Coffee Table
I’ve always wanted to build a piece of furniture and when we needed a new coffee table I thought I might as well design and build my own. If you want to learn a bit about making one of these, please read on.
The design process took me quite a while; scribbling all kinds of ideas in my notebook, my girlfriend reminding me that that particular idea would never hold as much as a cup of coffee, redesigning again. In the end I managed to design something that might just work. I made an accurate 3D representation of the design using the excellent (free!) Sketchup Software . You can download the Sketchup file at the end of the article.
After designing it was time to select the wood I wanted. I considered pretty much everything but eventually decided on something called ‘Nyatoh’, a hardwood with a lovely reddish sheen (FSC off course). I bought two pieces, 200×60 cm and 200×40 cm, both 18mm thick.
I first built a scale model from paper, using the individual parts to determine the most economical arrangement before cutting the wood. For me this helped a lot but you can skip it if you can’t be bothered, just be sure to check your measurements (twice) before sawing the wood.
Once you’re sure, get out the jigsaw. When sawing hardwood be sure not to set fire to the table-to-be because the jigsaw can get incredibly hot.
Even though the wood didn’t splinter a whole lot, you obviously do need to sand down the edges or even use a fine file.
When you’ve sawed all the individual pieces it’s time to start putting it all together. Now is also a very good time for a cup of tea.
There’s lots of ways of connecting two pieces of wood. I decided on a dowel reinforced joint because it’s fast and reasonably sturdy. It worked really well and with the glue it resulted in a perfect join.
I also bought this little device which helps arranging the drill holes for the dowels and helps you drill straight. It’s a really cool little device and it saves you quite a few headaches.
Keep building using the dowels and don’t forget to check the design every three minutes because it is very very easy to make a mistake and connect parts the wrong way.
And there you have it, a one-of-a-kind coffee table. Finished. Well, almost finished. Still needs some paint to protect the wood.
In the end I chose a transparent lacquer because the wood had such a wonderful colour. Below the end result from when the table wasn’t yet filled to the brim with newspapers and magazines…
downloads
Posted by jacob on 18 September 2006
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18 September 2006
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