Built-in entertainment center / fireplace / faux stone wall build thread

[jteneyck]

I've admired your projects for years, but I never knew you did such great work with such modest machines.  You continue to prove that it's the guy pushing the wood over the machine that matters most.  

I'm looking forward to seeing how this project comes together.  Carry on.  

John

[FS7]

I've admired your projects for years, but I never knew you did such great work with such modest machines.  You continue to prove that it's the guy pushing the wood over the machine that matters most.  

I'm looking forward to seeing how this project comes together.  Carry on.  

John

I very much appreciate the kind words. I intend every now and then to upgrade my tools, but I always put it off. Whenever I ask my wife about what my spends on clothing or something, however, she always says she never asks me what I spend in the wood shop. Modest to us, but probably not to everybody.

[FS7]

Anyway, the saga continues. Picking up where I left off (months ago)...

Raised panels for the side are cut and ready.



Side panels are aligned, dry fitted, space balled, glued, and clamped.



After that, for some reason I didn't take a picture of this, but I ripped off the thickness of the front face frame from one edge of these panels and cut a rabbet in the other edge to accept the back panel of the cabinet. I also cut a hole in the bottom for the grommets - back in the beginning, you remember the speakers were outside the unit. This is for the wire, and on one side it also has the subwoofer wiring and the HDMI cable that will (one day) go to a TV outside. I hope, anyway. Here's what they look like after being glued and assembled. 



You might notice those are two different sides. In any case, I then went on to the back. This is 1/2" sande plywood, and I used a few coats of Minwax cherry to try to darken it up a bit. The grain is nondescript (good, I didn't want it to draw any attention) but the panel absorbed a lot of stain. It turned out light no matter how many coats I put on. In the end, not a big deal.

Now, it gets mounted. I used screws - trim head smaller screws in the rabbet (it's about 1/2" wide, so big enough for screws) and regular screws (probably #8, I don't remember) through the back into the dividing members.

The screws are here, and even the smaller ones are visible on the edge. All holes are countersunk as I don't want to risk any more drywall damage than necessary in the back (and also keep the back smooth for a good mating finish with the wall). This also (hopefully) shows the difference between the stained (appearance) side of the non-matching plywood and the back side. It's a very pale yellow/off-white color without any stain added.

I did have some sanding to do before proceeding. The outside of the cabinet is now ready to be finished. In the ideal case, I would have achieved a better grain match between the raised panel sides and the face frame edge grain, but that's a lot easier said than done.

[FS7]

On to the bottom. Having learned a lesson from the back, I tried a lot more stain on the bottom panel. It made very little difference in the end.

Here's another spot where I didn't take as many pictures as I could. While what I did will be obvious, it helps to talk about it since it's probably not something that's commonly done. Truth be told, I've never researched it and don't really have the slightest idea whether there is a "standard" way to do this or not. On the bottom of the bottom plywood panel, I screwed pre-drilled (pocket holes) 1x2 pine to the underside of the panel, which should provide both a better mating surface (1.5" vs. 23/32") and a mechanical fastening to the hardwood edging. Here are some shots of the underside, showing the finished product.
The gaps are there for additional vertical (ground contact) support, since I don't want any sagging in the middle. I don't know that it would or wouldn't happen, but it seems like prudent planning to me. In any case, the panel can be turned over and finished now.


The second shot is important, as it shows the joint between the plywood and the hardwood. This is usually what happens to me, at least to some degree, when I mate plywood (especially cross-cut plywood) with solid wood edging. It's very hard if not impossible to mate perfectly. This joint will be hidden as it is designed to be overlapped by the top. This is part of the reason why I used 6/4 stock for the hardwood base edging, and part of the reason why I don't plane my face frame and side panels down to 3/4" (they are probably closer to 15/16"). It will be clearer in a few pics.

[FS7]

In any case, I can add the additional vertical supports (I bored holes on the drill press and used screws to attach them) and added some finish on the bottom. It's probably not necessary, but every now and then I fight my perfectionism and completionism. Once I turn this right side up, I do not plan to ever see the underside again.

Once it's flipped over, I can glue in the grommets. Now it starts to look somewhat like it's supposed to.

Note that the four "interior" holes will not get grommet inserts - there will probably be a lot of wires, including thicker power cables, and I also want airflow. The outside grommets are what Amazon calls "red bronze" and will have inserts. Also, the black plastic grommets in the center channel cavity will get inserts as they are potentially visible. In any case, it's now time to attach the top.

My method for attaching table tops is something I came up with and refined over the years. It has served me well, though it might be a strange idea to some. Let me walk you through it.

1) Scrap pieces of pine (stretchers, I guess, for lack of a better term) are cut to fit inside whatever gaps are available in the top of the piece.
2) Pocket holes are cut to attach those pieces to sides, dividers, back, and face frame as necessary.
3) Holes are drilled for screws with spacing allowed for expansion.
4) Dadoes are cut on the opposite side of the pocket holes (in this case, at 5/8" width to accept Lee Valley #14 expansion washers).
5) Expansion washers are glued in.

The pictures show both sides of the stretchers, the washers attached, and the stretchers installed in the cabinet ready to accept the top. The top can expand about 1/4" in either direction (depending on how well I center the screws) which should be more than enough. This is going from my shop about 12 feet to the wall, but the difference here is that it will contain electronic equipment and an electric fireplace. Even with a built-in cooling fan I expect more than average wood movement. Note that the configuration of the stretchers is somewhat unique - ordinarily I would try to put one all the way in the back (two instead of one in the middle, as it were), but I can't go all the way to the front since I don't have clearance to install fasteners in the very front and I need to leave the back open for the fan. In any case, I use FastCap PowerHead screws to attach the top (really good for such applications). Here it is all put together.
I also had a chance to make some shelves. I used 1/2" prefinished maple plywood (bought online with free shipping from Home Depot, not bad) and prefinished iron-on edging. The nearest size I could find was 3/4", so I ironed the edging on, leaving the shelf a tad wide, and then used a router to trim the edging down. It took a few passes with a chamfer bit, with the last actually chamfering the edge slightly. They turned out pretty smooth, considering they are shelves.

Now I have to do some grunt work. In my old house, I learned that an electric fireplace will take almost all of the juice on a regular 15A circuit. It doesn't need more than that, but it will hog it. I had to run a new circuit, so this meant trenching the wall, running wire, and installing an old work box. It's since been repaired, taped, mudded, and spray textured (at least to where it will be visible). I really, really, really do not like drywall work.

Next up are the doors. I have actually already cut them and just glued them tonight. They are in the clamps now.

[Bill Holt]

FS7,  Thank you for the great journy!  I use a similar methor to attach tops (mine are not picture worthy).  Another similarity, I too like oversized stock, normally 7/8".

From my vantage point, it feels like you are really enjoying the process.

[FS7]

FS7,  Thank you for the great journy!  I use a similar methor to attach tops (mine are not picture worthy).  Another similarity, I too like oversized stock, normally 7/8".

From my vantage point, it feels like you are really enjoying the process.

Even when I don't enjoy it (as with anything, sometimes I have other things to do or other things I would rather do, especially in the summer), it's always nice to look forward to the finished product. In this case it's something we'll all be able to enjoy as a family, which makes it even better.

I recently found out that people sell sawdust on Etsy. Probably elsewhere too. I have no idea what this is used for and a lot of it is simply listed as "mixed hardwood and softwood dust," meaning it almost certainly comes from a shop dust collector. It's sold by the pound, and it seems like it might be possible for me to have $100 worth of sawdust at any given time in my shop. It sounds crazy to me, but I guess if you need sawdust for some craft project you can't just buy it anywhere. The lumber I buy has always been on the thicker side (both CP Johnson, my current go-to, and Vienna Hardwood, my previous go-to, offer 4/4 lumber that's about 1 1/16"). Having never really had a need to plane to 3/4" for any particular reason, I usually leave it thicker. I'll at least match the thicknesses of the pieces before a project, but it's almost always considerably larger. The only thing I don't like is the weight. The additional rigidity and strength is the other side of that.

The point is that I never really liked the idea of planing for the sake of planing. The ability to sell it is something, I guess, but I highly, highly, highly doubt I would ever think it worth it to go through the trouble of filling up bags from the dust collector or the chip separator, pack them, and ship them. I mean we all have sawdust that accumulates so even if you wanted to sell it you have enough over time. But I struggle with having enough time as it is and it's just so much easier to dump the sawdust in the woods.

[FS7]

Good news - the project is almost done. I have the doors glued, but I need to add an edge profile, finish, and mount them. Then we're done. Well, almost. The IR repeater I had procured is...finicky. I am trying a few other solutions first.

The unit is mounted, the wall is painted (including edging around everything), the baseboard is reinstalled, painted, and caulked, wires are all run, new TV is in, fireplace is in, all of that. It needs doors and it's done.

The problem with the IR repeater seems to be that it's unreliable and doesn't like to work consistently. Apparently there are single receivers available (so instead of receive and retransmit, there are IR jacks on the back of the two devices I need - AV receiver and FiOS box) so I should be able to connect directly to an IR receiver. No sticking a retransmitter over the device's IR receiver. Let's hope that works. It *looks* pretty now - very unobtrusive, almost impossible to see - but it doesn't work well.

[FS7]

The project is now finished. I think I left off with the doors. I had cut and squared the stock a while ago. I just needed to profile with the rail and stile bits, glue up the panels, profile them, add space balls, glue everything up...you get the idea. It's the same as the side panels on the unit (pictured before), just with the edge profile and the hinges. I skipped a few of those pictures. But here are the doors, ready to finish:

It's worth noting that I used the Kreg hinge jig this time around. It makes drilling for cup hinges incredibly easy. I wish I had bought one earlier. It's preset for "standard" cup hinges (I used Blumotion 1/2" overlay) with a 3mm inset and the matching Forstner bit. Where to place the hinges wasn't much of a thought - just matched the jig up with the edge of the door and drilled. Super easy. The doors are then finished (this picture is blurry, but I'll still post it).

My finish bottle is now empty. I use Watco Danish Oil, but I do tend to thin it with mineral spirits. I think this is partly inherent and partly because of the way I store it. It slowly cures ever so slightly in the bottle, so thinning helps retard that. I also find that a thinner finish is easier to rub and less likely to create nibs, which are one of my personal pet peeves. In any case, it's now time to mount the unit while everything's drying. The doors can't go on until everything's done anyway, at least not without getting in the way. I started by painting the wall - take off the baseboards for the built-in and paint where the unit will meet the wall so I minimize masking. Here's the unit installed, with the baseboard "before" and "during."


After reinstalling the baseboards, I caulked, painted, and touched up. I am a perfectionist (as I say every other sentence) and one of the things I cannot stand is when paint lines are not clean. This is challenging with baseboards and other trim as it's not hard to get lots of waves in drywall. In any case, I caulk all of the 18 gauge brad holes and along the base, and then paint (just regular semi-gloss white). If the lines between the baseboard and wall are not clean, I will touch up one or the other with craft brushes. This might be excessive, but I would prefer things to look computer rendered. Probably not a realistic standard. In any case, with that drying I can move to the wiring.

I am not sure where I went wrong, but the outlets were perfectly aligned at the bottom but had an extra 3/4" or so on top. I measured these things six different ways before cutting, but not that dimension. I guess I just forgot or got confused. I *did* think while I was cutting (Dremel Multi-Max, by the way) that they looked taller than they should be. Fortunately, the oversized wall plates were able to hide things. The new circuit is on the left, and the two existing (low voltage and electrical) were already there. I did have to trim to the rightmost plate some as that was a little closer to the divider. The unit is almost exactly centered butted up against the outdoor faucet access panel, so I thought I could live with this hidden inside the cabinet.

[FS7]

Now there's a lot of equipment to move and a lot of wiring to run. That's boring and not worth pictures. Or at least that's what I'll claim since I didn't take any.

I will say that the IR situation required some tweaking. I purchased a simple extender here (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B009ZG...UTF8&psc=1), which works by receiving the IR signals and retransmitting them to the device. You do this by sticking on a retransmitter over the device's IR receiver. Google is helpful in telling you where exactly that is. The receiver has an LED indicating it's receiving IR, which is good. The retransmit part, though, was not that effective. It seemed to be spotty. I needed two devices controlled - the AV receiver and the FiOS box. It turns out that monaural cables can act as IR transmitters, so I was able to run a cable from the above repeater's output directly into the receiver. This avoids the problem of retransmitting IR and the receiver works like a charm. However, the FiOS box, which also has an IR 3.5mm input, didn't respond to this. I had to buy a second extender for just the cable box. More money than I would have liked, but they both work like a charm now. In any case, I can go back into the shop, get the doors, and put them on. I had a buddy helping me that day.

After that it's time to put the doors on, clean up a bit, and take a final picture.