# Scratch Build: Building the Ultimate Computer Desk



## ultimatedesk

Hey all,

I decided to buckle down and finally make the desk I've been planning for a long time.

It's going to be made of 3/4" 2-Sided Maple Veneered plywood and it will house 2 computers (So no cases, the desk IS the chassis).

It will have support for 3 27" monitors (One day, when I win the lottery) as well as manual fan control, dust control, noise control, and it will be solid like a tank, so one day, when I decide to populate it with awesome hardware after selling all of my other earthly belongings and moving into a tiny room, I should be able to sleep on it, use it as an earthquake shelter, etc...

Here are the initial plans:











And here is the shop I'll be using, along with a few pics of the wood I purchased:







Stay tuned for some updates! I'm already quite a bit into the project, so I've got loads of photos to show all of you, but that doesn't mean everything is set in stone, so let me know if you have any comments, advice, or criticisms!


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## ultimatedesk

*Initial Cuts*

Made the initial lengthwise rips:










And then cut and labeled all of the pieces appropriately:










And made a big mess!:










A good friend of mine - solid, dependable, strong, and sharp like a ground piece of carbide :










More to come!


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## shotgn

Good luck with that.....I have seen that posted somewhere else. But i dont remember where.

Looks awesome, been looking to do something similar.


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## JimE

Not trying to tell you how to use your tools, but your blade appears to high. The blade should only extend 1/8-1/4 above the material. You will get "cleaner" cuts as less material is removed by each tooth. Also, for furniture and trim type work, you will get much better results (with less cleanup and sanding), by using a finishing blade (ie: more teeth). That appears to be a general purpose "ripping" or "crosscut" blade.

Check references here: http://www.rockler.com/articles/saw-blade-selection-guide.cfm

Just pointing out what I've learned over time.

Good luck on your ambitious project.


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## ultimatedesk

*Thanks - First Desk Hole!*



shotgn said:


> Good luck with that.....I have seen that posted somewhere else. But i dont remember where.
> 
> Looks awesome, been looking to do something similar.


Thanks shotgn - I do have it posted in several forums online - just trying to get as many comments and feedback as I can. I'm learning just as much from the process, as I am from various commenters!



Dogg said:


> Not trying to tell you how to use your tools, but your blade appears to high. The blade should only extend 1/8-1/4 above the material. You will get "cleaner" cuts as less material is removed by each tooth. Also, for furniture and trim type work, you will get much better results (with less cleanup and sanding), by using a finishing blade (ie: more teeth). That appears to be a general purpose "ripping" or "crosscut" blade.
> 
> Check references here: http://www.rockler.com/articles/saw-blade-selection-guide.cfm[url]http://www.rockler.com/articles/saw-blade-selection-guide.cfm[/URL]
> 
> Just pointing out what I've learned over time.
> 
> Good luck on your ambitious project.


Thanks Dogg, I really appreciate the feedback - I actually have not had the opportunity to use a wood shop since I was in High School, which was quite a long time ago. The owner of the shop pretty much let me go at it however I wanted as long as I remembered to wear my safety glasses and not lose any fingers, so any time you have tips about woodworking, I'd be glad to hear them! Thanks for the website as well 

Had time to cut that last 8' sheet into the 28" sections, and cut a hole in the surface portion of the desk. The surface portion, fyi, will be composed of two 8' pieces of 3/4" plywood, so its total thickness will be 1.5" thick.

The upper plywood will have a hole that is .5" wider all around than the board beneath it.

Only had time to do one hole tonight - the lower portion, thankfully, because I made a few small mistakes!

Sorry about the photos folks, I had already uploaded these to imageshack and forgot to resize them, so here are the thumbnails since I don't have the original stock photos on me right now. From now on, they'll be properly sized at 800x600, which I feel is a fair compromise for detail and bandwidth.





I started off with a carpenters angle, measured off my lines with a pencil and then made a rough cut with a jigsaw. I then clamped a straight-edge lined up with the edges (measured) and ran a router across it to create the smooth finish.

I messed up a bit, going a bit too far with the router on one end, and then not far enough on the other end - I'll have to sand and file to square it off.

Sorry I didn't take too many pictures - the next hole will have more!







Thankfully the shop is heated, here's one of the heaters - it went down to -8*C that evening!



Here's the mess for the night!





And, the hero of the night! Mastercraft Plunge Router!!


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## JimE

The best way that I've found for cutting holes, is by using a hole saw.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hole_saw

You can get them in any size that you need and they work with a drill. Start from the "finished" side as the wood will sometimes splinter as the saw goes through. You will then have a nice clean cut on the finished side and a perfect circle.


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## ultimatedesk

*Drawer Time*



Dogg said:


> The best way that I've found for cutting holes, is by using a hole saw.
> 
> [url]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hole_saw[/URL]
> 
> You can get them in any size that you need and they work with a drill. Start from the "finished" side as the wood will sometimes splinter as the saw goes through. You will then have a nice clean cut on the finished side and a perfect circle.


Thanks for the link and tips there Dogg 

I was able to spend some time in the shop this weekend, and didn't get as much done as I would have liked to.

One of the main things holding me back right now is the fact that I have not selected the motherboard tray, and template for the motherboard input and outputs, as well as PCI slots. This prevents me from cutting the holes accurately in the back of both of the modules, which prevents me from assembling the actual modules.

I have some "spare" desktop chassis lying around, and will be working to find a solution to that soon.

In the meantime, I started working on the drawers for the right-hand module.

I first took them through the table saw again, trimming off the last 16th or two from some of the boards.










Then went to work sanding all of the pieces down with 150 grit. I will likely go up to a 180 grit before the final stain goes on. I clamped a straight-edge on to the table saw so that it was easier to sand with the grain (Thanks Mike)




























Slowly, but surely, I went through all the pieces for the drawers, except for the faces. Yes, bad things happen when I don't have my sketchup drawings. I start drawing with markers.



















Mike was doing some work in the shop at the same time as me that day, so there was quite the mess.



















I put together my tools of the trade










And here are the gluing steps I went through




























A few somewhat artistic clamp shots 




























Everything looks pretty straight




























Glued and clamped together the largest of the drawers, will likely put some hanging folders in there.





































Then I screwed everything together with #8 1.5" screws, all holes pre-drilled and countersunk. Most of the holes will be covered by the actual drawer sliding mechanisms, but the exposed ones will get some wood putty.

It's funny being in someone else's wood shop - I couldn't find the countersink bit anywhere - I tried looking through all the drill bit boxes (There were several) and nothing, so I had been using a small bit, then switching to the big bit to countersink, and then switching to the screw bit to screw in the holes.

Mike walks in half-way through the holes and you could tell he was rather amused - he goes to the back of the shop, pulls out a box, pulls out a box from the box, and then a small medicine container out from the box in a box - "Geez, didn't I tell ya to just look around? Oh. Wait. I guess this one was sorta hard to find eh?".

At that point, he also points out that there are several drills in the shop - silly me. So one drill with the countersink bit, one drill with the screw bit. It's been very interesting working in a shop dedicated to this type of work - very, very different from working in the basement with just basic hand tools.










I haven't attached the faces of the drawers yet as I haven't determined how I would like to attach them. I would also like to attach the trim to the outer edges of the faces before attaching them to the drawers, since it'll be much easier to clamp all the faces together at once.










And that's it for todays update - a bit short, yes, a lot of pictures of clamps, sorry, I got carried away 

I'm spending some time in the shop tonight, so hopefully I'll have another update for all of you tomorrow or the day after!


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## WereBo

'tis making good progress ultimatedesk







- Are you going to veneer the front-faces to hide the plys, when finished?


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## ultimatedesk

*2nd Hole*



WereBo said:


> 'tis making good progress ultimatedesk
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> - Are you going to veneer the front-faces to hide the plys, when finished?


Hopefully, there will be no exposed ply edges on the front of the desk. All other visible ply edges will be covered with 1/4" solid maple!

I finally got around to putting the second hole in the desk surface area (Since the desk is composed of two sheets of plywood, there are two holes needed, with the "top surface" needing a hole that is .5" larger all the way around, so the "bottom surface" supports the piece of glass which covers the gaming computer).

I took a few more detailed pictures compared to last time.

As with before, I started by cutting out a rough shape with the jigsaw. I was able to get within .5" comfortably of my marked lines. Sometimes if you rush the jigsaw, your cuts can get a little squirrely, so I was playing it safe. This is the top surface, so no screwing up here!!










I then took an extra dose of patience, and went in straight to the corners with the jigsaw. This is a step I did not take last time, and I made a mistake with the router because of this.





































I then took the router and pressed the bit right into the corner, and clamped a straight-edge on behind it. This is how I set the distance from the bit to the straight-edge. I repeated the same for the other side.

All it took was a good solid pass from right-to-left and I had a very clean straight edge without having to go all the way into the corners, where mistakes can be made, since it is quite difficult to see where the actual router bit is when the tool is running.




























Unclamp, reset router, reset clamps and straight edge, lather, rinse, and repeat:



















This hole had a very small margin of error overall, and I am very pleased with the result. The jigsaw is an incredible versatile tool and can be very accurate, as long as you have patience. This one corner is the only one that will need a touch-up with a file and/or sandpaper, and you can see, it's only going to need less than a 16th of material removal!










And that's all I had time for in the shop that day  Enjoy some of my mess!



















Until next time - I have some images in the queue, but I haven't quite gotten around to resizing them just yet


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## harrylucas

Too lazy to read through this all, but your case(s) arent going to be made out of wood? there is a reason why manufactures don't do that! Make sure its well ventilated with lots of fans!


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## harrylucas

And with the drawer faces you could use some wood glue and those double ended reverse thread things?
See:

http://i01.i.aliimg.com/photo/v0/215316633/Double_Ended_Screws.jpg


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## magnethead

harrylucas said:


> Too lazy to read through this all, but your case(s) arent going to be made out of wood? there is a reason why manufactures don't do that! Make sure its well ventilated with lots of fans!


I will attest to this. I built a 1/4" plywood case with *THREE 10" FANS* and even though it has the lowest CPU temp of any of my computers (only a 1.6 Turion), it's case right now (based on IR temp) is 91.5 degrees idling, whereas my poweredge server's case is 82 degrees, and my desktop's case is 84. The walls of my room are 82, ceiling is 83.


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## MPR

My former shop teacher told me this while I was setting up his new computer last month:

My old high school recently decided that all of their computer cases should be hidden and secure from student tampering within lockable cabinets, so they designed nice-looking oak cabinets with only small holes in back for the cords. They then asked my old shop teacher, who will be the first to admit that he knows next to nothing about computers, to build the cabinets.

The day the computers were installed in the cabinets one by one each began to fail. Interestingly, the schools "IT guy" was all behind the project and couldn't understand why the computers were shutting down.

The school principal then called a local computer repair shop who had a good laugh explaining to him the need for cooling with modern PCs. Needless to say the computers, at least the ones that are still running, have been restored to their proper place in the environment.

Edit: Your project seems to be going well, though I'd probably have lightened it up somewhat by using 1/2" material and lap joints for the drawer sides and 1/4" material set in a groove for the bottoms, but that's just how I build things. It looks like it is going to be sturdy though.


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## JimE

Another tip: pocket hole jig

http://www.kregtool.com/

There are numerous models from many companies. Obviously much stronger than just glue and no visible screws.


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## MPR

My dad started out as an industrial arts teacher before migrating into history and counseling, while building houses in the summer. Over the past 55 years he has built upwards of thirty houses, and I don't mean contracted them either -- I mean built. I recall when I first started helping him that dowels were the in thing for cabinetry, this gave way to biscuits, and finally to pocket hole screws. Pocket hole screws are amazingly efficient things and have revolutionized cabinetry, making assembly almost twice as fast. Oriented correctly you will have very strong joints and not a glue block, screw plug or nail head in sight.


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## ultimatedesk

Dogg said:


> Another tip: pocket hole jig
> 
> http://www.kregtool.com/[url]http://www.kregtool.com/[/URL]
> 
> There are numerous models from many companies. Obviously much stronger than just glue and no visible screws.


Thanks for the link Dogg



MPR said:


> My dad started out as an industrial arts teacher before migrating into history and counseling, while building houses in the summer. Over the past 55 years he has built upwards of thirty houses, and I don't mean contracted them either -- I mean built. I recall when I first started helping him that dowels were the in thing for cabinetry, this gave way to biscuits, and finally to pocket hole screws. Pocket hole screws are amazingly efficient things and have revolutionized cabinetry, making assembly almost twice as fast. Oriented correctly you will have very strong joints and not a glue block, screw plug or nail head in sight.


I will have to look into how I can incorporate some of these pocket screws. Thanks for the information.



magnethead said:


> I will attest to this. I built a 1/4" plywood case with *THREE 10" FANS* and even though it has the lowest CPU temp of any of my computers (only a 1.6 Turion), it's case right now (based on IR temp) is 91.5 degrees idling, whereas my poweredge server's case is 82 degrees, and my desktop's case is 84. The walls of my room are 82, ceiling is 83.


As the multi-quote is only allowing me to get 3 of you at a time - take this as an acknowledgment to all of you who have commented on the fact that I'll be using wood as my case material:

I will have to do quite a bit of testing, but until that happens, I can only say that I am confident that my "wind tunnel" design will expel most of the hot air. I have seen successful wood case mods done in the past, but I have also heard a lot of issues about heat in other wood case situations. So all that can be done is some crossing of the fingers, and the careful design of intake and exhaust  Thanks for your support and concern though!

It's been a little while since my last update, so here are a few snapshots. As some of you might know, I've been a little held back in the project due to not having selected my motherboard I/O plates and motherboard trays. Without having the actual items, I couldn't make the appropriate measurements to make cut-outs in the back of the cabinets, and therefore, was unable to make the dado cuts due to worry about everything not fitting properly.

So I scrounged through some old desktop systems I had lying around, emptied their components into my bins, and decided to take apart their chassis in search of some good motherboard tray and I/O parts.

So - off to the spooky basement with a pair of chassis, my trusty drill and dremel.



















Having never drilled rivets out of a case before, I wasn't entirely sure what to expect. At first, I started with a bit that was a little bit small, so the rivets came up onto the drill bit itself and got stuck on there pretty good. Eventually, I moved to a bigger bit, and all it took was one good squeeze of the trigger and the rivet would come right out nice and cleanly.



















Starting to rack up some parts here










You can see in the image above that the I/O and PCI Plate is built right into the back of the desktop chassis - this is unfortunate, as you'll see in some future photos, my other case actually had a modular I/O plate. I'll have to take the dremel to that part to get what I need.

Time to grab the pliers...










Here is the shot of the back plate of the other desktop chassis - see how the I/O plate was actually riveted in, and not pressed as a whole back sheet like the other one? Soo much easier to deal with.










That was a pretty fun experience taking apart the cases. I've got a bunch of scrap sheet metal now too - wonder what interesting projects I can come up with to use them...

On to that first I/O plate - I need to dremel out the section that I need










Huh.. that actually didn't work out too well, at least, not the way I would like. I'm going to take these parts to the shop to see if there are any better tools for getting nice clean lines.

Until next time!


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## MPR

The thermal conductivity of wood at its best is 100 times less than steel, so you are going to have to really watch airflow. That said, wood is as good an insulator of sound as it is of heat so you might have a fairly silent rig even if you have several large fans blowing.

Fifty bucks for a basic Kreg Jig kit is a worthwhile investment (the $100 kit is even easier to use). Cabinet face frames and carcasses go together in minutes and as you build other projects you will find all sorts of uses for it.


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## ultimatedesk

*Desktop Chop Shop Part 2*



MPR said:


> The thermal conductivity of wood at its best is 100 times less than steel, so you are going to have to really watch airflow. That said, wood is as good an insulator of sound as it is of heat so you might have a fairly silent rig even if you have several large fans blowing.
> 
> Fifty bucks for a basic Kreg Jig kit is a worthwhile investment (the $100 kit is even easier to use). Cabinet face frames and carcasses go together in minutes and as you build other projects you will find all sorts of uses for it.


Thanks MPR - I will have to check out the local hardware stores to see if I can pick one up before I start assembly of the cabinets. Airflow and temperature monitoring will for sure, be one of the top priorities during the setup phase.

I had some time to take those motherboard tray and I/O Plates to the shop to try out a few tools / techniques for shaping them into something I actually like.

First off, yes, Mike and I tried using the nice Dewalt Jigsaw, but the Mastercraft metal blades we were trying to use just wouldn't stay in the darn clamp. It would cut like butter for maybe 10 seconds and then bam, the blade would fall out of the bottom of the jigsaw onto the ground. Not sure what was going on there.










Next up, we tried this neat little Mastercraft oscillating tool with a metal blade as well, but no such luck. Couldn't figure out a good way to clamp down the metal tray, so it just vibrated it like crazy instead of actually cutting.



















Our next contestant was an air compressor powered cutting wheel, which, was ultimately less accurate than the dremel, and just as slow.










So we took out the big gun, the sawzall.










Ha, no, just kidding. It wouldn't work even a tiny bit for a piece like this.

In the end, you know what ultimately worked the best?










Yeah, a hacksaw. Go figure.

Anyways, here you can see my mangled I/O plate for the motherboard. It's not a pretty sight at all in my opinion.










This is the nice I/O plate that I didn't even have to do anything except drill out a few rivets.










I think I'm going to have to come up with a better solution for this. We'll see shortly 

Hope everyone who is getting snow is enjoying it, I know here in Ottawa, it's been a pretty crazy few days!

Stay tuned for more updates, will be spending some time in the shop this week and working with WOOD!


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## nbjeter3

Can I make a small suggestion (a slight change in your design as it were) instead of having two keyboards and mice (one hidden, the other the primary) why not a single keyboard and mouse hooked to a KVM? I imagine with all the work your putting into this, you will be designing cable management into it.

This will also allow for additional Airflow room for the PC with the keyboard and mouse shelf.


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## MPR

You sure do have some nice tools (I'm also partial to DeWalt).

When cutting small or intricate thin metal pieces that have a tendency to vibrate, I sometimes find it helpful to drill some holes where they won't interfere with the work then attach the whole thing to a board, which I can then securely clamp to my workbench.

Edit: I usually use my Dremel with a cutoff disk or a hacksaw and just cut metal, wood and all. Unlike most jigsaws, a hacksaw blade is usually turned so that it cuts on the down-stroke, and this pushes the metal against the wood, stabilizing it.


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## Acuta73

Your project is coming along nicely. Your pics get better, too. = )

Worry not about using wood for a case, it's been done many times with no issues. Just make sure ventilation is adequate. Insulation works both ways...

Also, update your thread on The Mod Brothers, I know many have been lurking without comment, but they ARE looking!


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## ultimatedesk

*Working with Drawers*



nbjeter3 said:


> Can I make a small suggestion (a slight change in your design as it were) instead of having two keyboards and mice (one hidden, the other the primary) why not a single keyboard and mouse hooked to a KVM? I imagine with all the work your putting into this, you will be designing cable management into it.
> 
> This will also allow for additional Airflow room for the PC with the keyboard and mouse shelf.


I have considered using a KVM, but there is also a regular possibility that I'll have a second person at the desk at the same time as me using the other computer, so two keyboards and mice are, unfortunately, a necessity.


MPR said:


> You sure do have some nice tools (I'm also partial to DeWalt).
> 
> When cutting small or intricate thin metal pieces that have a tendency to vibrate, I sometimes find it helpful to drill some holes where they won't interfere with the work then attach the whole thing to a board, which I can then securely clamp to my workbench.
> 
> Edit: I usually use my Dremel with a cutoff disk or a hacksaw and just cut metal, wood and all. Unlike most jigsaws, a hacksaw blade is usually turned so that it cuts on the down-stroke, and this pushes the metal against the wood, stabilizing it.


That's a great idea about attaching the whole thing to a board. I don't know why the desktop chop shop went so poorly - I must have been having one of my rare impatient days!


Acuta73 said:


> Your project is coming along nicely. Your pics get better, too. = )
> 
> Worry not about using wood for a case, it's been done many times with no issues. Just make sure ventilation is adequate. Insulation works both ways...
> 
> Also, update your thread on The Mod Brothers, I know many have been lurking without comment, but they ARE looking!


Thanks for the support Acuta73, I'm not too worried about the material - we will see how the ventilation works out, and if I need more power, I need more power!

As for updating my other thread... well, we'll see about that when this one gets caught up! 

I had a bit of time in the shop this week to work on getting my drawers up to speed. I decided to take the advice of a fellow forum member and add "false fronts" to my drawers so that I can attach the "real fronts" using screws by screwing from the inside of the drawer, so I wouldn't have any screw heads to cover up on the outside.

Here they are, with my roughed out false fronts - I happened to have 3 pieces of wood almost exactly the size I needed.










Time to take out 'ol trusty










A quick test fit, and all 3 fit perfectly



















Add a bit of glue, and some trusty clamps, and we've got ourselves the beginnings of some false fronts!




























All 3 of them fit rather nicely. I think they helped square out the drawers overall as well (Even though they were only out of square by around 1/16th of an inch).

So, I've got some time for the glue to dry. I'm not sure if anyone can remember this, but in my original cut sheets, I had planned on cutting out a specific piece of wood using the wood that I jigsawed out of the desk surface.

Here's that piece:










Not, exactly.... square..




So I take this nice little protractor attached to a table saw slide - it's set at 90, so here we go!










I do 2 sides, and then use the actual table saw fence to square out the other 2, but something just doesn't seem right..



















It's not really square. What's going on here?










Aha! Looks like the protractor was a little bit off, resulting in a shape one step closer to a diamond as opposed to a square. After a bit of readjustment, I redid that bit and cut it to size - it's the drawer face for the large drawer.










Now that the glue is settled, I decided to throw a few screws into the false fronts.



















Awesome. And solid too!










Now, this is kind of embarrassing, but I had to go back and fix a mistake I made in my initial cuts. This piece of wood was supposed to be 20" x 28", but it ended up being more like 19.8" x 28". It may not seem like much, but this is the back piece to the left-hand cabinet. I would have to adjust the width of all 3 shelves if I were to continue using this, and I've got the space already pretty tightly packed with computer components on the top shelf.

So... don't do this at home, just cut a new piece of wood (I didn't want to cut into a new sheet of 4x8 just for this one piece...)

This piece looks like a good fit...




























No one will see it, because it'll be in the back, but you will all know. So... let's just forget that ever happened, ok?


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## MPR

Looks like it's coming together.

I see those drawers glide wood on wood. You might try some dry lube on them to make them slide easier. I recently made a bin to go under a workbench that just slides on the concrete. I sprayed some dry lube made for table saw tops on its underside and it slides so well that I can pull out the thing with my foot, even though it holds 50 pounds of tools.


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## JimE

Although it's likely too late now, wood on wood drawer slides is not a good idea, especially if the drawers get any weight in them. Not necessarily because they can get hard to open (especially if it gets damp), but because the wood will wear and create dust.


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## hhnq04

Looks like a fun project, and you seem to be having a blast and learning a lot along the way. Keep up the work, will be looking forward to seeing the whole thing come together. And then comes figuring out what you're going to populate that empty chassis with!


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## SABL

Well,.......I see no room for drawer guides at all. Had a friend do that years ago.....with the number of drawers it turned out easier to recut and remake the whole lot. In this case, due to the construction of the drawers, it is a simple process by removing the screws from one side and work from there with the fence on the tablesaw. Bottom guides are not recommended if the drawers carry any weight.....side mounts can be purchased with full extension to get to what is stowed in the drawers. Capacity can be over 100lbs, if you wish. 

What are you going to face the cabinets with?? The boxes still have raw end grain from the plywood....Have you considered any type of "toe space" at the bottom of the cabinets?? It will give the bottom drawers some clearance from the floor and help keep you from stumbling when you walk up to the unit. (Look at your kitchen base cabinets) As you plan your desk, think about what type of "pull" you want for the drawers....if you don't want pulls (handles) sticking out you will need to plan on enough room to get your fingers between the drawers..... and also bevel the top or bottom of the drawer front to keep your fingers from slipping...:grin:. 

Not getting a perfectly square cut with a miter guide on a tablesaw is very common unless you have a way to clamp the piece you are working with to the guide itself..... I avoid it as often as possible....:grin:. It doesn't take much for the wood to make the slightest little bit of drift. Another thing I noticed is that the saw blade _appears_ to be heeling towards the fence of your saw.....that can cause problems with accurate cuts. Final point is that you are using a contractor saw....don't expect perfect cuts. 

You're doing great so far!! I have built more with far less.....:laugh:. The company I worked for was controlled by tightwads...... In my early days we were building custom book cases with nothing more than a miter-box, power saw (hand held), and a router. OK, we had an air nailer, too......:grin: (but it was mine)


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## ultimatedesk

*Desk Gluing Time*



Dogg said:


> Although it's likely too late now, wood on wood drawer slides is not a good idea, especially if the drawers get any weight in them. Not necessarily because they can get hard to open (especially if it gets damp), but because the wood will wear and create dust.





hhnq04 said:


> Looks like a fun project, and you seem to be having a blast and learning a lot along the way. Keep up the work, will be looking forward to seeing the whole thing come together. And then comes figuring out what you're going to populate that empty chassis with!





SABL said:


> Well,.......I see no room for drawer guides at all. Had a friend do that years ago.....with the number of drawers it turned out easier to recut and remake the whole lot. In this case, due to the construction of the drawers, it is a simple process by removing the screws from one side and work from there with the fence on the tablesaw. Bottom guides are not recommended if the drawers carry any weight.....side mounts can be purchased with full extension to get to what is stowed in the drawers. Capacity can be over 100lbs, if you wish.
> 
> What are you going to face the cabinets with?? The boxes still have raw end grain from the plywood....Have you considered any type of "toe space" at the bottom of the cabinets?? It will give the bottom drawers some clearance from the floor and help keep you from stumbling when you walk up to the unit. (Look at your kitchen base cabinets) As you plan your desk, think about what type of "pull" you want for the drawers....if you don't wan...


Ok. Where to start. The three drawers you see stacked up on top of each other are not in their final "configuration". All 3 drawers will have ball bearing slides (In the best case scenario) rated for 50-75 pounds ideally (I think my local hardware store only sells one kind). The drawers will be in an actual cabinet. I will likely make solid maple faces for the drawers - you won't see any end-grain plywood except for MAYBE the back of the desk - I'm going to try and avoid that.

And, just as a teaser... I just got a nice package from Kingston in the mail today, and I have a feeling, it's that SSD Drive I've been pining for...

I decided it was time to glue the two surfaces together that would comprise of the actual desk surface and take a break from working on the drawers for a while.

Here it is, the first piece. At first I wanted to lay it face down, so I could evenly distribute screws through the bottom, but in the end, I went face up so I would protect the surface, and it would be a LOT easier to line up the holes.










I threw on the top layer, lined them up, and thought to myself: Hmm, I wonder what it'll look like with the top shelf stacked on:










Pretty cool. This was the first time I had actually pulled a chair up to it to get a real grasp of how big this desk is going to be. I was pretty psyched.

Just a note, the two pieces of wood on each end holding up the shelf will actually be the inner supports (ie, pushed inwards towards the middle of the desk a foot or two), and the cubby holes on the outer ends will support the long shelf. The long shelf also has to be trimmed a couple inches, it won't reach right to the end of the desk.










This next part was really quite a challenge on my own.

I lined it up as best as I could (According to the holes that I cut out, since the edges are easy to trim later), lifted one end with a mighty, strong arm, squirted as much glue as I could with my other arm (And only as far as I could reach!), put it down gently, ran to the other side and repeated.

Let me tell you - with the amount of glue I put down, and the fact that each side weighs 20-30 pounds - it did NOT want to slide around easily to get into perfect position.

In the end, I had to muscle it around a bit to get the holes lined up satisfactorily.

(I spoke with a couple friends about this afterward, and one of them suggested making some pilot holes and screwing in a few screws BEFORE the gluing, and then retracting the screws so that just the tips go through the bottom board. That way after the glue is put down, you shuffle around the top board until the tips of the screws find the pilot holes, thus, eliminating the issue of getting proper alignment before the glue becomes too tacky.)

I then threw some weight on top of the table, attached as many clamps as I could find, and started putting some 1.25" screws through the bottom.










A few clamp shots of the hole - everything lined up pretty much perfect. 1/2" on the left and right, 1/2" at the bottom, and I think just a little under 3/4" at the top. (The size of the lip between the upper and lower holes)





































I wasn't satisfied with the way the clamping was going on lengthwise on the surface. I didn't have enough clamps to place them every half foot, so luckily, Mike had some of these nice, big, cedar logs lying around that I re-purposed temporarily.














































The end result turned out quite nicely. The hole was lined up properly. There is only a small overhang / underhang of maybe 2/16's of an inch on two of the edges of the surfaces that should be easy to correct with a flush-bit on the router later.

We'll take a look at them next update! Thanks for staying tuned!


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## SABL

DOH!!......gotcha.....you stacked the drawers too neatly!! 

The dbl layer of plywood is generally not done but will make an extra sturdy surface. 

The "step" can be cleaned up with a router and a flush bit *if* you have a straight edge.....or you can use a "straight-edge" clamped to the top and take a light cut. A factory edge from a plywood rip works nicely in a pinch. 

Looks good so far...keep the pics coming!!

You are doing a great job!! I've seen carpenters that could not do as well as you are doing.....:laugh: and I've seen a bunch of carpenters!!


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## ultimatedesk

*Drawer Trim*



SABL said:


> DOH!!......gotcha.....you stacked the drawers too neatly!!
> 
> The dbl layer of plywood is generally not done but will make an extra sturdy surface.
> 
> The "step" can be cleaned up with a router and a flush bit *if* you have a straight edge.....or you can use a "straight-edge" clamped to the top and take a light cut. A factory edge from a plywood rip works nicely in a pinch.
> 
> Looks good so far...keep the pics coming!!
> 
> You are doing a great job!! I've seen carpenters that could not do as well as you are doing.....:laugh: and I've seen a bunch of carpenters!!


Hehe, glad you caught the drawer thing  Remember, there will also be a cabinet on the side of the drawers to house the second system as well. I did get a chance to clean up the sides, you'll see that in a few updates 

Thanks for the encouragement - planning and patience go a long way! I have not really taken any shortcuts anywhere, since there is no deadline to have it built by - something most carpenters unfortunately have to deal with.

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.


----------



## ultimatedesk

*Trimming the Drawers*

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.


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## SABL

Nice job!! I'll come back and take a better look when I have the time.

Tablesaw blade is in bad shape!! Send it in or replace it.....I can tell just by looking at it that it needs resharpened. The cuts, even though Maple, tell the tale and I see and smell smoke just looking at the pics. For the smaller rips you can use a strip of scrap the width of the material you want and place it between the fence and blade....then lock the fence making sure the piece isn't pinched too tight. Leave the tape clipped to your belt.....:grin: Same thing goes if you need another piece the same width....just make sure the piece slides freely and barely touches the blade.

To cut down on splits turn the brad gun 90 degrees when nailing near the ends!! Another option for hiding the grain on plywood is to use iron on veneer....works great once you get the hang of it. *But*, your cuts must be straight and smooth.....the blade on your saw just ain't gonna get it....:sigh:

If I happen to lose this thread (I get kinda busy) send me a PM. I wanna see how this turns out.....you're doin' great so far!!


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## WereBo

As an aside, that wood-lathe looks very familiar, I had a similar one about 15(ish) years ago - I bet that makes more dust and mess than your project :grin


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## GZ

I have been lurking an watching progress and figured it was time to pipe up and say nice job. It lookes like it is coming along nicely. Although I loathe tacks and staples in finished woodwork, I do take that route myself sometimes. Usually when I plan on painting a surface, rather than finishing it.

Kudos to you and following your vision! I am looking forward to seeing the completed project!


----------



## ultimatedesk

SABL said:


> Nice job!! I'll come back and take a better look when I have the time.
> 
> Tablesaw blade is in bad shape!! Send it in or replace it.....I can tell just by looking at it that it needs resharpened. The cuts, even though Maple, tell the tale and I see and smell smoke just looking at the pics. For the smaller rips you can use a strip of scrap the width of the material you want and place it between the fence and blade....then lock the fence making sure the piece isn't pinched too tight. Leave the tape clipped to your belt.....:grin: Same thing goes if you need another piece the same width....just make sure the piece slides freely and barely touches the blade.
> 
> To cut down on splits turn the brad gun 90 degrees when nailing near the ends!! Another option for hiding the grain on plywood is to use iron on veneer....works great once you get the hang of it. *But*, your cuts must be straight and smooth.....the blade on your saw just ain't gonna get it....:sigh:
> 
> If I happen to lose this thread (I get kinda busy) send me a PM. I wanna see how this turns out.....you're doin' great so far!!


Hey thanks a lot for the tips - Mike and I were well aware of the blades condition, he had just finished doing some work with cedar for a deck before the winter started and never got around to getting it sharpened or replaced.



WereBo said:


> As an aside, that wood-lathe looks very familiar, I had a similar one about 15(ish) years ago - I bet that makes more dust and mess than your project :grin


Hehe, Mike made a HUGE mess that day!



gavinzach said:


> I have been lurking an watching progress and figured it was time to pipe up and say nice job. It lookes like it is coming along nicely. Although I loathe tacks and staples in finished woodwork, I do take that route myself sometimes. Usually when I plan on painting a surface, rather than finishing it.
> 
> Kudos to you and following your vision! I am looking forward to seeing the completed project!


Thanks gavinzach - I'm having a bit of a hard time with the nails, as you'll see in the next few posts. Any tips to help clean them up would be appreciated. Hopefully it doesn't affect the final finish TOO much...

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:


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## 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?


----------



## GZ

The nails, as long as they are countersunk, can be filled with a good wood filler putty and sanded smooth. If done right, the putty will stain the same color as the surrounding woodwork and blend in barely noticeable.


----------



## MPR

That's one solid project -- it would make a heck of a workbench.

Speaking of filler, I've had much better success with commercial color filler than homemade. You can get filler to match just about any type and shade of wood now.

As for nailing trim -- I've found that if you orient those rectangular finish nailer nail heads with the grain that it tends to hide them. Also, when nailing near the end of a maple strips I would often go "old school" and drill a pilot hole for a 3d finish nail.

I say "would" because I've used a pin nailer for trim now for several years. With pin nailers you hardly have to use any filler at all -- oftentimes the wood just closes over the pin. Pins work great on face trim as it's the glue that's doing most of the the holding; the pins are more-or-less just clamps.

I also miter the ends of trim for a bit cleaner look, though it does take more time.


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## ultimatedesk

gavinzach said:


> The nails, as long as they are countersunk, can be filled with a good wood filler putty and sanded smooth. If done right, the putty will stain the same color as the surrounding woodwork and blend in barely noticeable.


Thanks gavinzach - sounds like I'll have to do some experimenting with my final stain.



MPR said:


> That's one solid project -- it would make a heck of a workbench.
> 
> Speaking of filler, I've had much better success with commercial color filler than homemade. You can get filler to match just about any type and shade of wood now.
> 
> As for nailing trim -- I've found that if you orient those rectangular finish nailer nail heads with the grain that it tends to hide them. Also, when nailing near the end of a maple strips I would often go "old school" and drill a pilot hole for a 3d finish nail.
> 
> I say "would" because I've used a pin nailer for trim now for several years. With pin nailers you hardly have to use any filler at all -- oftentimes the wood just closes over the pin. Pins work great on face trim as it's the glue that's doing most of the the holding; the pins are more-or-less just clamps.
> 
> I also miter the ends of trim for a bit cleaner look, though it does take more time.


Nice info there MPR, thanks, I appreciate it.

I have a feeling it would be worthwhile to go over to Lee Valley and pick up a couple different colours of filler to experiment with, especially with a coat of stain over top.

That's a clear indication that you've spent some time in the shop - when you talk about aligning nails with the grain? Makes perfect sense, but totally eluded my mind when I was using the brad nailer for the first time.

Never knew about pin nailers. Just spent a little time Googling them, and it sounds like a great investment to have around for trim work... I think I know what to get Mike (The shop owner) for his birthday....!!

Anyways - I'll have a real update here in the next day or two - been too busy at work to think about the desk project unfortunately!


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## ultimatedesk

*Sponsor! Crucial!*

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!


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## ultimatedesk

Last time I left off, with regards to the table surface, I had just finished gluing and screwing it together. I put it on the backburner for about a week to dry while I worked on the drawers, and now I'm going to take it down in preparation for putting the outer trim on it.

Here it is:










All 4 sides were a bit off, with regards to the flushness. This was expected, as the initial sizing cuts were pretty rough, and it's better to have extra material than not enough.










Took out a straight-cut flush bit for the router, and some 60-grit sandpaper for the random orbital sander, and got to work. I did two passes with the router, because since the bit is not 1 1/2" tall, I couldn't trim the whole side of the table with just one pass.














































And, after a bit of work, the final result:




























The next step is to take a long strip of maple and turn it into trim for the table surface.


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## ultimatedesk

The last time I left off, I had just finished flushing the sides of the table in preparation to add some trim. I found a nice piece of long maple that was just a little over 8 feet long, a little wider than 1.5 inches, and thick enough to cut some 1/4 inch strips from.

I layed it out, setup the table saw and cut myself a test piece.










Looks good!










Here's a pic of the cutting process. I'm afraid I had some difficulty with this. Actually, let me rephrase - the saw had some difficulty with this. I was still using the same blade I've been using the whole project - which needs replacement pretty badly. Asking it to cut through 1.5 inches of maple, for a length of 8 feet was asking a lot of it.










I made it through eventually, but the whole process left quite a few burn marks on the wood.










I glued and nailed the trim around the perimeter of the desk, which was a pretty straightforward process.










And then took out a hand plane to get rid of most of the excess material and bring the trim down flush with the desk surface. Some neat pictures here.



















After some sanding with some 60-grit on the random orbit sander to get everything smooth, I went nuts with the wood filler.




























At that point I stood the surface up in the back of the shop and called it a night.

Next update in the loop, I setup some dado blades in the table saw, mmm mmmm, that was fun!

Have a good weekend everyone!


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## GZ

I love it, you have access to a router and you still used the hand plane. There is nothing like the satisfaction of doing things the old-fashioned way...

But you could have had those edges flush in the fraction of the time using a trim bit on the router...

:grin:


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## ultimatedesk

*Dado Cutting*



gavinzach said:


> I love it, you have access to a router and you still used the hand plane. There is nothing like the satisfaction of doing things the old-fashioned way...
> 
> But you could have had those edges flush in the fraction of the time using a trim bit on the router...
> 
> :grin:


You know, that is rather hilarious now that I think about it. I think that while I was working in the shop for those several weeks, I kept looking at the hand planes hanging on the wall and just waiting for the right moment to use it lol. Anyways - look at those cool curly strips of wood!!

It's been a while since the last update, but basically, I got around to installing the dado blade on the table saw to make some important cuts for the two cabinets, and was able to do a bit of test fitting.

For those of you not really in the know, a dado blade has two regular saw blades (One for the left, one for the right) and some irregular shaped blades of varying thickness that you put in between, until you get the right width. I'll let the pictures do the talking.




























The beauty of using dado blades in the table saw (At least I think) is that you can set it up at the right height and width, and then set the fence to the proper width and do all 3 of your supporting boards one after another so they will be lined up perfectly when it comes time for assembly.










I put 3 cuts in each of the 3 supporting walls of the left-hand cabinet. There was a bit of chipping, I should have probably put down some masking tape, but it's nothing major and will be on the inside anyways.










I threw on a bit of wood filler to patch up the chipped parts, and then let these 3 dry while I worked on the right-hand cabinet cuts.










I then had some time to put together a quick test fitting! Not bad! Some of the wood was just a bit crooked, so I'll have to spend some time with the sander to loosen up some of the dado joints.























































This pretty much completes the first phase of the project - I won't have any use for any of the big, messy tools anymore.

All that's really left are a few small detail cuts, some holes need to be cut out, the whole thing needs to be sanded to pre-stain state, and then assembly and staining!

I'll be bringing all of the materials back to my place where I'll be doing just that.


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## ultimatedesk

*Basement Move*

And, through the miracle of internet technology, I'm bringing you the next update right away!

There wasn't much work done in this update - just thought I'd show everyone where the progress is going to be taking place from now on. The spooky basement in my building!

It's a really old house, at least over a hundred years old, in fact, there's a 12" x 12" solid beam of wood running as the main support member along the entire length of the house, it must be at least 30 feet long. Can't get those any more!!!

My main complaint with the basement is that I am constantly bashing my head on the low ceiling beams, and it's quite cold! Getting motivated to go work down there is not nearly as easy as working in the nice, heated wood shop.

Time to let the pictures do the talking:



















I purchased a new shop vac at Canadian Tire along with a bunch of other stuff during the Boxing Week sales after Christmas. Sweet.










I also setup a plastic wall to help prevent sawdust from going all over the basement, as well as to help keep any breezes contained when it comes time to stain.










Some of my personal tools:














































And there we have it! Until next time, have a good weekend!


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## sangamam

*Re: Basement Move*



ultimatedesk said:


> And, through the miracle of internet technology, I'm bringing you the next update right away!
> 
> There wasn't much work done in this update - just thought I'd show everyone where the progress is going to be taking place from now on. The spooky basement in my building!
> 
> It's a really old house, at least over a hundred years old, in fact, there's a 12" x 12" solid beam of wood running as the main support member along the entire length of the house, it must be at least 30 feet long. Can't get those any more!!!
> 
> My main complaint with the basement is that I am constantly bashing my head on the low ceiling beams, and it's quite cold! Getting motivated to go work down there is not nearly as easy as working in the nice, heated wood shop.
> 
> Time to let the pictures do the talking:
> 
> 
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> I purchased a new shop vac at Canadian Tire along with a bunch of other stuff during the Boxing Week sales after Christmas. Sweet.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> I also setup a plastic wall to help prevent sawdust from going all over the basement, as well as to help keep any breezes contained when it comes time to stain.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Some of my personal tools:
> 
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> 
> And there we have it! Until next time, have a good weekend!



None of the images are visible ??? Some problem with imageshack asking to register


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## shotgn

> None of the images are visible ??? Some problem with imageshack asking to register


They work for me


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## Silverj2k7

This makes an interesting read!


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## ultimatedesk

*Quick Test Fitting*



sangamam said:


> None of the images are visible ??? Some problem with imageshack asking to register


Weird, there was someone else having an issue viewing the images as well. Yes, they are all hosted on imageshack.us - are they still not working for you?



shotgn said:


> They work for me


Perfect! 



Silverj2k7 said:


> This makes an interesting read!


Thanks Silverj2k7! Stay tuned, there's plenty more to come!

So, I did a bit of work in the basement the other night, and since the next part of the project is going to be assembly, I decided to give it another shot at test fitting, since the last time I tried it was just loosely put together.

Time to get out the sander with some 80 grit. The hose on my shop vac is a little over 2", and I didn't have an adapter to attach it to the DeWalt ROB Sander unfortunately, so a little tape had to do the job.



















I took each piece one by one and sanded down the edges where they slide into the dado cuts. I had to do a surprising amount of sanding, as the fit was incredibly tight.

I also took the time to label each piece (Top, Middle, Bottom, and which side faces the front) so that it could be easily repeatable when it comes time for final assembly.

Almost there. So tight! I needed a rubber mallet to set some of them, and then remove them afterwards.










This shelf was just ~slightly~ warped, and needed a lot of sanding so that one end was nice and snug, and this end actually a bit of free space (Hello wood filler!)










A couple more progress shots:



















And, all tightly assembled. I could probably jump on this box...



















I spent about an hour and a half doing that, and honestly, it was freezing cold down there and that's about all I could stand for that evening. Until next time!


----------



## ultimatedesk

*First Staining Attempt*

So - it's been some time since my last update (What has it been.. 2 weeks? Geez!) but I haven't been idle at home, it's just that I was really busy (There are kittens running around now!) and I've been working with some staining techniques, which has been a long, learning process.

I did a bit of research and came across a good video over here: Link and I opted to give it a shot, because there apparently, is a tendency for maple to come out a little blotchy due to the tight grain, or something or other like that.

So I picked up some supplies:










Made up a test board - some wood filler, some real maple trim, and one side sanded to 120 and the other sanded to 220:










And, apparently, I was supposed to cut the shellac with some denatured alcohol. Something I was not able to find, and subsequently, I found out that it is actually quite difficult to obtain here in Ottawa. I did not realize at the time, that I could have cut it with methyl hydrate, which is something quite commonly available at the local Canadian Tire.

And, this is where things start to go wrong. Here is the shellac applied:










Ok, not bad. Full strength. Ended up closing the grain structure completely, most likely. Here is the gel stain I chose:










And, onto the wood:










Wait 5 minutes, wipe off...










Gross. Seriously? This is why you test on samples first. Look at that colour - it's practically pink!

How about a second coat.










And why the heck not, we'll stain the back as well, where it hasn't been shellac'd.










Huh...



















Now really. That was not quite what I was expecting. Time to get a new sample piece - no shellac, but sanded properly to 120.




























What's going on here? This is not really the expected "richness" of a dark gel stain like this, is it? Hmm..










Doh! Looks like keeping the gel stain in the basement, where it is freezing, separated the contents. There is a visible layer of clear liquid on top of the stain - that shouldn't be there.

Staining attempt number 1? Failure.

1. If you're using shellac to seal, to avoid streaking and blotching - you MUST cut it
2. If you're going to use a gel stain, don't keep it in a cold environment before you're about to use it.

Well, time to put the stain upstairs for a little while, and maybe another trip to the hardware store... And just an fyi, this took me about a week just to do the 2 samples, since it's so cold, I can only do 1 coat per day, as it takes a long time to dry.

And here's a little something else:










Cute, no? A litter of 5 - the first one was stillborn, so we've got 4 kittens, pretty exciting stuff.


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## ultimatedesk

*Second Staining Attempt*

Some of you may have wondered - "You stained 2 small pieces of wood in the past 2 weeks?! That's all you have to show for progress on THE ULTIMATE DESK?!"

Well, not quite... Really - I did more, I swear.

As you all know, the first staining attempt went really poorly, so I immediately went out and started on a second staining attempt. This time, I purchased some pre-stain wood conditioner, as well as a traditional oil-based stain. I also set out to do this the right way. If I'm going to spend a week staining small samples, I might as well have something to show for it. I cut 8 small blocks of wood, and sanded them all to 120 grit, just like before, and tacked them all off.










I had a plan this time - I was going to see what kind of colour combinations I could get with just 2 stains, and 1 wood conditioner (The gel stain, for what it's worth, had been mixed several times, and had been kept upstairs for a few days). Here is the wood conditioner I used. You can see in the background that it tints the wood just slightly.










Here is the oil-based stain I picked up. It's a Minwax product, Red Mahogany.










And of course, the Varathane Gel Stain that you've already seen, also, Red Mahogany.










In this picture you can see a bit how the oil stain reacts to the wood conditioner. The wood conditioner seemed to have hardly any effect on the gel stain, most likely because gel stains don't really penetrate the wood the same as an oil stain.










And in this picture you can see the whopping difference between the oil stain and gel stain, which are, strangely enough, supposed to be the same colour. The one on the left is the Minwax, and the one in the middle is the Varathane. Neither the first or second piece have wood conditioner on them. The piece on the right is wood conditioner + the Minwax oil stain.










Here's the production line, the stain is still wet, I haven't wiped off the excess yet.










And here is the result of 2 days of staining. (First day sanding, tacking, wood conditioner, first coat of stain, second day some of them got a second coat).

From left to right, here is what I did to get the different results (Some of them obvious, some of them pretty darn subtle).

1. Minwax Red Mahogany Oil Stain
2. Varathane Red Mahogany Gel Stain
3. Wood Conditioner + Minwax Red Mahogany Oil Stain
4. Wood Conditioner + Varathane Red Mahogany Gel Stain
5. Wood Conditioner + Minwax Red Mahogany Oil Stain + Varathane Red Mahogany Gel Stain
6. Wood Conditioner + Varathane Red Mahogany Gel Stain + Minwax Red Mahogany Oil Stain
7. Wood Conditioner + Minwax Red Mahogany Oil Stain x 2 Coats
8. Wood Conditioner + Varathane Red Mahogany Gel Stain x 2 Coats

Wow! It's pretty amazing the different shades you can get when using just 3 pretty simple substances.




























I then set about the next 4 or 5 days applying one coat of high gloss polyurethane each day (That was a long and boring process). Basically, get home from work, go downstairs for a whole 5 minutes, do a quick sanding, tacking, and another light coat of poly, done for the day, wait for the next day.

Here's the final result of Staining Attempt Number Two. Please keep in mind, they are not in the same order that I mentioned above.



















There's no doubt that I will use this method again in the future. I also now have a great set of staining samples for maple plywood that I will surely fine handy in the future (They are all marked on the back what the process / stain used was).

Guess what though. None of them really came out the way I wanted. I'm still in search for that rich, deep, red mahogany / cherry look, and these just won't cut it (Though I admit, I do like #5 and #6, but maybe only because of their really spectacular grain pattern).

See you next time for Staining Attempt Number Three! *sigh*



Oh - and here's another snap of the kittens - they are 20 days old when this picture was taken, and they had just opened their eyes only a couple days beforehand.










I won't be posting another update until next week, as I've decided to take a trip to the East Coast to celebrate St.Patricks day! I'll be in Halifax if anyone wants to go for a few pints! Have a great weekend everyone!


----------



## WereBo

When I was into my wood-turning, I never really managed any truly successful staining. Like you, I found a lot depended on both the type of stain (oil or water-based) and also the wood itself - Pines and Maples tend to be resinous woods, so staining would be harder than a more absorbent wood like Beech or Oak, for example.

I'm only part Irish so I'll only be having a couple of pints of Guinness on St Paddy's Day, have a great weekend yourself


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## GZ

Maple is a wood that is best left light. I would only do light staining, possibly a golden oak coloration, or possibly dyeing. I am a firm believer in using stain to enhance the natural color of the medium, not change it. But I do understand, mahogany is very expensive! :grin:


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## SABL

To get the color you want you may have to do some mixing of colors. When I stained the woodwork for my home I used 2 parts "Early American" to 1 part "Cherry" (Minwax). 

Only in rare cases have I ever seen a professional painter use any type of wood conditioner.....I can see the use of such a product if you are going to spray the stain and not wipe down afterwards. For a deeper color allow the stain to set longer before wiping....trial and error will be the best guide for time. Gel stains are not my favorite and I avoid them.....I like the thinner liquids that will soak in but allow extra "soak time" for depth of color. If you find the wood hard to wipe you can use a rag dampened with paint thinner (mineral spirits). 

Any finish should be applied in very thin coats. Be careful with the polyurethane if using in high humidity......the humidity is what sets the finish and you can ruin it by overworking. Laquers will turn milky in high humidity.......


----------



## GZ

I agree with SABL. I will only work with liquid stain, they are much easier to mix, apply and they give the wood a much more natural color. I prefer spraying my stains as well.

be careful around seams... wood glue will show up like a sore thumb if it wasn't cleaned off properly!


----------



## brobarapas

you are very talented ,but were is the finished product?


----------



## ultimatedesk

*Third Staining Attempt*



SABL said:


> To get the color you want you may have to do some mixing of colors. When I stained the woodwork for my home I used 2 parts "Early American" to 1 part "Cherry" (Minwax).
> 
> Only in rare cases have I ever seen a professional painter use any type of wood conditioner.....I can see the use of such a product if you are going to spray the stain and not wipe down afterwards. For a deeper color allow the stain to set longer before wiping....trial and error will be the best guide for time. Gel stains are not my favorite and I avoid them.....I like the thinner liquids that will soak in but allow extra "soak time" for depth of color. If you find the wood hard to wipe you can use a rag dampened with paint thinner (mineral spirits).
> 
> Any finish should be applied in very thin coats. Be careful with the polyurethane if using in high humidity......the humidity is what sets the finish and you can ruin it by overworking. Laquers will turn milky in high humidity.......


Thanks for the comments, SABL. In my experience so far, I certainly have a preference for a liquid oil-based stain as well. They seem to highlight the grain much nicer, however, I have had a difficult time getting the right depth of colour, unfortunately. You'll see below that I sacrifice a bit of grain highlight for a really rich colour with a new gel stain that I have tried.



gavinzach said:


> I agree with SABL. I will only work with liquid stain, they are much easier to mix, apply and they give the wood a much more natural color. I prefer spraying my stains as well.
> 
> be careful around seams... wood glue will show up like a sore thumb if it wasn't cleaned off properly!


I am sort of worried about how the wood glue and wood filler will show up with this new stain. We'll just have to cross our fingers though I guess!



brobarapas said:


> you are very talented ,but were is the finished product?


Hehe, it's getting there, it's getting there, ok! 

gavinzach, I know what you mean about letting wood be naturally beautiful on its own, but I really had my heart set on a nice red colour, so unfortunately, budget-wise, this is the only way to go.

WereBo, thanks for the comments, it seems to me that many wood workers detest the finishing aspect. It would be incredibly frustrating to spend a 100 hours on a project, only to ruin it in a half hour after applying a stain! I had a great St.Patties day in Halifax - make a trip down there sometime. Most pubs per capita in Canada, if I'm not mistaken!!!

For those of you interested in seeing how the kittens are doing, I've been keeping a bit of a video log on them - ie. I have been taking quick video clips of them every few days, since day 0. You can check them out here:
YouTube - MrAderome's Channel

Also, here is a bit of a sneak peak, as far as actual computer hardware is concerned - I've been slowly acquiring bits and pieces, since I'm still not entirely sure what will end up in this Ultimate Computer Desk.

Kingston has decided to sponsor me, and has sent me this really fantastic SSD drive. I am PSYCHED!












As you are all aware, my first 2 staining attempts were successful in the sense that I learned a lot, however, I was still not achieving the result I originally wanted.

I decided to try something other than the tried-and-true local Home Depot, and I hit up a custom furniture store - Randalls. Let me tell you - it was a truly great experience, and I will be returning there many more times in the future due to the incredible service I received there.

I walked in with my backpack full of my 2nd attempt samples, and immediately a salesperson started talking with me about what I was there for. I explained to her the stains I tried, along with the techniques, and she asked to see my samples.

I pointed out the ones I liked, and why, and why I didn't like them, and she came back in a few minutes with a couple stains that might interest me. She then asked if she could do some sample stains on the back of the pieces I brought in. She took the pieces behind the counter, sanded them down, stained them, and came back in a few minutes with actual, real - this is what they're going to look like - samples.

How cool is that? I could have just gone there in the first place and spent the whole extra 2 dollars, but would have walked out with 1 product - the right one - the first time. Amazing - I'm really happy I discovered that place.

I can't imagine Home Depot opening up any of their products for a test piece.. I've never asked though, so who knows. Randall's is my goto place for stains now, however!










Once again, I decided to see what variety of colours I could get with what I had on hand, so I setup 8 samples once more:

1. Old Masters
2. Wood Conditioner + Old Masters
3. Wood Conditioner + Minwax + Old Masters
4. Wood Conditioner + Old Masters + Minwax
5. Wood Conditioner + Old Masters x 2 Coats
6. Old Masters x 2 Coats
7. Wood Conditioner + Varathane + Old Masters
8. Wood Conditioner + Old Masters + Varathane










I worked on the samples for about a week (1 coat per day, did 5 or 6 coats of poly on top, light sanding between poly coats)










Here are a couple close up shots while staining was in progress



















And a comparison with the previous samples, once everything was nicely glossed up










Look at the difference in colour! Now that's more what I was looking for. There's no question that the gel stain has "muted" the grain a little bit, however, the colour is unquestionably closer to what I was looking for originally.

Here is a shot of my previously favorite samples from the 2nd round, against the new samples










And a closeup of the 2 samples I think I like the best. The differences between this batch are quite subtle, as the Old Masters gel stain has a very strong dye which mutes out the effects of conditioner, or any other stain applied before or after.










Now that's what I call progress! I think I can call it quits for testing stain now. Time to move on to the dreaded motherboard tray / I/O Slot stuff...

Until next time!


----------



## JimE

Love the color selection.


----------



## ultimatedesk

*Some New Hardware*



Dogg said:


> Love the color selection.


Thank you sir! I am a big fan of the newest batch as well! 


Sorry about the lack of updates everyone, it's not that I haven't been working on the desk much, but it's more that I've been using the camera a lot (You know.. kittens) and I haven't had time to sit down and sort through all the photos, re-size, crop, etc for some real proper updates.

I've had this update sitting on the back burner for a little while now and I've been meaning to squeeze in it somewhere. I had been talking with some folks at Danger Den because I was looking at their motherboard trays and I/O panels, and they've decided to sponsor me!

Big thanks go out to Danger Den, as these are critical components required for a professional end result - you've all seen the mangled results of the cases I tore up earlier in the project.









Let us help you be cool!










Everything came very nicely packed - not much loose play, and plenty of foam to absorb any shipping issues.










I had these PSU support brackets custom made:










I sent them a higher resolution image of this, that I threw together in Sketchup:










Also included in this little shipment were some momentary switches for power and reset. (These are really popular these days, aren't they?)










And some real nifty motherboard trays:



















All the acrylic is 1/2" clear - I will leave them wrapped up until the project is close to completion. With these parts -finally- settled, I can cut some holes in the cabinets and actually put them together -for real- !!

Stay tuned, I'll sit down this weekend and sort through the next round of updates


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## SABL

Nice job so far!! Clearly evident that CnC was involved with the custom cuts.....if I had to do the same it would invlove the use of templates that would have to be custom made. Far more time consuming with templates.....CnC is controlled by servos and do not need a physical "guide" to replicate any part. Looks great and color is nice....pretty close to Mahogany.......and I have worked that wood many times. Also to note that there is more than one type of Mahogany.....but your sample looks fine.


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## ultimatedesk

*IO Slot Cutting*



SABL said:


> Nice job so far!! Clearly evident that CnC was involved with the custom cuts.....if I had to do the same it would invlove the use of templates that would have to be custom made. Far more time consuming with templates.....CnC is controlled by servos and do not need a physical "guide" to replicate any part. Looks great and color is nice....pretty close to Mahogany.......and I have worked that wood many times. Also to note that there is more than one type of Mahogany.....but your sample looks fine.


Thanks, the trays and psu brackets are indeed done with CnC - wouldn't that be a nice local modding resource to have!



good710 said:


> Thank you, for answering. But this method works for me only with .. In all other cases I get only strange results, like those below
> --------------------
> Watch TV Online:lol:


Hehe, to each his own I guess!!!


So - it's been sometime since I've posted an update - apologies, things have been very busy lately.

With the parts from Danger Den having arrived, I could now move on to some more specific details with both of the cabinets that will contain the computers.

Once again, I started with a test fitting, this time, it was a very accurate fitting, requiring quite a bit of sanding and fiddling around to get as close to the final product as possible.




























I then placed some test parts for fitting, and traced some outlines on the wood. The motherboard tray was placed on some thin strips of packing foam that I cut up, to help isolate any vibration from the CPU Heatsink.



















Installed some new blades on the jigsaw, put my biggest drill bit in the drill, and went to town!



















After doing the rough cut with the jigsaw, I took out the router and free-handed with a straight bit to smooth out the edges.










The semi-finished air intake for the left-hand cabinet:










The power supply rough cut:



















I decided that the PSU bolts will need a little more clearance around the screw holes.










The I/O Shield cut out was a bit tricky to measure, but I think I did a pretty decent job:




























And a final shot from above and below:



















Next update, I'll have pics of actual assembly of the left hand cabinet, and then more cutting, and biscuit joining on the right-hand cabinet.


----------



## ultimatedesk

*Left Cabinet Assembly*

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?


----------



## ultimatedesk

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!


----------



## WereBo

Glad to see you're all mended after the cedar-poisoning ultimatedesk, is from local trees, or what?

I can understand how woods can affect you, when I was heavily into wood-turning as a hobby (wooden plates, goblets, candlesticks, lace-bobbins for Mrs WereBo etc.), I discovered, the hard way, that I can't be in the same room as 'Zebrano' - I almost collapsed with a severe Asthma-attack after 5 minutes of being exposed to the dust - Having used almost every type of both exotic and indigenous wood though, Zebrano is the only wood that's had any effect on me.

The desk is coming on nicely, it shouldn't be too long until you get to the actual construction-phase, now :grin: - I heartily recommend leaving the final assembly-phase until you've moved though, it'll be a lot easier to carry/load several bits of desk, rather than a fully assembled one :laugh:

Good luck with your move to your new home


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## jaythorpe522

*Re: Basement Move*

1) Dude, this rocks. I just discovered your thread yesterday, and I'm up through the end of February. Can't wait to catch up to date. Looks like a great project.

2) 



ultimatedesk said:


> It's a really old house, at least over a hundred years old, in fact, there's a 12" x 12" solid beam of wood running as the main support member along the entire length of the house, it must be at least 30 feet long. Can't get those any more!!!


My parents' house was designed & built in 1978-1979. They worked very closely with an architect & a contractor, making a passive solar (south-facing, giant picture windows all along the south side) highly energy efficient house (including solar panels connected to the water-heater). The local energy company recently came out and did an airflow/efficiency test, and the house performed better than the model houses (basically, they close every outside orifice, open every inside orifice, stick a big fan in the doorway, and measure airflow). The guy said if it was any tighter, they'd have to recommend opening up airflow somehow.

Anyway, sounds super modern, right? But the whole house is post-and-beam construction. Posts are iirc 6x6, beams are 6x12s. Main floor is open construction around a central bricked fireplace/chimney. Very old New England Farmhouse plan for the interior of a fairly modern home.

In the early 1990's they added a pool and then built a room around it -- it was planned always as an indoor pool, but the construction was staggered because the expense was a bit staggering. The pool room is roughly 28x40 feet, with a saltbox-colonial roof and also post and beam -- but the posts (don't remember how big, maybe 1 foot square??) are only at either end of the room. There is only one beam across the middle; it's at the apex of the roof, and if I remember correctly, is 1'x3'x40'. MASSIVE. The truck that delivered it was from the 1950's, special-hired for the purpose; idunno what made it special, probably the sheer amount of torque it was designed to produce, because... The driveway is over 1/4 mile long and up a very steep hill. The crane truck that put in the beam was sitting on our lawn for at least a week while they tried to figure out how the hell to get everything in place.

So anyway, you *can* "get those anymore" 

That addition was so much fun; the planning that went into it, from the P&B construction to the heat exchange & dehumidification systems, ionizer system to keep the pool clean instead of chlorine... Just a ton of variables.


----------



## ultimatedesk

*Staining the Desk Surface*



WereBo said:


> Glad to see you're all mended after the cedar-poisoning ultimatedesk, is from local trees, or what?
> 
> I can understand how woods can affect you, when I was heavily into wood-turning as a hobby (wooden plates, goblets, candlesticks, lace-bobbins for Mrs WereBo etc.), I discovered, the hard way, that I can't be in the same room as 'Zebrano' - I almost collapsed with a severe Asthma-attack after 5 minutes of being exposed to the dust - Having used almost every type of both exotic and indigenous wood though, Zebrano is the only wood that's had any effect on me.
> 
> The desk is coming on nicely, it shouldn't be too long until you get to the actual construction-phase, now :grin: - I heartily recommend leaving the final assembly-phase until you've moved though, it'll be a lot easier to carry/load several bits of desk, rather than a fully assembled one :laugh:
> 
> Good luck with your move to your new home


It was a totally random discovery actually. Went over to a friends place, and 3 of us cut down 10 large cedars in his backyard, bundled all of the brush for pickup, and all throughout the next week I was feeling miserable for no apparent reason (Stuffed nose, congestion, difficulty breathing) - so two weeks later, we go to pick up the cedar logs, bring them to the cottage and spend an afternoon in the sun stripping off all of the bark - boy that was a mistake. For the next 10-15 days I was extremely sick, asthma-like conditions like you were mentioning. Weird how it took so long to take effect though.

Don't you worry - assembly and disassembly is a possibility!



jaythorpe522 said:


> 1) Dude, this rocks. I just discovered your thread yesterday, and I'm up through the end of February. Can't wait to catch up to date. Looks like a great project.
> 
> 2)
> 
> 
> 
> My parents' house was designed & built in 1978-1979. They worked very closely with an architect & a contractor, making a passive solar (south-facing, giant picture windows all along the south side) highly energy efficient house (including solar panels connected to the water-heater). The local energy company recently came out and did an airflow/efficiency test, and the house performed better than the model houses (basically, they close every outside orifice, open every inside orifice, stick a big fan in the doorway, and measure airflow). The guy said if it was any tighter, they'd have to recommend opening up airflow somehow.
> 
> Anyway, sounds super modern, right? But the whole house is post-and-beam construction. Posts are iirc 6x6, beams are 6x12s. Main floor is open construction around a central bricked fireplace/chimney. Very old New England Farmhouse plan for the interior of a fairly modern home.
> 
> In the early 1990's they added a pool and then built a room around it -- it was planned always as an indoor pool, but the construction was staggered because the expense was a bit staggering. The pool room is roughly 28x40 feet, with a saltbox-colonial roof and also post and beam -- but the posts (don't remember how big, maybe 1 foot square??) are only at either end of the room. There is only one beam across the middle; it's at the apex of the roof, and if I remember correctly, is 1'x3'x40'. MASSIVE. The truck that delivered it was from the 1950's, special-hired for the purpose; idunno what made it special, probably the sheer amount of torque it was designed to produce, because... The driveway is over 1/4 mile long and up a very steep hill. The crane truck that put in the beam was sitting on our lawn for at least a week while they tried to figure out how the hell to get everything in place.
> 
> So anyway, you *can* "get those anymore"
> 
> That addition was so much fun; the planning that went into it, from the P&B construction to the heat exchange & dehumidification systems, ionizer system to keep the pool clean instead of chlorine... Just a ton of variables.


Hmm yeah.. well, as with most things, you can certainly pay to get them.. Just think though, ALL the houses on my street probably have these huge logs, whereas these days, how much cost do you think you save by going with steel? Lots I'm willing to bet.

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!


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## WereBo

It's likely that the reason the Cedar took so long to affect you, is that you weren't breathing much Cedar-dust - Wood-turning creates flour-like dust-particles at times (depending on grain-direction etc.), therefore lots easier to get into the lungs.

If you plan on being around any Cedar-trees for longish periods of time, it might be worth getting hold of a 'Ventolin' (UK, dunno what it is in the USA) asthma-inhaler, it worked great for me :wink:

That desk-top is getting a beautiful lustre to in now


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## ultimatedesk

*Prepping the Upper Desk*



WereBo said:


> It's likely that the reason the Cedar took so long to affect you, is that you weren't breathing much Cedar-dust - Wood-turning creates flour-like dust-particles at times (depending on grain-direction etc.), therefore lots easier to get into the lungs.
> 
> If you plan on being around any Cedar-trees for longish periods of time, it might be worth getting hold of a 'Ventolin' (UK, dunno what it is in the USA) asthma-inhaler, it worked great for me :wink:
> 
> That desk-top is getting a beautiful lustre to in now


Interesting - thanks for that WereBo - I'll have to look into having something like that around the shop, I guess you never know when you might have a bad reaction, especially around all those tools, could be dangerous!

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.


----------



## WereBo

*Re: Prepping the Upper Desk*



ultimatedesk said:


> ......................
> 
> Enjoy! You can never have too many clamps you know?............


That's what I kept telling Mrs WereBo, but she still kept escaping......










:grin:


----------



## ultimatedesk

*Top Shelf Assembly*



WereBo said:


> That's what I kept telling Mrs WereBo, but she still kept escaping......
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> :grin:


lmao, too funny WereBo 


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!


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## WereBo

After the amount of research and preparation that's you've done, don't beat yourself up for not doing more! :4-thatsba

It's proceeding well so, as the old saying goes - 'Don't sink the ship for a half-penny worth of tar' - Slow and steady does it :grin:


----------



## ultimatedesk

*Top Shelf Trim*



WereBo said:


> After the amount of research and preparation that's you've done, don't beat yourself up for not doing more! :4-thatsba
> 
> It's proceeding well so, as the old saying goes - 'Don't sink the ship for a half-penny worth of tar' - Slow and steady does it :grin:


Thanks WereBo, good words to live by!

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

*Staining Stuff*

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!


----------



## ultimatedesk

*Drawer Face Staining*

With the drawers themselves all stained up, it was time to stain the drawer fronts!










Since most of the back of the drawer fronts won't be visible, I decided that I could probably stain and poly both sides at once...

Pre stain!



















They look so nice like this... ahh, next project...










Some staining time




























And some sweet, sweet gloss poly.










Woops! One of the drawer faces slipped off the painting cones and picked up a whole whack of saw dust and wood chips... at least this will never be seen on the final project!


----------



## jaythorpe522

lookin' good, lookin' great! Keep it coming!


----------



## ultimatedesk

*Trimming the Cabinets*



jaythorpe522 said:


> lookin' good, lookin' great! Keep it coming!


Thanks jaythorpe522!

With the drawers and drawer faces all finished and ready for installation, it was time to turn to finishing up the two cabinets.

First up, finishing the piece that goes on the front of the left-hand cabinet.










And, well, not a lot of writing today, as the rest of it should look pretty straightforward. I had to cut up a bunch of trim pieces, and somehow arrange the clamps to hold them in the right place. A few of the arrangements required some creative thinking, but in the end, I got the whole cabinet trimmed up over the course of a few days.



















Mmmm glue.





































Enjoy! We're getting close to the final assembly, yay!


----------



## hhnq04

*Re: Trimming the Cabinets*



ultimatedesk said:


> Enjoy! We're getting close to the final assembly, yay!


Does that mean you're ready to take an order :laugh:

Looks great man, one heck of a project!


----------



## ultimatedesk

*Sanding the Cabinets*



hhnq04 said:


> Does that mean you're ready to take an order :laugh:
> Looks great man, one heck of a project!


Thanks hhnq04! If the price is right, maybe pretty soon! 

With the trim all glued up and dry, and the weather nice and warm, I decided to take the cabinets outside to have the trim sanded flush. I start with 80 grit to get all the bits nice and close, and then move to 120 grit with the random orbit sander in preparation for staining.










Everything looking pretty good on the right-hand cabinet



















And now for the left-hand cabinet



















I'm under the impression that I mistakenly sanded this edge too much prior to installation, because I thought that I was going to have to squeeze this end into the dado cut at the back of the drawer. Woops! Hopefully that won't show up too much after staining.










And, a bit of glue squeeze-out that I missed previously is easily taken care of by the sander










I'll be staining over the weekend, so some fresh and shiny cabinets await for next weeks early update!

Have a good weekend folks!


----------



## WereBo

Waiting with bated breath.... :grin: It's looking good now the construction has started, I can start to picture what the final unit will be like :wink:


----------



## oneitsolutions

Lovely Work!


----------



## PoWn3d_0704

I've been following along since you've started, and I must say, it's quite nice. Cant wait to see what kinda beast you fit in there.


----------



## ultimatedesk

*Staining the Cabinets*



WereBo said:


> Waiting with bated breath.... :grin: It's looking good now the construction has started, I can start to picture what the final unit will be like :wink:


Thanks, it's pretty exciting eh? I hope it turns out how I envisioned it!!



oneitsolutions said:


> Lovely Work!


Thank you sir!



PoWn3d_0704 said:


> I've been following along since you've started, and I must say, it's quite nice. Cant wait to see what kinda beast you fit in there.


Thanks! That will be a really exciting part too!!

Well, got some time to start the staining of the cabinets this weekend, and overall, everything went pretty well. Started off with a bit of detailed sanding by hand, and then a good dusting with a tack cloth / cloth with paint thinner.



















And then went to work applying the stain with a clean cotton rag



















They both turned out pretty well - these pictures were taken after only the first coat (A second one will go on). I find that this stain really shines once a coat of poly is put over it.

Let me tell you - getting the inside of the cabinets was quite time consuming and I really did a number on staining my arms...










Eww! It looks like a heart!


----------



## WereBo

*Re: Staining the Cabinets*



ultimatedesk said:


> ...............
> 
> Let me tell you - getting the inside of the cabinets was quite time consuming and I really did a number on staining my arms...
> 
> .......................


Are you going to varnish them to match the cabinet?



















:grin:


----------



## ultimatedesk

*Rubbing out the Desk Surface*



WereBo said:


> Are you going to varnish them to match the cabinet?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> :grin:


Sure am!

I kind of forgot to take some pictures of the cabinets after I applied a pair of coats of polyurethane, but here's the status of the project so far










Both cabinets have been poly'd, and there are only 3 more pieces to stain + poly (The two caps for the end spaces on the top shelf, and the door for the right-hand cabinet). Otherwise, I am pretty much ready to assemble.

Before assembly, however, I wanted to try a technique I had been reading about - rubbing out a finish.

You start with some baby oil and a product called rottenstone (It's a very finely ground stone)










Apply some baby oil liberally (This slows down the cutting process. If you use water, it will speed up the cutting process)










Sprinkle on your rottenstone (Once again, fairly liberally. I didn't find the cutting action very aggressive at all, especially with all the baby oil)










Take a block of wood with a soft material wrapped around it, in this case, I used a piece of cut up fleece from an old blanket, but I think a felt block is the most recommended for this.










Go with the grain in long strokes, and rub the slurry into the wood. Its very fine cutting action should almost eliminate all dust marks, brush marks, and any small scratches.

This took quite a long time, and it was very, very messy. Baby oil rottenstone slurry everywhere. I then went through a ton of rags soaked in paint thinner cleaning it all off the desk surface in preparation for some good 'ol waxing.










Applied with a lint free rag, I swirled it onto the table a little bit too liberally










I then let it dry for a few moments and "attempted" to buff it all off by hand with a clean rag. Much to my dismay, after spending 10 minutes trying to buff only but a small corner, I realized that I would never get the shine I was looking for...










So I made a trip to my storage unit (My mom's garage) where I remembered I had an old electric car buffer in a bin...










Booya. It was late when I got back home, so I left it and went to sleep. Have a good weekend everyone - Canada Day tomorrow here in Canada, so I'm going to enjoy the long weekend. I'm moving this weekend too, so hopefully the desk survives the trip!!


----------



## WereBo

I've heard of rotten-stone but never used it, I think it's slightly higher in the hardness-scale than pumice-dust.

I hope the oil-streaks come off easily, without ruining your work so far, I'd hate to see you have to cut it back for another polyurethane coat :sigh:

Good luck with your move :wink:


----------



## Excabus

I just stumbled across this post! That's an amazing color, really interesting so see the work through and through, the idea of incorporating the computer itself into the desk is great. Looks great so far, hope it all turns out!


----------



## ultimatedesk

*Before Transportation*



WereBo said:


> I've heard of rotten-stone but never used it, I think it's slightly higher in the hardness-scale than pumice-dust.
> 
> I hope the oil-streaks come off easily, without ruining your work so far, I'd hate to see you have to cut it back for another polyurethane coat :sigh:
> 
> Good luck with your move :wink:


I think you've got it right - sometimes people will start with pumice and then move to rottenstone. The oil streaks... gave me some trouble, I'll admit. See below lol



Excabus said:


> I just stumbled across this post! That's an amazing color, really interesting so see the work through and through, the idea of incorporating the computer itself into the desk is great. Looks great so far, hope it all turns out!


Thanks! I hope it turns out well as well lol! Only time will tell (Or once I scrape up some cash for some hardware!)

So, I finally moved this weekend, and I'm glad to say everything went pretty well. A few small parts of the desk got scuffed up, but nothing major. Here are some shots from just before being transported.

The car buffer partially worked. I ended up actually taking some more paint thinner and totally removing the wax. For some reason it didn't stick well - I think it's because I didn't remove the baby oil enough before adding the wax. Either way, it's shiny as glass and looks great.










Then I took some 3/4" weather stripping and put it on both cabinets to prevent the desk surface from slipping and sliding:




























And, here's a sneak peak. Right before the move was pretty much the moment of triumph - assembling the 4 stained and poly'd pieces, and actually sitting at it. The monitors come in at perfect eye height, and the desk height is perfect as well, providing lots of forearm and elbow support.

Ahhhhhhhhh.... 8 months.

Now for the details


----------



## WereBo

Even at it's most basic form, it's starting to look beautiful - The colour is so rich and the shine really sets it off nice, even though I usually prefer a 'satin' finish, rather than high-gloss.

I can't wait to see the final product in use :grin:


----------



## magnethead

WereBo said:


> Even at it's most basic form, it's starting to look beautiful - The colour is so rich and the shine really sets it off nice, even though I usually prefer a 'satin' finish, rather than high-gloss.
> 
> I can't wait to see the final product in use :grin:


agreed. Especially since I'm not sure how a laser mouse will respond to the high gloss. Shoot, I never painted my desk, it's still raw MDF.


----------



## ultimatedesk

*Thanks!*



WereBo said:


> Even at it's most basic form, it's starting to look beautiful - The colour is so rich and the shine really sets it off nice, even though I usually prefer a 'satin' finish, rather than high-gloss.
> 
> I can't wait to see the final product in use :grin:


Thanks WereBo



magnethead said:


> agreed. Especially since I'm not sure how a laser mouse will respond to the high gloss. Shoot, I never painted my desk, it's still raw MDF.


Thanks magnethead - might want to get that desk painted! MDF from what I remember off-gasses quite a few nasty things unless it gets sealed up!

The move went well - I'm actually using the desk right now (With a mouse pad. I haven't tried the mouse on the actual desk yet). Nothing installed yet of course, but slowly getting there. Hopefully some new updates early next week!


----------



## Acuta73

I wanna see this bad-boy with hardware installed...

Been following this since you posted it on Mod Brothers, albeit quietly. You have done some truly beautiful work and can't wait for a finished product!

Edit: I don't dare let my Ex see this...that finish is exactly what she loves and I'd be up to my bum in work for her!


----------



## magnethead

*Re: Thanks!*



ultimatedesk said:


> Thanks magnethead - might want to get that desk painted! MDF from what I remember off-gasses quite a few nasty things unless it gets sealed up!


Considering I breathe leaded gasoline and Alcohol (fuel) fumes every weekend, I don't think a little formaldehyde will hurt me. LOL

(Alcohol fumes are bad. Our car is on gas and it's not too bad, even in the garage with doors closed. One weekend I was 6 feet from an alky car, and almost got gassed after 10 seconds)


----------



## ultimatedesk

Acuta73 said:


> I wanna see this bad-boy with hardware installed...
> 
> Been following this since you posted it on Mod Brothers, albeit quietly. You have done some truly beautiful work and can't wait for a finished product!
> 
> Edit: I don't dare let my Ex see this...that finish is exactly what she loves and I'd be up to my bum in work for her!


Thanks Acuta73! You wouldn't believe the number of people in real life that have seen it, turned to me like "Ooooh - maybe you can build me..." !



magnethead said:


> Considering I breathe leaded gasoline and Alcohol (fuel) fumes every weekend, I don't think a little formaldehyde will hurt me. LOL
> 
> (Alcohol fumes are bad. Our car is on gas and it's not too bad, even in the garage with doors closed. One weekend I was 6 feet from an alky car, and almost got gassed after 10 seconds)


Lol, nice magnethead - well as long as you're aware of it I guess! You're already living life in the fast lane it sounds like, so enjoy it - I've always wished I could work with cars more often - especially the fast, loud ones!

So - I finally had some time this weekend to do a bit of work on The Ultimate Computer Desk.

Here's a little shot of the desk as it sits now. Note that the drawers aren't installed, there's clutter everywhere, the two cabinets are not lined up in any particular fashion, and of course, no hardware has yet been installed.










If you didn't notice, I finally said to myself "Ok Mr. You've been working on this desk for 8 months - time for a present". I ~finally~ ditched my old CRT monitor (Which was nice, at 1600x1200 resolution) and purchased myself a brand new 27" Asus. Sweet!










That was my first new computer component in ages!


I moved on to the next part of the project, which was installing the drawers, so I got to work. Sorry about the pictures, I think I accidentally turned the auto focus off!



















Imagine my surprise when I went to go and slide the drawer in. The drawer was too wide! I accomodated for 0.25" on each side of the drawer, for the width of the drawer slides. Unfortunately, these particular drawer slides were 3/16's of an inch wider than I accounted for... Here's a wonderfully in focus shot:










So my options were:
1. Redo the drawers completely, making them a total of 6/16's (3/8's) skinnier, or
2. Shave off 3/16's" from each side, about 1.5" tall, along the length of both sides, of each of the drawers.

What a bummer! I thought oh well, it'll actually look pretty tidy with the sides shaved anyways, and also give additional support, so here goes!

Time to tape up my poor drawers. They're about to get scratched up pretty bad!










Setting up the tablesaw for some "guidelines" - 3/16's of an inch deep, set the fence at 2" and then 3.5" if I remember correctly.










And there you go, some proper guidelines for the material that will need to be removed.










This was a pretty big surprise, but not too major, and nothing that cannot be done well.


----------



## ultimatedesk

So, after I used the table saw to make my reference cuts, I grabbed the router with a 1/2" flush cut bit, set it at the appropriate depth and went to town. Making the reference cuts made the rest of this usually tedious job easy.




























When I went to do the reference cuts on the shorter drawers, I realized... there were a bunch of screws in the way. Ooops! Good thing I noticed so quickly!










I had to go and remove all woodfiller and the screws that were in the way of the 3/16's inch material removal. This meant all the screws along the bottom, and 1 or 2 at the front and back of the drawer. What a pain!




























After getting all of the extra material removed, I drilled some new counter-sink holes (Since the old ones were taken off with the router), re-inserted the screws, and gave all the dressers a light sanding, since I would have to redo the polyurethane coat anyways (They got pretty scratched up). In this pic, I had already re-stained the portion where I removed the extra material.










So. Next - polyurethaning the drawers... AGAIN!


----------



## GZ

You are doing an excellent job, ultimatedesk! I haven't been posting much, but I have been keeping an eye on your progress and wanted to thank you for sharing!!!

I am glad someone is keeping up on their project!!! All mine are shelved for the time being.

Nice score on the monitor!


----------



## ultimatedesk

*Installing the Drawers*



gavinzach said:


> You are doing an excellent job, ultimatedesk! I haven't been posting much, but I have been keeping an eye on your progress and wanted to thank you for sharing!!!
> 
> I am glad someone is keeping up on their project!!! All mine are shelved for the time being.
> 
> Nice score on the monitor!


Thanks gavinzach! It's tough to keep up with projects sometimes eh? Life has a habit of putting other stuff in your path of priorities lol


While getting ready to re-polyurethane the drawers, I also took the time to stain and poly the right-hand cabinet door, as well as the two pieces that will be above each of the cubby holes on the top of the desk



















Re-polyurethaning the drawers went really well - they look fantastic










Things have been pretty busy in the shop - have been re-glassing a war-horse of a canoe at the same time!










Here are the first couple drawers installed. They fit perfectly - the slides fit right into the grooves that I cut out. This photo turned out a little redder than reality










Getting the actual slides lined up and screwed in straight took a bit of patience, but well worth the effort










Ahh, nice and messy, but finally got the drawers in.










Some of the things I'll need to be working on shortly:

- Front Panel (Fan controls, LED's, Power/Reset switches, USB, Audio Jacks)
- Fan Installation (Foam surrounds, filter fitting)
- Hardware selection

After the hardware is selected and installed, I will be able to focus on cable routing and placement of the drives.


----------



## JimE

Looking very good. I need to make a new desktop for my current store bought desk. After 10 years of use, the laminate top has taken a beating. This is just the motivation that I need. LOL

Keep up the great work.


----------



## MPR

Haven't been here is a while but I would like to say that your desk turned out pretty sharp. I tend to go for the "oak" look myself but I like the "cherry" look of yours too.

My Dad and I just finished an oak gun case for granddaughter/niece and my brother took it to her yesterday (her "husband" [what do you call a long-term live-in boyfriend?] is the one who hunts but I stipulated that it is _her _cabinet [she can easily convert it into a china cabinet too if the relationship goes south]).


----------



## YTGeek

wow I am very impressed by your work .... so amazing on what you can actually do when you put your mind to it  ... Very nice work! and keep it up and also keep up updated  want to see the final project! 

YourTravelingGeek ray:


----------



## deleted26032012

Looks Amazing!!!!!!!! 
I have been watching your progress from the start with envy that i dont have the time to put into a project like that. Can't wait to see it all assembled and up and running. 

p.s hope the cat is doing good :3


----------



## ultimatedesk

*Up and Coming Preview*

Thanks Dogg, I love that you've become inspired by the desk! Go for it!!



MPR said:


> Haven't been here is a while but I would like to say that your desk turned out pretty sharp. I tend to go for the "oak" look myself but I like the "cherry" look of yours too.
> 
> My Dad and I just finished an oak gun case for granddaughter/niece and my brother took it to her yesterday (her "husband" [what do you call a long-term live-in boyfriend?] is the one who hunts but I stipulated that it is _her _cabinet [she can easily convert it into a china cabinet too if the relationship goes south]).


Thanks MPR, sounds like a cool project, have you been into woodworking for long?



YTGeek said:


> wow I am very impressed by your work .... so amazing on what you can actually do when you put your mind to it  ... Very nice work! and keep it up and also keep up updated  want to see the final project!
> 
> YourTravelingGeek ray:


Thanks YTGeek - there's plenty to come, and getting more exciting by the update!



Ryan-McAuley said:


> Looks Amazing!!!!!!!!
> I have been watching your progress from the start with envy that i dont have the time to put into a project like that. Can't wait to see it all assembled and up and running.
> 
> p.s hope the cat is doing good :3


Thanks Ryan-McAuley, it's getting close! You know it's been 9 or 10 MONTHS?! Crazy eh!

Sorry for the delay in updates everyone - I've been enjoying the beautiful summer weather we've been getting lately and haven't been putting a tremendous effort into getting the desk finished.

Surprise though - I did manage to get quite a bit done, and I've had some good fortune lately as well. I expect to post several updates this week, so just to get you back into the spirit of things, here's this weeks preview!

4x Scythe Ultra Kaze 120mm x 38mm 3000RPM
4x Scythe Slipstream 120mm x 25mm 1900RPM









Lots of foam cutting and trimming, and a sweet, sweet ruler from the Moddders Inc Featured Rig of the Month Contest(Thanks! I'm honored!)









Hmm, what's this?









Holy moly cool prize pack Modders Inc! I still can't believe I won this - perfect stuff for The Ultimate Computer Desk! 









Finally removed the protective cover from these babies - they look soo nice!









Hmm? Another surprise?...









Oh good lord! What kind of super monster is that!!?









Bwahahaha









Ok, so maybe a lot's happened in the past couple weeks. I haven't been posting any updates because I've been tinkering around with hardware AND enjoying some good outdoor times. I'm thinking that the next round of updates in the following month or so will be ultra exciting - things are starting to wrap up!

Seeya soon!


----------



## Timer5

Wow your system looks good any you have one really good desk.


----------



## MPR

I'm anxious to hear how the computer runs once it's installed. Looks like you have thought out the cooling by the looks of the fans but please let us know what the temps are when you finally fire it up.

Yes, I've been working with wood on and off for about thirty-five years now, my Dad for about 60. Dad does more than me -- his first degree was industrial arts before he started teaching history and he's always done building in the summers.

I always kid him as to how he spent the first ten years of his "retirement." He retired from teaching and then with another 65-year-old and "kid" of 50 proceeded to build ten houses (not contract, mind you -- build).

We built the Folk's house (upper right) in '80 when I was discharged from the army. Dad build all of lower houses after he retired (he built several more not in the picture).



You might notice that Dad's got a really nice shop (the large building north of the upper-right house).


----------



## ultimatedesk

*Fan Setup*



Timer5 said:


> Wow your system looks good any you have one really good desk.


Thanks Timer5!



MPR said:


> I'm anxious to hear how the computer runs once it's installed. Looks like you have thought out the cooling by the looks of the fans but please let us know what the temps are when you finally fire it up.
> 
> Yes, I've been working with wood on and off for about thirty-five years now, my Dad for about 60. Dad does more than me -- his first degree was industrial arts before he started teaching history and he's always done building in the summers.
> 
> I always kid him as to how he spent the first ten years of his "retirement." He retired from teaching and then with another 65-year-old and "kid" of 50 proceeded to build ten houses (not contract, mind you -- build).
> 
> We built the Folk's house (upper right) in '80 when I was discharged from the army. Dad build all of lower houses after he retired (he built several more not in the picture).
> 
> 
> 
> You might notice that Dad's got a really nice shop (the large building north of the upper-right house).


Wow, that's really sweet! I hope to continue making woodworking a regular part of my life. I find it extremely therapeutic. Hopefully I'll be able to show my (future) kids about woodworking too! Pretty awesome how your dad built houses... for retirement fun! 

Oh - and I will certainly be talking about temps quite a bit once all is setup and done. I may even have to make some modifications before I can say it's "done". We'll just have to wait and see!

After gluing a few blocks of foam together with a spray adhesive, I trimmed the block down to the appropriate size using a bandsaw.










Unfortunately, it wouldn't fit in order to do the vertical cut...










So I took out the trusty hand saw!



















Here's the plan for the fan layout



















At first I tried cutting the holes with a good quality knife, but the cuts were not very consistent and it took a long time. I ended up using an old drywall saw, which worked perfectly.










Test fit










Cut some more holes










Awesome!










Let's see how it looks in the right-hand cabinet










LOL - hilarious. It shouldn't fit like that. At least, it didn't during my initial measurements! I'll have to tweak that a bit later!

On to the crazy fans. I decided to go with 3 instead of 4. There just wasn't enough room for foam between each of the fans, and I figured there would be a lot of vibrational noise if they were touching. I could always go to 4 in the future if this proves to be insufficient.










Lookin good




























Stay tuned! More stuff tomorrow!


----------



## JimE

Kinda late now, but for the desk ventilation (if your current setup isn't sufficient), you could simply use AC powered fan(s). 

There are several benefits, such as larger fans, not tied to the PC power, and you could control them via rheobus or thermal control.


----------



## MPR

I can't quite read the labels but if you multiply 12V * the amp rating * number of fans you can get an idea of how many watts you should factor into your system's power supply requirement calculation. Also, remember that the rear fans should be pulling slightly more than the front fans are pushing so that the air flows smoothly through the case.


----------



## ultimatedesk

*Server Setup*



Dogg said:


> Kinda late now, but for the desk ventilation (if your current setup isn't sufficient), you could simply use AC powered fan(s).
> 
> There are several benefits, such as larger fans, not tied to the PC power, and you could control them via rheobus or thermal control.


That was certainly a possibility during the design phase. I like the idea of continuing to run the fans after the computer has shutdown for a short while afterwards as well. We'll see!



MPR said:


> I can't quite read the labels but if you multiply 12V * the amp rating * number of fans you can get an idea of how many watts you should factor into your system's power supply requirement calculation. Also, remember that the rear fans should be pulling slightly more than the front fans are pushing so that the air flows smoothly through the case.


I think the Kaze 3000RPM fans pull around 7W at max. I'm hoping that the intake fans will be so strong that it will just push all the air through the system to circulate it, cancelling out the need for an exhaust fan. We'll just have to see, unfortunately!

I was in an extremely fortunate position recently. A friend of mine's work was moving from a large location to a much smaller location, and he had asked me if I wanted to come scope out the old office for any old bits of computer stuff that might be useful to me. To my shock and amazement, I was indeed able to pick up some pretty fancy hardware that I would have never dreamed of owning. They must have done some pretty big upgrades to leave stuff like this behind!

I was able to get a hold of a handful of Socket 775 motherboards with Core 2 Duo processors, a bunch of DDR RAM, a box full of Hard Drives, and some relatively decent (lower powered) power supplies. The real treasure though, was a pair of servers. You can see that I had already disassembled one of them:










2 Full 4U Antec Rackmount cases, each of them containing a Dual-Xeon motherboard + Processors. Both with FB-DIMM RAM sticks as well.

This particular one contained a pair of Xeon E5410's, with 16GB of DDR2 FB-DIMM's, 4 1TB Western Digital Blacks (SATA), and the motherboard is an Asus DSBF-DE.



















The other one contained a pair of Xeon E5335's, with 4GB of DDR2 FB-DIMM's, 5 1TB Hitachi Deskstas (SATA), and the motherboard is an Asus DSGC-DW.

Now - before we go on - someone had queried earlier about the PCI Express slot on the board pictured, and I had said something along the lines of "Ya ya, it's there, don't worry about it". I of course, actually looked at the pictures, and no, it's not. It is indeed a PCI Express 16x slot, but on this particular motherboard, it only runs at PCI8. Now, the other motherboard, the Asus DSGC-DW DOES have a PCIX16 slot. When it was released, it did not support the 54xx series of Xeon processors, but I checked the website and there is a BIOS update to add this functionality. I will have to do a test setup with that board to update the BIOS, and then it will be swapped into the desk with a full video card, both the E5410's, as well as the 16GB of RAM, so keep that in mind when looking at the rest of this update. No, unfortunately, I didn't take any pictures of the other motherboard.

Cool stuff either way. Never, ever thought I'd have a dual processor motherboard. What an amazing find!

These dual Xeon heatsinks mount directly into the motherboard tray, so unfortunately, I couldn't use those spiffy motherboard trays from Danger Den. Also, since they are of size "SSI", there's no way it would mount on a regular ATX motherboard tray anyways. Time to drill out a tray!










It actually came out pretty nice and clean










This is a bit of a shame, since I took the time to clean the processors, put new thermal compound and remount everything. I'm just going to have to disassemble it again anyways when I put in the different motherboard. Ah well.





































This is a bit of a hack job getting the tray mounted... Since the processors are mounted to the tray, I had mounted it outside of the desk, so when I went to fasten the tray to the desk, I was *gasp* actually lazy and didn't want to dismount the motherboard again... so umm.. I'm going to replace those odd-angled screws when I switch motherboards..










The power supply looks pretty good there. It's an Antec 650W - an Earthwatts maybe? I forget. I may consider replacing it with a unit that has a 120-140mm fan just to exhaust the air a bit better. The board has a requirement for a 24pin, an 8pin, as well as a 4pin, so I can't just use any power supply unfortunately.










The cables, of course, are not nearly long enough to reach the connectors on the board. I've already ordered the extensions and hopefully I'll get them at the beginning of next week. Oh, you'll see that I've straightened out the fans as well.










The cooling solution looks good. There will be two fans directly in front of the CPU's. I may consider putting an additional hole in the door to allow the CPU's and RAM to exhaust directly.










There is one major issue with the right-hand cabinet setup. The original specifications called for an ATX board, which is significantly smaller, so umm.. I have no idea where the hard-drives are going to fit. lol! Fun times.

Hope you're enjoying this flurry of updates. I may or may not be able to post an update tomorrow, as I'm going camping for the weekend! At the latest, I'll be posting again early next week!


----------



## YTGeek

wow! just so amazing!  keep us updated! 

YourTravelingGeek ray:


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## MPR

Just a thought, but there is no actual reason your PSU _has _to be inside the case with the rest of your components. If you could mount the PSU outside the MB compartment and just run the wires in it would both aid in cooling and also give you room to mount your hard drives. The hole where the PSU was would be a good place for the case to exhaust heat, and you could put a fan there to help with this.


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## nbjeter3

Exactly what I was thinking! Mount a "cage" outside the cabinet, for the PSU with a hole in the back to allow the MB Cable through, and then a couple smaller holes at the top for the Drive connector cables. This will aid in the Reduction of heat as well as allowing room for your HDD's and take care of a LOT of cable management issues!. This will also give it a LOT cleaner look in the cabinet and aid in the Airflow issues. You could mount anouther can (a 120V) for an exhaust where the PSU was going to be, and that way any heat that rises to the top, will be exhausted out, and when you shut the system down, it can draw the remnants of hot air out of the cabinet.


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## nbjeter3

Wrap the fan in foam to take up the extra space and fit it to the hole. This will minimize noise generation.


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## ultimatedesk

*Gigabyte Board*



YTGeek said:


> wow! just so amazing!  keep us updated!
> 
> YourTravelingGeek ray:


Thanks YTGeek!



MPR said:


> Just a thought, but there is no actual reason your PSU _has _to be inside the case with the rest of your components. If you could mount the PSU outside the MB compartment and just run the wires in it would both aid in cooling and also give you room to mount your hard drives. The hole where the PSU was would be a good place for the case to exhaust heat, and you could put a fan there to help with this.





nbjeter3 said:


> Exactly what I was thinking! Mount a "cage" outside the cabinet, for the PSU with a hole in the back to allow the MB Cable through, and then a couple smaller holes at the top for the Drive connector cables. This will aid in the Reduction of heat as well as allowing room for your HDD's and take care of a LOT of cable management issues!. This will also give it a LOT cleaner look in the cabinet and aid in the Airflow issues. You could mount anouther can (a 120V) for an exhaust where the PSU was going to be, and that way any heat that rises to the top, will be exhausted out, and when you shut the system down, it can draw the remnants of hot air out of the cabinet.


Both of you, great stuff to think about. I am still debating what exactly I will do with that section. I have ordered a couple parts and will have to see where they fit. Also, unfortunately, it appears that they only make those cable extensions so long for the 24pin, 4pin and 8pin!!

A huge thanks goes out to Gigabyte for supplying me with this amazing motherboard - a GA-Z68XUD4-B3.

Without a doubt, the coolest motherboard I have ever owned!



















I could barely wait to open this up when I got it in the mail!



















And this poor motherboard tray that had been sitting for months and months covered in brown paper - finally had it removed. It looks even better than I could have hoped!










Here is the test fit in the actual desk










And with the fans in place










I'm going to trim off the plastic tabs from the motherboard tray to make it a bit easier to build the tunnels for cable management. Also, I'm considering putting a pair of holes beneath the motherboard to pass cables through underneath. Lots of stuff happening in the next few weeks!

I attempted to boot up the Asus DSGC-DW board (The one with the PCIx16 slot) but it would not boot. I'm afraid that that particular motherboard has gone bad, so I will continue to use the board with the PCIx8 slot. Anyone have any suggestions with regards to determining the best video card I can put in a PCIx16 slot with only x8 bandwidth? I was thinking I could look at the theoretical bandwith of an 8x slot and match it with that of the video card to maximize performance (ie. no point in installing a 5970x2 in an x8 slot).

Anyways, hopefully will have a handful of updates this week!


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## MPR

It looks like all of the air will vent through the PSU? Is this right? This might work OK, many cases are set up to do this. Watch those temps when you fire the thing up the first time.

You can use a PCI-e 8x card in a 16x slot but not vice versa. I'd just use that nice new Gigabyte board for the whole system -- most new video cards can drive multiple monitors.


----------



## nbjeter3

Most of the higher end PSU's have pretty long cables on them and if necessary a couple extensions should do the trick. You could also mod your PSU with longer cabling if you wanted to and sleeve it all up nice and neat. If you get a modular power supply, it normally has the same molex connectors on the PSU portion as what you can get at Radio shack and build your own extensions.


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## ultimatedesk

*Testing and Cable Management*



MPR said:


> It looks like all of the air will vent through the PSU? Is this right? This might work OK, many cases are set up to do this. Watch those temps when you fire the thing up the first time.
> 
> You can use a PCI-e 8x card in a 16x slot but not vice versa. I'd just use that nice new Gigabyte board for the whole system -- most new video cards can drive multiple monitors.


Thanks MPR - most of the air will indeed vent through the PSU, as well as the open PCI slots. We'll have to see how that works before looking at any more modifications



nbjeter3 said:


> Most of the higher end PSU's have pretty long cables on them and if necessary a couple extensions should do the trick. You could also mod your PSU with longer cabling if you wanted to and sleeve it all up nice and neat. If you get a modular power supply, it normally has the same molex connectors on the PSU portion as what you can get at Radio shack and build your own extensions.


Ah yes, I ended up getting some extensions and that has worked... somehwat..

So - it's been another few busy weeks, so apologies for the no updates. Have been enjoying those last rays of sunshine before the summer ends!

I think I mentioned last update that I tried to boot up the Asus DSFC-DW board but had issues - here was the attempt:



















I got a green LED to light up (Standby power on the motherboard) but jumping the Power ON pins had no reaction whatsoever. Tried it with a different videocard, re-seated the RAM and CPU's, but still no luck.

Moving onwards - since I un-mounted almost everything, I decided to keep the copper heatinks instead of the aluminum ones for the other motherboard. I also picked up a pair of these units from Rosewill via Newegg:



















They should do nicely for my hard-drive racks. I would like to mount them like so, except higher up:










Unfortunately, they are deeper than the cabinet I built. At the time, I was thinking maybe they would stick out of my air intake window, and I would just build-out the section of the door with the air filter... Not exactly what I had in mind initially though.

With most of the major components in place, I decided to start tackling the cable management with some cardboard templates, and then some 1/8" plywood:




























At this point I was a little frustrated with how slowly this portion of the project was going. Things weren't quite fitting the way I had planned, and they were not looking as nice as I would have liked them to...

Maybe it's time for some thinking instead of doing.

I decided (In hindsight, unfortunately) to go ahead and mount the hard-drive racks so I could get some better measurements and ideas of how to manage the cables nicely.



















Installed the fans and started to route some of the cables










Took out a handful of old SATA cables... (Yes, let's not forget, that I'm a computer tech first, and a carpenter second, or maybe even fifth or tenth...)










And had fun connecting all the bits and trying to get them in a reasonable state of organization




























Ugh... this will not do, this will not do at all. Might as well boot it up and see if everything works though (I had mounted and un-mounted the board several times, banged around a few things, etc, so might as well see if it's all still working!)

This would be the first time I see if all the fans work as well. Keep in mind that this is with the door removed.










Until next time.. still not quite sure what I'll be doing next.


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## MPR

Can you mount your drive racks in far enough so that you can put your intake fans in front of them? As I think you have discovered, you may have no place to route your cables with the fans behind the drive racks.


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## ultimatedesk

*Seasonic and a New Layout*



MPR said:


> Can you mount your drive racks in far enough so that you can put your intake fans in front of them? As I think you have discovered, you may have no place to route your cables with the fans behind the drive racks.


You've got it MPR - the cable layout + drive placement was driving me nuts, so I've decided to do a bit of revamping:

First off I want to give out a huge thank you to Seasonic, who has decided to sponsor The Ultimate Computer Desk by sending a ~really~ sweet Power Supply my way. An 850 Watt Seasonic Gold.


















Thanks Seasonic! We'll take a closer look at that PSU a bit later..

I had been a little frustrated with the layout of the Dual CPU Xeon board for quite some time, so I finally made the decision to ditch it and setup the right-hand cabinet with an ATX sized board. This is more in spec with my initial design - the extra couple inches makes a big difference, and it will make it easier to upgrade in the future as well.

On one hand, I'm a little disappointed that I won't be using that super geeked out board, but rest assured, I'll find something else neat to do with it.

So I went ahead and removed everything and started from scratch. Looks way better already:



















I then decided that, unfortunately, through the miracle of cable limitations, it would make a lot more sense if I put the optical drive in the front of the case, as opposed to up above the desk, where I had originally wanted to put it. So, time to do some more cutting.



















The masking tape managed to pull off some of the polyurethane, but have no fear, I will be making a faceplate that will contain the power button, LED's, and USB ports that will cover that spot up quite nicely.










And, we've gone so far, yet, gained so little, eh? It'll get done, I swear!


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## MPR

That beige masking tape is a mess -- I've never used it but that it didn't pull off some of the finish that it was supposed to be protecting. The newer blue-colored painter's tape releases much more cleanly.

Nice jigsaw there -- I was thinking about getting a new one the other day as I was using my old single-speed Craftsman -- I think I'll get on Amazon now and look around.


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## GZ

Yes... The blue tape is definitely the way to go. Much lower tack than masking tape.

Looking good.


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## ultimatedesk

*New Layout Work*



MPR said:


> That beige masking tape is a mess -- I've never used it but that it didn't pull off some of the finish that it was supposed to be protecting. The newer blue-colored painter's tape releases much more cleanly.
> 
> Nice jigsaw there -- I was thinking about getting a new one the other day as I was using my old single-speed Craftsman -- I think I'll get on Amazon now and look around.





gavinzach said:


> Yes... The blue tape is definitely the way to go. Much lower tack than masking tape.
> 
> Looking good.


Thanks, both of you, I will certainly have to look into an alternative. Someone else also mentioned using something called Sellotape that I'll have to take a look at as well.

Thanks, re: the jigsaw - I actually just got that for my birthday last month and this was the first time using it! It's got a knob under the handle to adjust the maximum speed, which is nice, so if you don't like only partially holding the trigger, you can press it all the way and limit how fast it goes. The bottom foot-plate is also reversible, giving you either a narrow slot to help prevent chipout, or a large slot for higher visibility.

Feeling a bit more motivated about the right-hand cabinet, I decided that the foam fan-holder had to go. It was too large, was akward, and was difficult to keep straight and in the proper position.

I decided to put together a nice and clean fan holder:










After doing some measuring, I took it to the drill press for the initial holes (I didn't have a hole saw for 120mm fans unfortunately... that would be pretty huge!)



















I then took out the spindle sander to sand right to the line. Just an fyi, I swapped out the spindle for a much larger one. This was my first time using this type of sander, and I was very impressed - the degree of accuracy and control is extremely high - perfect for sneaking up on the pre-drawn lines.










Time to drill some holes for the fan screws










And a test fit. The product came out quite nicely - accurate cuts, all 4 of the positions are secure with screws, and this piece should be much easier to align in the proper location in the case.



















I had cut a few other new pieces for cable management, but they were rough cuts, as I will not know their exact dimensions until I install hardware. I can't install hardware until I finish cutting and drilling in the right-hand cabinet, and since there is still the issue of the power button, LED's, etc... 

Time to get started on that, I suppose!










Kinda looks like a bull head eh?


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## MPR

Those spindle sanders are nice; My Dad and I picked up one at a sale last year and I've rigged a dust collection hose for him (I had to make an adapter as for some reason the one that came with the fan is a weird size) -- he uses it all the time.

If you find that you are getting too much vibration with the fan housings screwed directly to the mounting plate try these:

Newegg.com - Nexus SFM-1000 Silicon Fan Mounts, 4 pieces


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## Timer5

Man your desk is as awesome as you can get. It is truly the ultimate computer desk.


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## JimE

Just a thought, you may want to install or use a fan bus instead of the motherboard headers. While motherboards often supply multiple fan headers, having fans connected place a load on the motherboard power components. Less load on the motherboard the better.


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## GZ

Dogg said:


> Just a thought, you may want to install or use a fan bus instead of the motherboard headers. While motherboards often supply multiple fan headers, having fans connected place a load on the motherboard power components. Less load on the motherboard the better.


That is excellent advice. You can even customize your fans with a fan speed controller.


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## ultimatedesk

Timer5 said:


> Man your desk is as awesome as you can get. It is truly the ultimate computer desk.


Thanks Timer5!



Dogg said:


> Just a thought, you may want to install or use a fan bus instead of the motherboard headers. While motherboards often supply multiple fan headers, having fans connected place a load on the motherboard power components. Less load on the motherboard the better.


Good idea. I rarely connect them directly to the motherboard, however. Right now, I have them all connected directly to 12v via a molex connector, though a fan controller is probably in the future

MPR - yes, I love the spindle sander. So convenient, and the accuracy and control is just phenomenal when you need to remove just a small amount of material. I will look into noise and vibration issues once the bulk of the hardware is setup and running!

I guess it's been a while eh!

Well, you'll be glad to know, that I'm actually almost done. There've been a few changes to the original plan, etc, etc, but I've still been goign full steam ahead, just not a lot of time to post updates lately.

Here you go, some photo bombardment!

First off, my awful cutting job. Notice how the masking tape ripped off some of the polyurethane? Looks pretty great eh.. (NOT!)










Fitting my original faceplate design










I thought it didn't look too bad, but the USB ports were difficult to secure, and there were no audio jacks, so I went about and redesigned a new face plate










Did some work with the band saw, scroll saw, and some sanding, and voila!



















Looks not terrible eh? That's a nice unit from Silverstone that I picked up from my local computer store. Everything fits real nice and tight










Holes for the power switch and LEDs look good










And a quick test fit










Wonderful! I cut the hole for the card reader / usb with a jigsaw, but neglected to take photos...

Anyways - after a couple coats of black spray paint, I think it looks pretty cool.










With the faceplate out of the way, and hopefully, the last of the drilling / sawing / making sawdust portion over, for the right-hand cabinet, it meant I had the all clear to install more hardware.

Here are the two hard-drive trays with the actual HDD trays removed.










Gave them a nice coat of black spray paint and they mounted them inside the cabinet. I think they look pretty groovy.










Even groovier loaded up with hard drives.. (Two missing in this pic, 7TB total, however!)











Now, before we get to the next pic... another boon happened recently - traded some of those Core 2 Duo systems + some cash and picked up a really cool previous generation Core i5!

Here's the power supply - a Corsair 650TX, a very quality unit. All that could be better is some modular action. Ah well!










And another beautiful Gigabyte motherboard - a GA-P55-USB3 with 4 GB of G.Skill RAM



















Here's the sweet mother. A quad core 2.8Ghz. Wow, talk about moving on up the CPU chain!










I picked up an older version of the Coolermaster Hyper 212 (Not the Plus version) and mounted a pair of Scythe fans to it










Oooh, it's getting so close to boot time!


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## WereBo

Now it's starting to look REALLY awesome :grin:


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## Itguy2010

I don't know if this has been said but you should patent this idea or something. It's AWESOME...


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## Amd_Man

Outstanding workmanship there. It's looking real good.


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## ultimatedesk

WereBo said:


> Now it's starting to look REALLY awesome :grin:





Itguy2010 said:


> I don't know if this has been said but you should patent this idea or something. It's AWESOME...





Amd_Man said:


> Outstanding workmanship there. It's looking real good.


Thanks, all of you, I really appreciate it! I didn't think I could patent something like this - think it'd actually be worth all the hassle?!

Wow, with all those SATA cables there, it sure messes things up, no?



















I went ahead and threw in my current video card (Radeon HD5770, which kicks some pretty decent butt still). I'm sure I'll see an improvement from my P4 3.2!!!










And here's the magical moment. It looks like it's already been tweaked around a bit. Running at 3.2Ghz instead of 2.8Ghz, RAM speed up to 1600Mhz... Hey - nice temps! That's only a few degrees over ambient! (It's chilly in the basement)










Only one major problem with this setup... Can you see what it might be? (Well, ok, there's more than one thing not "ideal")










That might cause an issue. I also don't like the way the heatsink exhausts all of its hot air directly onto the back of the video card, so off to the local computer shop!

This should do the trick:










Much better. Fits almost like it was meant to be.










Looks real good there actually. I think the wide fin spacing will be an advantage as well, since there is going to be a lot of general air flow throughout the cabinet.


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## WereBo

Now there's an idea for a PC spares-mods company, custom-length cables... That would tidy the SATA-Drives nicely :grin:

Excellent find on the heatsink/cooler, a perfect fit :laugh:


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## GZ

Looking good!

I was wondering what you were going to be doing for cooling with the board mounted upside-down.

What are you going to be using for a side cover???


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## ultimatedesk

WereBo said:


> Now there's an idea for a PC spares-mods company, custom-length cables... That would tidy the SATA-Drives nicely :grin:
> 
> Excellent find on the heatsink/cooler, a perfect fit :laugh:


Yeah... custom cables will be a future upgrade item, I'm sure of it. I'm not crazy happy with the way all that stuff is layed out currently.



gavinzach said:


> Looking good!
> 
> I was wondering what you were going to be doing for cooling with the board mounted upside-down.
> 
> What are you going to be using for a side cover???


Coming right up!

So, now that the hardware has been installed, I can proceed to managing those cables a little. I first cut a quick piece out of 1/4" hardboard with a few strategic holes










Already much more to my liking. Time to place the new fans with their new mounting system










Ok - with both "plates" in place, I can cut the appropriate holes in the door and go ahead and install!



















Woohoo, that blue furnace filter sure looks out of place eh? Everything fits, it's nice, snug, and square, so I went ahead and added a bunch of closed cell foam










Another view of the almost finished right-hand cabinet old i5 system



















*Testing*

I've been using this cabinet setup for a little while now, and I'm happy to report that the temperatures are really quite nice. Because I've "sealed" the air intake portion, all of the intake air is coming through the blue furnace filter. You can literally feel suction if you place your hand in front of the filter. There is a massive amount of air coming out of the CPU hole, as well as the open PCI slots, power supply exhaust, and the half inch of space between the door and the "non-intake-area". (You can see in the previous photos, I did not put foam around the entire door perimeter).

So far it has been idling at ambient (23-25) and at maximum, just under 50 degrees Celcius.

I can hear the fans running - they are louder than all of the hard drives spinning up. I am going to get a small fan controller and get them down to the minimum speed while maintaining these current temperatures (There is a very large amount of air running through the case).

*To Do*

I have clearly got to find something to either replace the blue furnace filter, or cover it up with something a little more visually appealing.

Also, I need something to cover the CPU exhaust area. It will need to match whatever I do for the furnace filter area.

'Til next time!


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## WereBo

If the blue filter aren't available in other colours, can you disguise it, either with a black fine-mesh grille or even some CCFL lights, to make it look as if it's meant to be blue?


PS - Is it possible to 'paint' the hardboard cable cover the same mahogany colour as the desk? That would help hide it all even more :wink:


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## MPR

Looking nice! You could probably build something like this to go over that blue air filter and never see it:


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## GZ

Check this place out... You should be able to find something to use or make a cover for the HSF opening.
PC Case Mods Store

As for the furnace filter... I suggest using an ultra-fine mesh screen in a frame... It will catch most of the heavy dust and restrict as little airflow as possible.

Micronic wire mesh data, prices, helpful information


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## Grim95

Isnt wood getting heated too easy?


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## ultimatedesk

MPR said:


> Looking nice! You could probably build something like this to go over that blue air filter and never see it:


Thanks, that's a pretty good idea



gavinzach said:


> Check this place out... You should be able to find something to use or make a cover for the HSF opening.
> PC Case Mods Store
> 
> As for the furnace filter... I suggest using an ultra-fine mesh screen in a frame... It will catch most of the heavy dust and restrict as little airflow as possible.
> 
> Micronic wire mesh data, prices, helpful information


Thanks for the links - that's actually almost exactly what I'm looking for. I'll need to take some measurements to see how much I need



Grim95 said:


> Isnt wood getting heated too easy?


Nah, I've run the system for several hours in a row, and there is so much airflow going through the case, that it doesn't seem to get heated up at all. If it's fire that you're concerned about, consider this: the average ignition temperature for plywood is 350 degrees fahrenheit.

On the other end of the desk, things have been progressing along nicely as well - had this beauty cut for me










Placing it in the hole, it sits just a little bit too large. The original square I cut out was about a millimetre smaller on one end than the other










So I took out the trusty chisel and did a bit of shaving!



















There we go!



















Mm, starting to look so awesome!



















The foam fan-holder will have to say bye-bye on this side, just like the one in the right-hand cabinet. Doesn't quite look right.


*Oh*
And WereBo - darn multi-quote only allowed 3 selected! I think I'll be painting the cable covers black!


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## WereBo

I like that dual-purpose glass window, it both looks cool and acts as an instant dust-bunny monitor.... :grin:


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## JimE

So I finally got motivated and have my new desktop about ready to install. I'll post pics in a couple of days.

Thanks for the motivation.


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## JimE

Better late than never I guess.

Before:


After:


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## WereBo

That's certainly an impressive looking set-up Dogg, especially the oversized mug that's just perfect for tea :grin:


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## JimE

WereBo said:


> That's certainly an impressive looking set-up Dogg, especially the oversized mug that's just perfect for tea :grin:


LOL...I drink iced tea all the time.


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## shotgn

Where did you get those mounts for the monitors?


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## JimE

They are Ergotron units. I purchased them from buy.com during a sale and got free shipping. A single mount, and a double mount, both are clamp on.


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## toothman




----------



## Paul tevyaw

Could you make a YouTube video on this when done? I would love to see it, thanks.


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## helios19

I only just noticed this thread, and it's absolutely incredible!

I'm in need of a new computer desk myself and I have to admit I'm extremely jealous! xD


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## Denno020

Dude, I wish I had your workshop! You seem to have every tool imaginable. Desk looks absolutely stunning. Great work.


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