Over on LumberJocks, they’re having a Halloween Challenge and I thought that I’d enter. They’re giving away three prizes to randomly-selected entrants – the first prize is a $50 gift cert from Lee Valley. Anytime the prizes are given away randomly, instead of based on skill and craftsmanship, I’m all over that! But my wife didn’t particularly want me spending a lot of time in the shop merely for the chance at a $50 gift certificate for tools (and DEFINITELY not for a plane holster or a cap, she would say).
So she told me that she’d let me have $50 extra bucks for tools if, instead, I built a lego table for our kids. We’re expecting our third child in a few weeks, and once that little bugger starts crawling around, we’ll need to have those legos off the floor.
So I thought that was a pretty good deal. I downloaded Google Sketchup (my first time using it) and started planning the table. I based it off of this great project (a train table) by fellow LumberJock Joshua Sargent.
The table will be a multi-use table. The plywood panel will be covered with a 70×100 (centimeters) “car mat” – you know, a colorful very thin rug that has roads, buildings, etc. drawn on it. It’ll be removable if need be. I’ll then build a frame and panel “lid” which will seat onto the top. On one side, it will be a plain smooth surface for a homeschooling workspace (I’ll have to figure out the best way to fill the grain so it’ll be smooth). On the other, I’ll have a checkers/chessboard painted on one half, and on the other half…hmm, any ideas?
Below is the sketchup of the main part, minus the lid. You can see that it’s pretty much identical to Joshua’s table, except that I’ve joined the frame pieces with dovetail joints instead of screws. I think I’ll still need screws to attach the legs to the frame, unless you guys can think of another option.
Thanks for reading!
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October 31, 2008 at 3:22 pm
Joshua Sargent
Ha! I love the internet! Was so cool to hear from you that somebody half-way around the world saw my meager little table, improved the design, and is going to build it for their own children! What a trip!!!
I’m already jealous that I couldn’t do the dovetails…that’s going to be so much better than the screws.
Two things about the legs:
1. If I would have had the idea when I built mine, I might have tried dowels instead of screws (maybe wood, maybe brass) to attach the legs to the frame. You would still see them, but in my opinion they would have looked better than the screws. I don’t know enough yet to know if that would have provided enough strength – the table is extremely sturdy with the screws and glue. At 200 pounds, I can stand and balance on the frame with no fear of it budging at all.
2. It isn’t easy to tell from the picture, but it looks like your SketchUp might be showing the legs coming all the way to the top edge of the frame rails. On my table they stop about 1.5″ short, so the tops of the legs provide the corner supports for the plywood table top. I used .75″ plywood, so the lip is about .75″.
I too, planned on building a lid for the table, so I’ll be interested to see how yours turns out. One other idea I had was to devise some way to easily and quickly “extend” the legs of the table to raise it up high enough (6-9″ or so) so that it could be used as a kids dining table with chairs. I have some ideas, but I’m not convinced they’ll work reliably. Will let you know if I figure anything out…please do the same. Am looking forward to seeing your finished table! My son loves his!
February 10, 2009 at 4:51 am
tom
Would you be interested in making custom wood products for my website. ? great job btw.