Console Table Construction

[frederic]

The rain stopped yesterday (sorta), so I managed to get some welding in the morning, and will have time to get some more done today. It's actually bearable outside, amazingly enough.

For those that don't recall, my console table will be constructed mostly of steel, almost the width of my home studio, and shoved under the slanted ceiling since that space is useless to me otherwise (stand up and hit your head!). This console table will support a lot of gear, including six Tascam TM-D1000 16-ch digital mixers, one TM-D4000 32-ch digital mixer, an Akai DL1500 remote control for my farm of Akai DR16 recorders, some patch bays, two computer monitors to start (eventually four once I splurge for lighter, LCD monitors), and more than likely, two posts for supporting studio monitors. I've decided to construct this in assemblies, as humping up a 12'6" wide steel table up a flight of stairs into my studio is going to be impossible. The idea is to build it in three top sections, then bolt it all together, on to of the legs and truss support, which I haven't decided whether the truss should be of steel or wood. Wood is lighter, steel is stronger, I'll figure that out later.

Here is the video in real audio format: (Please, right click and save-as)

9MB Video (Real Audio format)

And some pictures:

[DDev]

It sure is nice to see you at this stage. I remember discussing this (gasp!!) about a year ago (my how time flies!!). The assembly shown, are those section openings your drop-in spaces for the mixers? I'm just trying to maintain a visual image from what I remember of your design.

Keep at it. Almost there (well, except for the patchbays, wiring, etc etc etc).

Darryl.....

[frederic]

Originally Posted by DDev

I'm just trying to maintain a visual image from what I remember of your design.

Yes. The round tube, which is nothing more than cast steel schedule 40 black pipe normally used for natural gas feeds in dwellings, is what the mixer's curved palm rail will rest on. Its absolutely critical that the different sections line up perfectly, for visual reasons.

The steel square tubing that is welded perpendicular to that round tube, will support the feet of the TMD1000's, for a minor sloping angle towards the console operator. The open space between each of those perpendicular pieces is just open space, since there are no mounting points underneath there is no reason to fill this in. Each of the TMD1000's have vents down there anyway, so they aren't blocked, not that its ever been an issue.

The reason for extending the perpendicular square tubes a little further back than the back end of the mixer, was to provide a place to mount cabling management pieces, whereas I can tie the cables up behind the mixers and now have anything dangling below. This way if I choose to mount gear under the table, I can do so, if that is determined to be necessary down the road. Not fun climbing under a table with large knots of wires hanging down. One might accidentally choke him/herself.

Of course I could have forgone all this work and just made a very wide, flat table and sit all the gear on it. Would have been less work for sure, but it would have looked like a large piece of plywood draped across the width of the room, whereas once all the welding beads are ground down, and the table is painted to match the moulding (dark green), its going to look a little nicer, I think.

I am concerned however that the three sections aren't going to line up perfect enough for my tastes, so sad to say, I may end up making the tabletop as one huge unit, and rest everything on that. Hopefully not. Its getting miserably cold to weld, this time of year!

[frederic]

Okay, both "wings" are completed, at least roughly. I have a lot of grinding to do to hide the beads, which I'll do when the weather gets better. Right in the middle of welding together the second wing, it started to hail. I kept going because I had everything clamped correctly, but after a while the hail started to hurt as it got larger.

Hail, in December, scary.



Anyway, now that the wings are constructed, I have to be honest, and say I'm not 100% pleased with them. Well, the wings themselves are okay, I just still haven't figured out how to tie them appropriately to the center section, which I haven't built yet. What looked good on paper seems to not pan out accurately "in real life", so I have to redo the center section design and tweak it a little bit.

Though, thinking about this further, I started revisiting the entire console table (in my head), and was thinking about something a little more interesting...

Make two legs per side, essentially an upside down "T" either out of steel or out of wood (2x8?), then box out a crossframe the width of the console table out of 1x8" poplar (which is really 3/4"x7.25" for some reason), then put "ribs" across that, making the area the little mixers will rest on. Instead of my usual "black pipe" thing where the curved overhangs on the front of the mixers will rest on, I could remove them, and flush mount it within the console table "box", must the way Argosy does with their console tables. The more I think about this, the more I like it, but I guess I'm lacking the confidence in my woodworking ability.

Oh well, I'll have some fun sketching and drawing, and we'll see what we come up with. Worse that happens is I continue what I've started, certainly no harm done.

[TexRoadkill]

Even if you go with wood facia I would still go with steel or alluminum for the main beams especially if you are using any CRT monitors. If you can make a padded armrest for the front your elbows will thank you later.

[frederic]

There will be padding across the width...

Just have to figure out what to attach the padding to, wood or metal!

[frederic]

Okay, I was extremely unhappy with the original configuration, too many design flaws, so I redid everything. Just because I like wasting steel







12' 6" wide open frame top. Next, I have to weld in the 1" square tubing for the supports, have to make the legs, the leg supports, and drill and tap everything that needs to be drilled and tapped.

Then prime, paint, install the feet, and carry upstairs into the studio in sections.

This is fun

The end result will be that the legs bolt on, the two halves bolt together, thus no piece is larger than 6'3" and no piece weighs more than 50-60lbs, meaning I can carry it up the stairs by myself without injuring myself.

[fitZ2]

Hey frederic, looks like ANOTHER frame I'm familiar with Now your on the right track! Lookin good my friend. Keep up the pics! By the way, in a few minutes my Autocad will be loaded on my new computer. I'll post a few sections and details and pics of my pad assembly. Makes it easy to build. But depending on your frame, youll have to add a member or two, or drill some holes in it.

fitZ

[frederic]

Spent most of the day making one leg. Not because its difficult or overly time consuming, but because of the constant interruptions.





More to come tomorrow!

[RICK FITZPATRICK]

Hey frederic, what are you using to cut the tubing?

[frederic]

Ryobi compound miter saw.

Materials with an 1/8" wall or less, or 1/2" solid rounds or less, I'll use a $99 ryobi compound miter saw with a $60 metal cutting blade. I get the blades from my welding supplier, and they last a long time. I've used DeWalt and other blades from home depot and lowes and they cut fine, but don't last that long with the amount of cutting I do.

For thicker materials, I'll either use a milwalkee sawzall, or a miller plasma cutter depending on required accuracy in the cut, shape of the cut, etc.

I debated using round tubing, in which case I would have cut the tubing using a tubing notcher, which if you aren't familiar with those units, its essentially a large steel brace with a rotating shaft that you attach a bi-metal hole saw, and attach your drill on the other end, for a perfect fishmouth cut every time, even at angles. I went with square tubing for this just because its much easier to cut and weld, gets the "outside" of the project over with quicker. I'll be covering portions of this desk with poplar, but I'll be doing that inside where its warm. Wood doesn't spark when you cut it

[punkin]

I'm getting drawn into this and find myself very intersted...tell us about the hinges in your last set of photos. Up until I saw them, I thought I had an understanding of the build but that lost me.

You're doing a hell of a job! Very generous of you. Thanks.

[frederic]

Originally Posted by punkin

I'm getting drawn into this and find myself very intersted...tell us about the hinges in your last set of photos. Up until I saw them, I thought I had an understanding of the build but that lost me.

Sure, be happy to explain. Keep in mind you're only looking at one half of the table, and its upside down The first picture shows more or less how the hinges were designed, essentially they are a 3" long, 1.5" wide by 1/8" thick flat steel, spaced a hair further apart than the leg is wide, the leg being the 2" square tubing thats about 18" long.

The long threaded rod is 1/2" diameter, and not part of the hinge. I'll be using bolts, but the long threaded rod allows me to line up the center holes of the front leg, and the back leg, a lot easier. Once I wended on the horizontale 2" square tube that rests on the floor to both legs, there isn't going to be any play whatsoever. This is because the welding will hold the two legs rigid. So if the centerlines of the hinge pins (bolts) aren't perfectly aligned, the leg won't move easily and bind.

The second picture zooms in a bit, for more detail. Again, ignore the threaded rod, as its not part of the design, just an alignment piece. 2nd picture shows things before welding.

Picture three shows things after the hinges were welded to the bottom of the table (again, its upside down), and I've spaced out things using 1" square tubing so that the foot is set correctly to the two legs, so I can weld them together. Actually, you'll see two 1" square tubes, they are just there for spacing. They aren't part of the structure.

In picture four, you'll see the leg is sticking straight up, and the foot is welded to the two legs. If the hinge pins (bolts) are somewhat loose, the leg moves freely. If you look closely at picture four, the back of the table is furthest away from you. A bolt-in angled piece of metal needs to be there, which isn't yet, and will be bolted on to a bracket that I have to make for the underside of the table, as well as attached to a threaded hole on the back side of the leg. You'll see pictures of that tomorrow, after I acquire the steel for the angled leg supports. I forgot to pick it up today... ooops.

Did that help at all? Even though a picture is often associated with 1000 words, I realize its difficult to visualize what i'm doing here just yet. While I know in my head which is the top, front, side, etc, its probably not apparent to anyone else just yet. A few more days of pictorials will make things much clearer.

If anything is unclear, let me know, I'd be happy to expand.

Originally Posted by punkin

You're doing a hell of a job! Very generous of you. Thanks.

Thanks!

[punkin]

OK...I'm with you now. When I thought table, I wasn't thinking folding legs. I envisioned removable at best with all the heavy duty welding going on. Very cool. I'm supposing that you're planning for some sort of locking mechanism to keep the legs from the dreaded "auto-fold syndrome"?

Again, thanks...carry on.

[frederic]

Originally Posted by punkin

OK...I'm with you now. When I thought table, I wasn't thinking folding legs. I envisioned removable at best with all the heavy duty welding going on. Very cool. I'm supposing that you're planning for some sort of locking mechanism to keep the legs from the dreaded "auto-fold syndrome"?

Again, thanks...carry on.

Maybe this will help... its not a complete sketch, but its readable.

http://www.midimonkey.com/~frederic/console/design.gif

Once the diagonals are bolted on, the legs will not move and support the weight I'm asking it too. For portability, I can take out the diagonals (which I haven't made yet), and flip the legs flat against the underside of the table top, or I can remove the bolts entirely, making more seperate structures, that are lighter. This is getting very heavy very quickly, which is one of the reasons why I'm making it in bolt-together sections.

Originally, the legs were going to slip into square openings that would hold the legs perpendicular to the underside of the table (and in turn, the floor), but constructing such a thing would have tripled the time I spent attaching the legs, so I passed over that idea for simplicity. Keep It Simple, Sam!

BTW, if you're interested, in a few of the pictures you can see my white pickup... if you look at the black bumper with the two ridiculously large driving lights, you might notice that I made that myself, welding together 1/4" thick steel plate

[punkin]

OK...Ok...I'm getting it now. Look like a serious piece of furniture. It should be very stable and transportable. I get what you're saying about slipping the legs into the box openings...I tried this on a previous project (different application). It didn't turn out as stable as I would have liked. I think this approach is much more sound.

Thanks man. I can't wait to see the finish work!

[frederic]

Yep. Though transportable isn't a big deal, once I install it, its there until the house burns down, or I die.

Just need to get it up the stairs by myself, since my wife is pregnant and kinda weeble-like!

7.2mb real media: Console Leg Assembly Video (12 minutes 4 seconds)

[frederic]

I've made other things out of steel also... here is an engine test stand. Tested a 600cid, twin turbo stroker engine on it the latter part of this summer.


Also made a dual-throttle body intake adaptor for the 600cid, twin turbo stroker motor. Grafted two GM throttle bodies onto one big Ford engine!


And a huge bumper for my truck:


Though my wife often mentions how all of my hobbies are grand-scale, grand-priced, hobbies. Cars, computers, and music ain't cheap

[Michael Jones]

I wish I could weld.
I'm going to be limited to wood, glue, and screws.

[RICK FITZPATRICK]

Cars, computers, and music ain't cheap

Damn, I can remember when I was happy with just a guitar. What happened?

I'm going to be limited to wood, glue, and screws.

Limited? Michael, just be happy with that. You can do PLENTY with it. Start welding, and then you need.......grinders......and then, a metal cutoff saw etc etc etc .....and then before you know it you want a CNC Laser at $100k , and then the shop, and then........opps, what happened to music and the studio????
fitZ

[frederic]

More pictures. The last picture shows the entire table, bolted together, upside down. Tomorrow I have to do the cross pieces that actually support the gear, then grind down all the beads, prime and paint. Then dismantle it, and hump it up a flight of stairs without destroying my new walls







I gave up trying to have the table be one span, supported only on the far away sides, so I solved two problems with one solution... I made a leg support in the center towards the back of the table, so there is still room for my legs when I'm sitting in front of the table. Also, this gives me two additional bolt-through points to join the two sides of the table together, for a total of four. The leg will support the two halves, and also make the center joint that much more rigid. $22 worth of steel, all done.

Michael - welding doesn't have to be difficult. The process I use is Gasless Fluxcore MIG. The welder is a large box, with a spool of welding wire in it, which feeds through the hose and the gun (the part you weld with), and the wire forms the arc. All you need for this kind of welding is a 20A, 120V outlet, a face mask, gloves, and the welder itself. Mine is a Lincoln SP135 which is more than enough for welding 1/8" thick material. This unit is typically $550 - $600 or so, and a really nice unit. Hobart and Miller also make welders of this time, and cost a hair more.

If you're ever in my neck of the woods (central NJ) I'd be more than happy to teach you how to weld with this method. Within 2 hours you'll have it down pat. Its really that easy. Just takes a little time to figure out how to set the machine for different thicknesses, as well as learning the hand control. Also there will be wood on the front of this, giving me a nicer appearance since I'll be using poplar. Also, a desk surface so I can route an indentation for my trackball and keyboard, then cover with foam and stretched material over that, for a nice cushiony surface to lean on. More than likely I'll use vinyl, since its inexpensive, easy to clean, and provides a nice tough surface as long as one doesn't puncture it. The desk surface supports aren't attached yet, that should occur tomorrow if the weather holds out, snow wise.

Rick - I used to be vary happy with a ibanez guitar, a 4-track, and a roland TR202 drum machine. This was back in 1983 though... things have scaled over the years - scaled up!

[geet73]

Welding is kinda fun. I'm not all that good with it.. but whever I do it, the arc just keeps me mesmerized. Heh.

I can't wait to see this all put together.

[RICK FITZPATRICK]

Hey frederic...........H E L P!!! Sorry I didn't post the CAD drawings of the arm rest yet. Tomorrow at the soonest. I just fired up my NEW computer on Saturday, and BAM!!!! Immedietly I picked up some kind of virus. Still got it. Been fighting the mofo ever since. Looks like I'll have to reformat the whole hardrive. Picked up something that redirects internet searchs to a wierd homepage. I even found a whole website dedicated to eradicating it. But, looks like too much trouble for me. Its easier to reformat. DAMN!!! Anyway, I'll post those as soon as I get the files and autocad loaded. My sister-inlaw managed to save my files from my old hardrive that crashed God, I hate computers. I suck when it comes to this stuff. Oh well, thank god for gurus.
BTW, your console frame is lookin AWESOME!! Been working on mine too, all week. Soon as I get this damn computer thing solved, I'll poke all three of em in the belly box and start inserting the goodies
fitZ

[frederic]

Sorry you have to reformat, that blows. You might consider acquiring some kind of tape backup drive, and after you reinstall, back it up. I have a large network in the house (with several servers), and one of the servers connects to a SCSI-attached HP Surestore quad 70gig DLT, 15 tape library. This of course is gross overkill for most people, but backing up data is critical if its valuable (and/or your time is valuable). You could even backup your system with a DVD writer these days...

When my studio PC's go back online, its actually two PC's. One for midi, audio, etc, one for adobe premiere, animation, and other software that takes forever to "render". I don't surf the internet on either machine, at all, ever. Neither PC can see the internet, and the internet cannot see them.

To read mail or surf the internet, I have to open a remote "VNC" viewer, pointing that viewer to a small linux computer in my server racks in the basement. Or, this laptop, which has absolutely nothing on it of any value. Surfing using Linux is great because all the virii I've seen thus far in the last decade goes after WinBlows, rather than Linux.

Plus, old PC's make good linux computers. Linux can be tuned for specific hardware and is blazing fast as compared to winbloze. Of course you can't run Sonar, Premiere, Bryce3d on Linux. But keeping internet surfing and studio stuff seperate has kept me out of the virus, popup, redirect hassles that everyone else experiences. This laptop is windows, and the only thing on it is emule for file sharing and a IE for net surfing. If it gets infected, I have a boot image DVD I created with the "build", I simply put in the DVD, it boots, I press "reinstall" with the mouse, it wipes the drive and reimages the entire laptop and I come back a few hours later with XP Pro, emule, and IE on it

BTW, your console frame is lookin AWESOME!! Been working on mine too, all week. Soon as I get this damn computer thing solved, I'll poke all three of em in the belly box and start inserting the goodies
fitZ

Thank you... its been a fun project thus far, though the snow that's expected today and tomorrow might torture me a little bit. But I have no choice, it must be done this weekend as there are no more nice days left. Can't finish the floor until the console table is done, painted, assembled. As it is I have to paint it upstairs in the studio where I can get the temperature to painting temps.

For the arm rest, workspace, PC Keyboard/trackball area, I'm going to weld on 10" long 1" square tubing across the front of the desk every so often, bore holes through the ends of those pieces vertically, and use short deck screws through them into the wood that I choose to put on top of them. I am fairly sure I'll use poplar, but that may change. Originally I was going to use pine, but looking in the corner of the room I see that my pine is highly curved and warped in several directions. Oh well, should have known better.

[frederic]

Originally Posted by geet73

Welding is kinda fun. I'm not all that good with it.. but whever I do it, the arc just keeps me mesmerized. Heh.

I can't wait to see this all put together.

There are many different methods of welding the "home guy" can do. I view welding as "soldering with a huge soldering iron".

Gas welding, which uses oxygen and a fuel, typically oxyacetelyne though sometimes propane, can also be used for welding steel. My welds look much better with this method, as I've been using this method for decades. But, then you have to deal with refilling tanks, and sad to say, unless you weld constantly, i.e. for a living, you have to deal with the tank nazi's. You either rent your tanks for $30-50 a month (each), or you buy them outright for $300 each, and exchange them for refilling. And if your welding place goes under, no one else will touch your tanks. That's happened to me twice in my life now. Not fun.

Mig welding comes in two flavors, fluxcore which is the method I'm using, in which the welding wire inside the machine has a coating on it which provides the shielding around the weld puddle to prevent contamination. Works great, but generates a lot of smoke and fumes. People often complain this method is difficult because of the smoke, but the trick to it is not to place your face shield above the smoke, but rather next to it. I weld outside, so the smoke goes right up and away. If I'm welding a smaller project in the garage, I'll just put one of those white fans on the edge of my welding table and blow the smoke away.

Mig welding with shielding gas produces cleaner looking welds, using either CO2, Argon, or a mix of the two, depending on what you want to weld. While the welds look much better, this introduces two problems for the DIY'er. First, you're dealing with the aforementioned tank nazi's as you have to have a tank of shielding gas, and second, the spool of wire in the machine, because its not flux coated, will rust very quickly if you don't use it up. If you live in a dry, hot climate (arizona) this is not an issue, but if you're in a humid area the bare wire becomes useless quickly. To save money, I buy large spools in bulk, so this was another reason why I chose fluxcore.

TIG welding is by far the sexiest... the machines are more expensive but the welds are by far prettier. This is because the area that you heat for your weld is by far smaller, its very localized. One of the reasons why TIG is preferred for aluminum - the entire workpiece doesn't sag and drip onto your worktable

I've welded aluminum with my MIG welder though, using an Argon/Helium mix, with decent results. Not as pretty as TIG of course, but the parts "stuck" and were very strong. The Lincoln 135 is a very versatile welder for sure. Its big enough to do decent sized jobs (like the 1/4" plate "superbumper" I made for my truck, see pics further up this thread), as well as able to be adjusted down for welding steel as thin as 22ga. Really, really, thin stuff.

There is also arc welding, which is nothing more than a huge-ass transformer in a box, with a switch to control what tap you're drawing power from. Arc welders are very well suited for thicker materials, as the penetration of the weld is deeper. This is what you use for welding bucket loaders, trailer hitches, stuff in the 1/2" thick and up range. You can weld thinner materials with an arc welder, but its much more difficult. The major advantage I see with Arc welding is twofold - the welder itself is cheaper ($200-300 or so) and what you weld doesn't have to be clean. Because the current is so high, any dirt or paint just evaporates off your welds. Mig, Tig, and Gas welding require some prepwork in order to make an effective weld.

Every weld I've done on this table, for example, required a quick zap with the angle grinder... because steel is covered with a hardened black oxide coating. Its part of the manufacturing process in making the steel, and it protects it from rust at least for a short time, long enough to ship from the plant to the warehouse and in turn, to you.

You probably can't see from my low-res pictures, but there are a few spots here and there across my table where rust has formed, in little 1/4" to 1/2" patches. This is where I've bumped the steel with a tool, banged it around on the way home in my pickup, etc. The black oxide coating was chipped off.

But, before I paint I'll have to sand the entire console table, then prime it with a good automotive primer. Then paint.

Anyway, sorry for the long post... but if anyone is considering learning welding, consider a flux-core wire mig welder. Lowes and Home Depot sells Miller and Lincoln Electric units at reasonable prices. Imagine being able to make console tables, rack furniture, etc.