Thicknesser not a problem, planer no induction but I’ll make myself available when you want to do the Oak
Complete Lounge Makeover
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So @joeatkin2 made the very good suggestion that I’m making things far too complicated by effectively “making IKEA furniture” and that I should instead make it all out of simple 4-sided boxes in 18mm MDF, stacked screwed and glued and clad in another layer of MDF. With a little shimming and veneer, the front edges can all present the same thickness:
Then all the timber strips can be glued to the front, all cut exactly to length, and trim routed to flushness.
I think if I was a contractor building this on site, able to commit full working days, this would be the correct method. But I’m going to have to build this in dribs and drabs whenever I can spare an hour or two, storing the pieces as I make them and only making a mess in the lounge when I’m ready for final assembly. A bunch of flat slabs stacked against the wall in the spare bedroom will be much more family friendly than piles of boxes, and will require no dusty or wet work in the house.
I reckon you’ve sold me on Beech instead of Oak though Joe 
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But it should go up in a matter of hours if it’s made from boxes
Having now watched a bunch of cabinetry videos, yeah you’re right. Boxes it is. Will probably paint each panel while flat before final assembly on site though. Just trying to keep disruption to minimum…
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(I will be spamming this thread as I go, partly so I have all this stuff documented. Apologies in advance!)
Boxes, lots of boxes (25, including the door reveals)
The solid timber lip of each shelf will be built in to the box above, so I can get a perfectly flush edge where it matters, then shim it as close as possible on the underside.
The baseboards, skirting, verticals and additional external panels will have to be fit on site.
I may or may not build in speakers to the top shelves (grey hatching).
I may or may not register each box to its neighbours with additional dowels.
I will have some fun routing power/data/HDMI/audio.
123 pieces to cut. MDF has got expensive recently O_O
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Just spent a rather eye-watering sum at SL Hardwoods. Enough solid timber to do the whole room (I want it to come in one batch for the best matching) and enough sheet material to do the TV wall & shelves.
@joeatkin2 or anyone else who’s a certified spark: I intend to build the electrics into the furniture, all in 2.5mm² and in a loop, extending the ring that’s already in the room. What’s the easiest way to make sure it’s all signed off properly?
I went for Ash in the end, instead of Beech. Two reasons: 1. The laminate floor is already Beech(ish) so it wouldn’t contrast. 2. My coffee table has Ash legs and borders. Also I just like the way it looks. Strong grain and pores that pick up a patina over time.
Call me tomorrow
How did you output that bottom image from the 3d design? Was it a particular software, or did you do it by hand?
All by hand I’m afraid! With premium 18mm MDF currently over £50, I really wanted to Tetris the heck out of it.
Here’s the final cut list, with the major panel cuts in pink, so that I can store smaller pieces in my house, and take sensible batches down to the space:
6 8x4 sheets turned into this:
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I was hoping you’d say software! That’s quite impressive!! Looks like it should come together nicely.
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1 box down, 24 to go (in this phase anyway)
The dowel jig I bought lets me get the joint very well aligned, so long as I remember to put the fence on the outside edge of every piece.
Next time: Mitre joints for skirting on the baseboard.
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First baseboard and skirting complete, and here’s a bunch of boxes to go on it! For the first time in my life, I am cutting things exactly to the specified dimension and everything fits together on the first go. No shimming, shaving, bodging or bending. Even the mitres. (Vertical pieces in this photo just resting there to illustrate intent)
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Progress report:
- Floorboards removed and stored. I need to make a little bit of new floor under the desk in the other corner of the room and every plank counts.
- Shadow gap backing pieces painted black and inserted behind skirting, loose.
- Baseboard levelled out . The floor is not flat!
- Sockets, backboxes and wiring installed at lower level (not powered up yet)
- 13 boxes drilled, dowelled, painted, glued
- 13 boxes installed and levelled. Despite best efforts, some boxes are off-square or the wrong size by a fraction of a mm. By designing it with shims everywhere I can keep everything straight & true by adding or subtracting from those shims. Also lets me eg. slip that speaker wire through. The bubble is in the middle of the level in all directions, which is a personal best
- Behind the speaker (old drivers in new cabinets that I made) there are built-in red’n’black terminals so no trailing wires. Most boxes are also held back to the wall with an L bracket on top.
- Started installing sliding door support. Might need to borrow an SDS drill off someone cos my puny cordless is not really cutting it.
Face in hands moment: The upper four shelves are 2mm too short for standard large-format hardback books. 9.5" = 241.3mm vs. 240mm shelves. Everything on the 2nd shelf (and lots of other books we have of similar size) are supposed to fit on the upper shelves. Aaargh.
Just over one month of construction time so far, but that will slow down as the weather gets worse (my home workshop is under a tarp stretched out over the patio) and I go back to university. Should have the whole room done by this time next year I reckon.
Next: the piano desktop and TV backing/surround. Also need to make sure all the cable guideways are made so AV stuff can be connected up without dangling wires in the void. No ash trim until it’s all assembled and I can make good measurements.
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Hey can i ask what software u used to generated the 3d models and the 2d layouts and dimension information?
It’s Autodesk Revit, which I also use at work. It’s not really aimed at hobbiests I’m afraid 
I can highly recommend it, if you’re an architect or interior designer!
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Hahahaha hahahaha. Ha.
Got the TV wall finished today (apart from the top rail which will be the very last thing).
The door slides very nicely behind the TV, with soft close action and a home-made self closing mechanism involving bike brake cable, pulleys and a lead weight in a bit of drainpipe. On to the wall on the right next!
Should have the whole room done before the heat death of the universe.
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In Makerspace time you are still doing well!!
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Hi Tom,
There’s quite a few questions to get through to extend that socket, so my first suggestion would be to have a spark come do it.
But if your preferring to do it yourself:
- Any idea what the length of the existing loop is your extending? Unlikely to be crossing the threshold here but there is a maximum length for loops before you need to increase cable size.
- What fuse is the existing ring main on? Assuming that your adding sockets, might want to consider it otherwise when everything is plugged in it might start tripping.
- If cables are to surface mounted inside your new creation it wouldn’t hurt to put the cables in conduit rather than leaving them loose/pinned.
- Have you considered running power also up to those speaker locations?
Hope some of that helps.
Hi Peter,
Thanks for the advice, although it’s all been wired up for over a year now with no complaints!
It’s all running as a 13A spur (you can see the socket with the grey cable bottom left). The sockets in the furniture are all single gang, and it’s a tree+branches topology something like:
Total load is no more than you’d expect running on a power strip behind a TV stand. All the cables are neatly routed and pinned, and all junctions are wago clips in boxes. There’s no power to the speaker shelves, although there are speaker wire terminals there. There’s power to the top left shelf for a VR sensor.
In the final condition I’m planning to replace the socket with a fused spur (with the junction box being accessible in the same location as the socket is now).
Phase two complete! It was a real backbreaker of a day cutting up all the MDF for this one, and somewhere along the line the table saw fence or stop block must have slipped because the widths of the carcassing ended up being +/- 3mm out in places. Something I only realised after I’d already glued the first row of boxes down and was stacking the second. >_<
To correct my mistake, I used the ash trim as a guide. Each horizontal piece is the same length so I used the chop saw to make them all identical. Then I could use clamps on all the vertical pieces to stretch/squash the box edges back into line. I nailed through the ash with panel pins to hold things in place, used a punch to push the nail head under the surface, then glued little slivers of wood back in on top. I managed to match the grain almost everywhere.
I found some acrylic paint in the kids craft box with an excellent colour match so did the whole “paint the crack and sand it while wet” trick to hide the joins. I’m leaving a final sanding and oiling till the whole room’s done, to get a consistent finish.
Either of the options for the next phase will include some steaming for the rounded corners of a corner table or computer desk, but that’s for another time…
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