Chapter 0 - Completed (I think) Feb 7, 2003 Let the Building... well... the Pre-Building Begin!! Jan 15, 2003 - The materials are here that I ordered from Lowe's Home Improvement and I can start building that enormous jig-table. I lifted the idea for the design from Rick Maddy. See his site here. He had the excellent idea of using truss-joists(TJI) for table top support. I used the 10" (9 1/2") TJI as opposed to the 12" ones like Rick did since a 12' span isn't really that long of this size and the 10" ones give you a bit more room for the shelf underneath that I planned to build. You have to order these TJIs here but they only take about 4-5 days to get them in at most. They are excellent to build with since they provide a much wider (2 1/2") top on which to lay your lumber. They are also much lighter than a 2 x 12 or 2 x 10 but provide more strength. I'd recommend this method. The TableThe first step was cutting the TJIs to length. I cut them to 138 1/2". This gives me room to tack them together with a 3/4' piece of birch plywood that I had left from another project and then when I put the top on, still have a 2" overhang for clamps and such. After the TJIs were cut to length, I leveled them precisely and tacked on the end-caps with wood screws. You need to make sure you level them well because you'll have a warbly table-top of you don't spend the time here. I then flipped this structure over (onto it's top) and bolted on the legs to each corner with (4) 6 1/2" carriage bolts each after carefully cutting each one toa length of 32 1/2". Then I found the center point of the bottom of each leg and drilled a 6" deep hole for my feet. Using a carriage bolt, washer and a nut fashioned a foot for each leg that would enable me to precisely level the top. (see below) |  |  |
After attaching the legs I flipped the whole thing over and leveled it so that I could attach the top. The first layer consisted of simple 1/2" OSB plywood. After covering the table with the OSB I placed a 1/4" sheet of Masonite on top of that to give me a nice flat surface that was smooth as well as replaceable. (see photo right) I then added a shelf underneath to give me some storage. I did this using a couple of 2 x 4 x 12' and some 2 x 4 x 8' for the ends and bracing. I then turned my attention to creating an epoxy hot-box and cloth box. Storage for the Epoxy and Cloth Not wanting to re-invent the wheel and build cabinets from scratch I turned my attention to the isles of Lowe's again and found an 8' x 48" cabinet with 5 shelves on it. It was about 26"" deep and would offer (with modifications) a perfect location for my cloth and epoxy. The first thing I did was remove the top shelf and first shelf from the bottom, leaving only the middle 2 shelves. The top shelf I will leave out and this spot will be replaced with 2 simple dowel curtain rods with "U" holders on each end to hold 2 LARGE bolts of fabric. I could easily reconfigure for 3 or 4 bolts if I desired. The bottom shelf that I removed is turned sideways and remounted (after being cut down) utilizing 4 "L" brackets. This resulted in a space about 30" x 30" x 26" (W x H x D). I then covered this in 1" foam insulation and used the "light bulb & line voltage thermostat" method to regulate the heat. I was worried that every time I opened those big doors I would lose all of my heat for my epoxy so I had to create an insulated door. This was fashioned out of another 1" piece of insulation and mounted into place with some stops on the inside on all 4 sides to keep in from pushing in. (see right photo) I then remounted the doors with some improved fittings,. I'm kinda like home improvement that way, and created a handle for my insulated door. Then, realizing that the insulated door was actually a smidge wider than high I decided to mark which way was up. However a marker malfunction caused me to mis-mark the door causing odd formations of letters on my door. I'll be danged if I use those kind of high-tech markers again ;-). (see below) Updated August 19, 2005 - Just for John Basol - He had a question on the Mailing List Oh John, (and anyone else who has the same question) here is what I did to finish the epoxy box. I wired up the bulb receptacle in series with the line level thermostat so that when the temp fell below what I had set on the thermostat It would turn on. I then just wired a plug on the end of a wire whip coming out of the hot area and plugged it into the wall. With this insulation you see here I keep the epoxy between 90 and 100 degrees even if the garage falls to 30 degrees in the winter. Now the good thing about the setup that I have is that the epoxy that you arent using can be kept in the cabinet and the leaking heat from the hot area keeps everything around 70 degrees in the winter and ambient temp in the summer... OK... Moving on. I keep the epoxy that I think I am going to use in the next week in the sticky stuff pump and I plug the ends of the spigots because the hardner has a tendancy to get crusty if you don't. Not the resin for some reason. Anyway... I cut a hole for the spigots to hang out the front and I cut a channel on the side for a piece of 3/4" pvc to stick through to extend the handle out the side of the hot box. (see pictures below - click for larger images) That way I don't have to fiddle with opening the insulated area every time I need epoxy. What I don't have a picture of if a $3.50 thermometer I bought at Walmart that has a probe and measures inside and outside temp as well as having the time in 1.5" numbers. That way I can see what the temp is in the hot box and the garage and still not miss dinner because I lost track of time ;-) Hope that helps!
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