Lots of advice needed

[alisfair]

sounds like a sweet project. I would suggest plastic laminate for the table surface. Sure it takes away from the wood theme but it eliminates questionable painting, staining, and epoxy. Doesn't take but one soft spot to ruin a kids project if it punches through the paper into the soft surface below. Just a thought. Nice your thinking of your children and investing in them .
Alisfair

[dusty]

If you can isolate the kids desks so that they are not real close to one another during their study periods, I think you and mama will be happier in the long run.

My kids did not study well together. There was a marked improvement when we gave them "separate" study areas. Same room just not elbow to elbow.

[Ed in Tampa]

Heath
What happens if you rethink the project to be more workarea/study related and less book case. I know book cases are though of when study is mentioned but in truth today's education is moving away from books.

As a Pastor I built a study in my home and lined the walls with "MY" books, books long time cherished and carefully collected. That was in the 70's / 80's today I rarely reach for one of those books I have them all plus hundreds more on my computer and with the built in indexes and concordances I do twice the work in 1/4 the time.

As your kids age computers, are going to be used more and more in their study. Our neighbor home schools and in my opinion is doing one of the best jobs of homeschooling I have ever seen done and I know she is running into computer scheduling problems.

As for a desk top have you looked at the glued up table top boards at the big box stores. When I was building my study I found a tabletop about 5 feet long and 30 inches wide it is made of cut offs that were nailed together and planed/sanded flat. The boards are 1x3 and none of them are longer than 6 inches long. I don't remember the cost but it was cheap cheap cheap. I stained and coated it and it has been in service since 1979

I mounted it between two cheap chest of drawers bought from the bare wood store again I think they cost $59 a piece. This gives me 4 huge drawers in each chest which I then subdivided to hold what I needed plus their tops are book storage for books often used and my printer and other computer related things. I think I have less than $150 in 8 foot of work space that holds my computer, my most often used books, all my supplies and such. Behind me and to the side of me are book cases taking up room and holding books I access on my computer.

Also if you do this you can adjust the height of the table work surface by placing the cleat that holds the desktop on the sides of the chest of drawers to meet each child's height.

In your case I would get three chests of drawers and mount the desktops between them then each child would be separated by a couple of feet. This would solve the problems Dusty mentioned. Add a wall mounted light over each work space and few small shelves that sit on the top of the chest of drawers for books, mementos, and other things and you are done.

[JPG]

Why do I keep hearing bird noises?


:D:D








Good suggestions!!!!!!!

[heathicus]

The general layout is something that my wife and I really came up with together after considering what she needs for the girls to do their work and considering their individual learning styles, the very limited amount of space we have, the whole bunch of stuff I have, and the current disorganized chaos of the "office." I know it seems simplistic and not well considered, but it actually has been. There are many ideas we wish we could incorporate, but this is the best with the space we have. The room is only about 10'x10'.

That said, Dusty, you make a good point about them being elbow to elbow. Even though I added a little separation between them, it wouldn't hurt to separate them a little more. Perhaps I'll swap the middle and right - put a girl on each end rather than side-by-side. I'll talk to the boss about that.

Ed, you're right about computers and digital media replacing physical media. The minimum desk size per child was determined by making sure they had enough room for a laptop computer and their workbooks, and a small storage space within reach for pencils, crayons, etc. My wife needed a place to store all their books and other supplies when not being actively used. Due to space constraints, going up was easier then going out, hence the shelves above the desks. She would also have use of "my" desk and computer and would be right next to them. My desk is being shortened from 4' to 3'. I don't mind the lost space because my current desk just seems to gather clutter and I very rarely actually sit at it. My computer has basically become a network file server and I use my Android tablet more than my home PC now.

You're also right about books. I have a ton of books, but I seldom ever read a physical book now. I listen to audiobooks on my 40 minute drive to and from work. And the times I read a book, it's an e-book, not physical paper. But, I love physical books. Love the way they look and smell and feel. There's no digital replacement for that. Whether I ever open them and read them or not, I can't get rid of my "dead tree editions!"

The idea to build three individual desks and connect them together for future moving around is an understandable one. But I don't want to move them around in the future. If they need other desks in the future, then I'll build or buy them at that time. These will be "permanently" installed shelves, currently being used as desks.

And now that I've planed down the cypress and gotten a good look at it, I'm actually pretty excited about using it as one long continuous top. As long as I can get a good, durable, protective coat of something on it.

I think the desk height is fine. They're using the kitchen table right now. They just have to drag everything out after breakfast, put everything back up for lunch, drag everything back out again, put it up again, etc. The youngest one wakes up raring to go and tackle the harder subjects, but needs a break after lunch. The oldest is, like me, NOT a morning person and is sluggish until well after breakfast and is able to focus better later in the day.

Regarding the finish... is there any issue with using the tung/spar mixture over the epoxy?

[joshh]

Why do I keep hearing bird noises?

Maybe you are having a stroke and don't know it?

[JPG]

Maybe you are having a stroke and don't know it?

No, they cause unconsiousness. At least the last one did.

[nuhobby]

Regarding the finish... is there any issue with using the tung/spar mixture over the epoxy?

The adhesion should be fine. Do note that some epoxies have a darkening effect on the wood, and this is more visible once the overcoat is applied. So it's best to get excess epoxy sanded/scraped away from where you don't need it.

[BuckeyeDennis]

My brother has cypress cabinets in his kitchen. They are very pretty, but the wood around the door pulls gets gouged up by fingernails pretty quickly, necessitating frequent refinishing. I just Googled the Janka hardness of cypress, and it is only 570.

I was thinking maybe one of the pour-on epoxy finishes like you see on bar tops and such, but then I saw some reports that they don't hold up well in the long run. Anyone have any first-hand experience with these?

Have you considered putting tempered glass on the desktops? Probably a bit pricy, but virtually bulletproof, and would let that pretty cypress show through.

[heathicus]

My parents are visiting Sunday, so I hope to get the boards edge joined and glued up tomorrow. I don't have enough clamps for the length of the boards. I also don't have a biscuit joiner, but I do have the Beadlocksystem. So I'm thinking a combination of that and pocket screws. But I don't have a Kreg jig (just never can let myself spend the money on it). So I'm thinking I'll either make my own jig. Shouldn't be much to it right? A block of hardwood that can be clamped to my board with guide holes drilled through at an appropriate angle. Easy enough to make on the Shopsmith. It should at least get me through this project, right? Thoughts?

I studied the epoxy options at the local hardware store today and ended up not buying anything. I'm still not sure what I should get.