Don’t worry my irritable devotees, full build video forthcoming! There were too many worthy adversaries in the challenge that I didn’t make the cut. That’s good news for you though, here is the teaser for your viewing pleasure, young chap.
The cabinet is made from 3/4″ poplar plywood with 1/4″ oak plywood on the back. The drawers use the same 3/4″ and 1/4″ plywood construction. Drawer slides are simply made from strips of poplar. Each drawer gets larger as you move down with the bottom drawer being 3 courses of shingles tall.
Cedar shingles installed using crown staples as fasteners. Mitered corners are alternated with each course. This was a little different than what you would do on a house sidewall since I had to leave a straight seam at the sides of the drawers. Shingles were installed all the way up the cabinet to ensure the courses lined up, then the drawers were cut free. Shingles wouldn’t typically be glued, but I did it because I had to cut the courses at each drawer since pieces were left without fasteners. Everything was finished with boiled linseed oil.
– Each shelf is 2″ thick, all laminated from 3/4″ plywood. The left and right sides of the shelves are cut at 5° to correspond with the angle in the singles. This allows for the shelves to be adjustable to each coarse of shingles. The shelves are finished with linseed oil.
– The drawer pulls are made from river rock stones. Each was drilled out with a 1/2″ masonry bit and a screw was cemented to the stone with epoxy. Each had a nut threaded on before attaching it to the drawer to space it out from the face of the drawer. They are finished with linseed oil like everything else.
– The 4 feet are made from laminating a salvaged LVL structural beam. Each is 2 layers thick and cut at an angle to mimic the shingles. These are screwed to the bottom of the cabinet and also finished with linseed oil.
First off, I estimate this countertop at around 160lbs…fun getting that thing out of the subterranean shop! The form was made from a sheet of melamine with pine added for the chamfered corners and black silicone to seal the square corners. The whole form got a coating of paste wax to help pull the counter off once it cures. 1″ thick rigid foam is used to create a cavity to help take off weight (the counter edges are 2″ thick). To smooth it, I started by dry sanding and finished with wet sanding where I simply wet the slab with water and used a high grit sanding disk. To seal the counter, regular 2 part epoxy resin was used. The first coat was spread and then scraped smooth when it soaked in, the 2nd coat was just a thin layer. The boards on the back were stuck on with epoxy since a hairline crack formed when I flipped the counter over because I took it out of the form too early. I didn’t use reinforcing steel because the concrete mix I used is fiber reinforced, which is sufficient for this application.
