and the dirt and the death-squalor evidence.

A quick coat before I leave for work and there is a chance I might be able to make some sawdust tonight.

It’s a bit darker with the second coat, but, so far it looks good.

No more evidence of suicidal moths.

Now, if it would only stay that way for the rest of the day.

Did I mention I HATE POLYURETHANE?

The challenge is to make a 127 1/2” long countertop that looks good using only 41” long plywood peices.

A trick I learned a long time ago is to place an alternate grain strip between end grain splices. It looks way better, in my opinion, than end grain to end grain joinery.

Also, I am using only plywood for this top—no solid wood. The build up is a little different here.
The front edge is a maple veneer that I had left over from another job.

The thing about an almost 11 foot top and 8 foot veneer is there needs to be a seam. Fortunately the grain is fairly homogenous on this peice and I matched it up really nicely with an angled splice.

Now you see it…

... now you don’t

The top got a clear sealer coat and I had to call it a night.

Tonight it will get a color coat—a semi-transparent dark brown dye fogged over the sealer.
Then the finished clear lacquer top coat and installation onto the wall unit.

Wood Gloat:
My truck can barely carry this pallet.
124 pieces 23”W X 41”L of A-1 Maple Veneer on 3/4” PBC

From a local furniture company liquidating assets after bankruptcy.
Bargain basement price of $100 for the load.
I picked this up Friday during my lunch hour.

It took an hour and 45 minutes to unload this once i got it home.
Okay, so the first 40 minutes was cleaning a space out in the garage. Still, 1:45 wore me out before dinner.

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So, what to do with all that plywood? First up—the Family Room Wall Unit

BEFORE:

Some ratty old bookcases and a yard sale table were just getting by and are ready to be replaced with a nice built in wall unit.
This was taken Saturday morning almost 10am. Before taking this down, we needed a game plan and a drawing.

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DEMOLITION TIME:

My wife got busy moving books off the shelves and we took the cases to another room where they got set up again. Okay, no actual demolition took place—just re-arranged things.

The dog wasn’t quite sure what to make of this disruption to his kingdom. I’m sure he thinks we’re crazy.

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PAINTIN’ TIME:

Yes, that is green…

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FRAMING OUT THE MOSAIC PANEL:

Let there be light! These LED rope lights were less than $8 at HD and will create an accent light from behind the mosaic panel where the TV will be wall mounted. The framing creates a space behind the panel for the lights.

The top-most board and the bottom-most board are french cleats that will hang the mosaic panel when it is finished.

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TIME FOR SOME CASEWORK:

I was able to make short work of these cases in the garage. The interior shows off the nice Maple veneer panels that I got on Friday. At one point I realized that I miscut the partitions. After a brief moment of panic, I realized that I have a stack of these panels along the garage wall as tall as I am and that the mistake cost me about 60 cents. The interiors are sealed with vinyl sealer and pre catalyzed clear lacquer.

And that’s what I got done this weekend…
After work tommorrow I will start on the Maple Countertop and the Mosaic panel the TV will mount on.

I knew I needed a good foundation on this beast of a machine I am going to build, so I went about looking for a suitable set of leveler feet for it.
What I decided on turned out to be fairly cost effective and appropriately substantial to handle the anticipated load I’m going to put on this thing.

For $26.99 I found a set of four Billiard table legs on Amazon which looked like they would mount up perfectly to my machine.

When compared to the furniture levelers, there was no comparison. 6” diameter cast metal feet with a chrome finish—Nice!

First thing I had to do was to flip the frame upside down and drill a 1/2” hole through the bottom of the rail.

I added the T-slot nuts into the rail and screwed the mounting plate to the bottom of the rail. For this I had to shorten the screws a bit as they bottomed out before tightening the plate. That proved to be the most time consuming part as all I had was a cut-off disk in my dremel for the task.

The feet threaded right into the mounting plate and they are very secure.

Once all four feet were attached I flipped the frame back over.

Voila! It’s starting to look like something.

I still need to true up the framework, but that will be a relatively simple task, now that I have adjustable feet for it.

My next big purchase are the THK rails for the main X axis. They are 65” long and cost around $500.00 for the pair. This might seem overkill, but I intend on this thing being very accurate and tight toleranced.

It will be one of many substantial investments into this future CNC machine.
Thanks for following along! Happy Thanksgiving to all!

Before;

First thing I had to do was tap the end screw holes for the corner brackets. I could have used these with the t-slot connectors and not had to tap anything, but I wanted the brackets to do double-duty as end caps too.

I didn’t have an appropriate tap, so I used my dremel tool to cut a groove across the threads of a screw, being careful to leave a good cutting edge on the leading edge of the threads.

With a little 3-in-1 oil and my power drill, it worked out nicely.

After;

It didn’t take too long to get it put together to this point. I have about 2 1/2 hours into it so far.

It’s beginning to take shape;

I’m pretty sure I will need to add some sort of levelling legs underneath it in order to set it level and true.
Right now the thing has a twist in it and is put together mostly to solidify the vision I have in my head for this.
The leveling legs will likely add another 4” to 6” in height to this which will put it right about where it should be.

I won’t bother to true it up until that part is done.

There will be another frame inset inside this one that will hold the 4th axis motor and tailstock.
It will be hinged at the head and have an adjustable height on the tail end—probably with some all thread. (Details pending, of course) This will allow for tapered work. (The infamous pseudo-5th axis.)

The side panels will probably be filled in for rigidity, but I want to be sure that the bearings and pinon gears will have the required room for mounting before I do that part.

The current overall size is 28”W X 68”L X 28”H

Thanks for following along. Stay tuned.

I have a dining table project coming up which may provide funds to buy the next batch of parts. That could be as soon as Thanksgiving. We’ll see how it goes.

I have a pretty good idea what I want and the materials I can acquire on the cheap will dictate most of what ends up becoming my completed machine.

I want to be able to do 3 axis machining on a small basis, but also a 4th rotary axis for doing and carving on turnings and 3-D objects.

I’ve found a lot of good componants and they’ve come down in price even since last year.
This T-slot is from an old test bench that my Father had gotten and wasn’t using. He gave it to me as a birthday gift. What he really gave me, was the birth of my new machine. I figure I’ve got just enough here to make up the framework of a decent hobby machine.

There’s no real budget sitting around for this project, so I’ll have to acquire peices out of my monthly budget.
This will be a slow going project. If I finish it within the next two years, I’ll be pretty satisfied. For now, this is what I’ve got.

I spent a couple hours last night stripping this down and cleaning it up. It sat outside for some time and a lot of the bolts and nuts were rusted. They’re all now soaking in oil in a #10 can to clean them up.

T-slot is like the grown man’s erector set. This stuff is cool. This 2” X 2” stuff is way more rigid than I thought it would be. I’ve decided to do a double rail framework to make it even more rigid. It should work fairly well I think.

That’s it for now. Stay tuned. Take notes. Thanks for reading along!

The pump is a pneumatic venturi that I got from joewoodworker dot com. It was the most expensive part of the build but not that expensive. It was surprisingly efficient at drawing a vacuum.
As you can see, in an Arizona summer it drew 24.5 inches of Mercury.

Subsequent builds I acheived 27 to 28 inches of mercury, which is pretty good, if you’re taking notes.
Eventually I will put an automatic valve on it, but I found if I hang out in the area a couple hours while it is in the press and take note of the pressure guage I can manually recharge every few minutes and not have an issue.

For the bags, I found I can buy the same vinyl in rolls at the fabric store (10mill thick instead of 30mil of the commercial ones) and buy heavy duty double sided tape at HD and make “semi-disposable” bags for real cheap. It worked out great. Besides, no one makes the 10 foot bag that I would need for this project.

The Build:
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The first step in the actual plywood making was to create my form. For this I made a type of torsion box from 4’X10 PB which I laminated with 3/8” wiggle wood. No additional layers were needed.
My daughters paid a visit just as I was gluing up for the top and they we eager to lend a hand.

Before running the full laminations, a test was in order. I needed to be sure this system worked before committing expensive plys and veneers to this. Besides, I need to create color samples too, so it fit the bill perfectly.
The layers from back to front looked like this; 20 mil Polybak Liner backing, 1/8” MDF, 3/8” 3-ply wiggle wood, 1/8” MDF, 20 mil Red Oak veneer face. If you look closely you can see the plys for the finished panels underneath the form biding thier time.

I used standard PVA adhesive for the plys and chose NOT to put the form in the bag. At this size, the bag would crush the form anyway, so I used the off-fall from the form ribs as cauls on top of the bag. It held its shape without any coersion at all. Nice.

At the time of this project, I was cramped into 1/2 of a 2 car garage. It always looked cluttered, but when this took most of the space, it got crazy for a few days.

This was to be part of a rostrum in a church, actually a Jewish Tempe. Someone attempted to do this themselves by bending 1/4” ply over a frame and failed. Too many bumps along the way, finishing issues and the like. Thicker plywood would make for a really clean and quality look and I got the nod to finish the job.

The Layup:
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Unfortunately I don’t have pics of the layups in the press. I had my hands full spreading glue under a timer. Even with a helper this was an intense process. The panels are just over 9 feet long and there were a couple inner seams in the substrate. I staggered the seams throughout the layers and prejoined these whenever possible before the final layup.

Here is a look of the finished panels just before delivery.

The Finished Installation:
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I think these speak for themselves.

Another satisfied client.

Thanks for following along.

Its last project—Stumpy’s Tubafore contest. (Being as I won the contest, I figured maybe it was time to get the kind of respectable tools that such a station deserves. heheh Ok, maybe a little better saw than that—No offense Stumpy)

I’d been lurking on CL for almost a year trying to decide what to get. I’d read every TS forum on here. Read the reviews ad nauseum. Finally it happened. The saw I wanted on CL for $500—In Las Vegas… dang!
I began rationalizing how to get it. Las Vegas is $150 in gas and 11 hours round trip driving from Phoenix.
That would bring the cost to around $650 plus losing my whole weekend. (Not to mention the losses at the casino—it’s Vegas afterall.)

Then there was this ad in Scotsdale for $900 for the same saw. Would he take $700? It’d be worth it.

After a few calls over that last few days, he says he would take $750 for the saw. BINGO! My weekend was worth at least $100 to me, so off I went.

This pic was what the guy emailed to me when I replied to his ad. I’ll be taking new photos later today (Notice the blade guard still in the factory packaging down below the table)

When I get to this guy’s place, I am amazed by the tools he had. This guy was set up nice.
When I asked why he was selling the saw, he said he thought he’d try his hand at wood working, but discovered, after buying all the tools, that he wasn’t that good at it.

In my head I’m thinking, “Isn’t this like golf? Do it because you enjoy it. And, if you’re good at it, all the better!” On the other hand, I figure I’d better not talk him out of selling me the saw either! So I didn’t say anything. He told me about how he inherited a bunch of tools from his Dad when he passed and he showed me about 30 vintage planes. He wasn’t really sure what to do with them, but he isn’t ready to sell any either.

The saw weighed over 400 lbs. We ended up taking it apart in order to load it into my truck.
When I got it home I took a couple 4/4 rough sawn Maple planks from the rack, screwed them to a 2X4 clamped in my workmate and built a ramp to slide it off the tailgate. My truck is 4X4 so the tailgate is pretty high up. Unloading it by myself was a bit precarious, but workable with the gravity assist and all.

I took my time putting it together. Checking and aligning everything as I went. This model has a slider on the left side of the table which is likely only slightly better than a basic miter gauge. Still, I am hoping it will come in handy. The table is pretty flat, but there is a slight bow front to back (about 0.007”) in the sliding portion of the table that is starting to bug me. In my head, I’m already trying to figure out how to machine it flat again.

I’m not very impressed with the fence. The tail end of it isn’t very rigid and flexes when pushed. Also the hairline in the sight-glass moves based on your viewing angle. I’m still checking if these two issues can be adjusted or fixed.

This morning all the muscles in my body are telling me I was heaving about a 400 lb saw the day before. I’m not nearly as young as I used to be.

Hopefully, I’ll be cutting wood with it tonight. It will be a good break from having to use one leg to keep the saw from moving while trying to rip 8/4 Maple. At a bare minimum, at least I won’t be as embarrassed to take photos of my messy workshop anymore. Pics to follow.