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[Ultimatedesk]

you better hurry up your computer is going to be obsolete before your done lol

lmao, you're totally right. You know I've been working on this thing for like 6 months now?! Isn't that nuts!

It's been a while, but I can assure you, progress is still moving forward with the Ultimate Computer Desk!

I finally got around to assembling the left-hand cabinet - here it is, all glued and clamped together. It's a really solid unit - the dado cuts lined up really well, and the structure is rock solid.





Here I am doing a mock-up of the right-hand cabinet. This one was a little trickier to put together. There is a pretty specific order of assembly, otherwise, you're left with a piece that just doesn't want to fit properly.



Some outlines for the motherboard I/O and power supply



I remember mentioning that I free-handed the holes with the router for the left-hand cabinet. I decided to play a safer route for the right-hand cabinet.

I took a piece of wood, lined it up with my straight edge, and ran my router on top of the wood with a straight bit - this game me a perfect "stencil". What I can do then, is take the stencil, line up the edge with a line that I've drawn on the target piece, place a straight edge behind the stencil, clamp down the straight edge, remove the stencil, and run my router across the straight edge for a straight, accurate line.

Wow, that was a mouthful.





And the end product:





And then I made a pretty huge mistake...

Here is the suspect:



Bam. Can you guess why this was a bad idea?

[IDad]

cracked or misaligned ???

[Ultimatedesk]

cracked or misaligned ???

Neither! You'll see below!

Holy moly, I'm really sorry for the lack of updates folks - I've been sick for quite a while and the weather has been miserable so I haven't had much time to work on the desk. Apparently I had cedar poisoning! Wonderful!

Anyways - back on track!

Those of you who guessed it right - yes, I shouldn't have made the hole in the first place. I don't know what I was thinking. This is the right-hand cabinet.



Whoops!



Here's the biscuit joiner I was using. It worked pretty well for what it is. The tricky part was determining the order of which pieces/faces/sides to glue first and how to keep it all from falling apart before completion.









Here's the left-hand cabinet all dried and ready for some trim



And voila, my erm.. elegant clamping solution (I need to grab some cauls!)





Hope you enjoy! Rest assured, this project WILL BE FINISHED! Just.. mm, I don't really know when. I'm moving in a month and a half, so all the staining/sanding will have to be done, at a minimum.

Take care!

[Ultimatedesk]

This part of the project took a better part of a month. There was a lot of sanding, waiting, and sweating as I put on each thin layer of polyurethane on the desk surface.

Here it is at the start of the phase - what a mess!





You can see there was still sanding to do from when I put in the wood filler back in... November!



All cleaned up, ready to rock the stain. It was starting to get nice as well so it was time to lube up the 'ol bike chain as well!





Part way through the first coat



Note that this is the bottom of the desk surface. I did this intially without any kind of pre-stain or wood treatment to see if I could get away with it.





I actually noticed a significant amount of dark spots and uneveness, so for the top of the desk, and for all future staining, I went with a pre-stain, and two coats of Old Masters Gel Stain. Here is the desk surface approximately a month later with around 8 coats of polyurethane on top. It will be getting a good ol fashion rubbing out in another month from now once it has fully cured.



Have a good weekend everyone!

[IDad]

looking good dude!

[Ultimatedesk]

looking good dude!

Thanks iDad! The project goes on!

So, with the main desk surface out of the way, it was time to start focusing on the top shelf portion, which, at this point, hadn't been sanded, cut perfectly, or assembled. Here were all the pieces required.



A quick mock up:



A few tests with the biscuit joiner to make sure I was aligned properly:







I couldn't get it exactly in the center - the bottom of the joiner is a bit concave and it made lining it up a little difficult. The tool is generally used to join boards end to end, so there wasn't really any facility for on-face joining like this.

Assembly and glue up time:







Enjoy! You can never have too many clamps you know? I couldn't continue on doing the side pods until this stuff dried up first.

[Ultimatedesk]

With the first phase of the top shelf all solid and dried, I could continue on to the two side pods. Here's the initial mockup.





Notice the pencil lines for the biscuits I'll be installing.



Those biscuits are so dark and moody... lol!



Aaand, some gratuitous clamping shots. Like that extra-long setup? Yeah, that worked this time, but I don't recommend it. It wasn't too stable, but there wasn't really anything else I could clamp on to for that end-pressure required.







Mmmm glue.



So that's it for this update, I know it's a pretty simple one, but hey, it's one more phase done. Just needs to have some trim stuck on and then staining!

Have a good weekend!

[Ultimatedesk]

Ok, so it's been a little while since an update eh?

I've been busy, sorry folks, life seems to speed up in the summertime!

As a peace offering, here are the kiddo's, at about 4 months old now!





And, back to the desk!

I had a bunch of solid maple cut into more 1/4" strips so I could finish doing the trim on the top shelf and the cabinets.



My trusty compound mitre saw - got it reconditioned at a bargain place for like 60 dollars, and it's been pretty reliable for a number of years now. It's loud as all heck though!



And, my favorite part - clamping up!







And, since there was nowhere to place clamps in between this area, I had to improvise with a small block of wood!

[Ultimatedesk]

After the trim was glued on and then sanded flush, I proceeded with the staining and poly



Looks good, eh?



I also finally decided to buckle down and build myself a quick rig to store all my clamps. Since I'm moving soon, it'll also make it easier to move them to the new place! Nice lap joints eh!!



I proceeded to the cabinet drawers, where I finally sanded off the wood filler that's been attached for weeks (months?)



Lined up the drawer faces, glued them on (Was going to screw them on after, from behind. Lol)



And put a bit of weight on top..



Walked away for a bit, and realized... maybe it was a bad idea to glue them on first! Uh oh!

I decided that it might actually be a lot easier to line up the drawer faces if I attached them AFTER I had attached the drawers to the drawer slides, to I ripped em off.

So, next on the list - staining the actual drawers!

Pre-stain on!



Mmm, they look so good





And, poly of course





Done!



And just so ya know, it really did basically take a month just to finish the top shelf and the drawers... more to come soon!

[IDad]

comeon already finish the darn thing! LOL thats going to look awesome once completed