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bmccarthy

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  1. Oh yeah, some low light photos. I apologize for the quality, I absolutely suck at low light photos. And please excuse my messy desk.
  2. Here we are guys. This is the result of all that hard work. First the frame! And lastly some natural light final shots. Nvidia is going to be releasing an article this month about my build. Thanks for taking the time to take a look at my build. It was a lot of fun and please feel free to reply with questions!
  3. Ok, So I'm missing a bunch of assembly photos. So I'm going to show what I have for now and when I change out the fluid (I used event fluid that shouldn't stay) I'll update this part of the build log. But here is what I have at least. One thing I love about modular power supplies is that I can make custom connections for the pump. So here I just crimped atx pins and put them in a 6pin female connector. Yellow is 12v so all you need to do to ensure the proper pin out of your PSU is to use a multi meter and test each pin on the PSU. There are some diagrams online, but I've had one bite me in the ass before, so now I always test my own power supplies when making custom cables. If you anyone would like a diagram for the SF600 let me know. I like to take the pump apart so that I can sleeve all the way to the solder points on the pump. Just makes for a cleaner aesthetic. The two sleeved cables have 2 wires each. One is the common and 12v for power, and the other is for PWM control which goes to the CPU fan header on the motherboard. The motherboard has a single 12v RGB header. I have 3 areas of the case that need RGB lighting. The main compartment, the top compartment, and the exterior shell. So I made my own spliter. I probably could have bought one. But I really hate the way RGB strips use those 4pin connectors that are not secure at all and come loose rather easily. So I used 4pin fan connectors which seat more securely. I twisted the colors together and then added a little solder. I'll be using a small length to finish the connection to the motherboard so that it is not to cramped with the large bundle of wires. To make the connection super secure, I used a dupont pin (the same pin used for usb and front panel connectors) and crimped it down on both ends of the wire. Followed that up with some solder. These things are not coming part. The finished splitter. I used dupont pins in a usb connector that seats really well onto the RGB 4pin on the motherboard. I also used the same connector for the Front I/O, much easier to connect one connector than a bunch of single dupont connectors. Made custom length fan cables. This really helps keep things nice and clean and it is really easy to do. You can reuse the existing fan connector and just put on new fan pins. Here is why I had those custom lengths. The radiator fans and the two front fans run to this fan splitter which is PWM. There is a single connection that runs to the only other fan header on the motherboard. Radiator and front fans installed. As well as the middle lateral support on the other side. I had to leave this sides mid lateral support off because that is where I'll be running most of the system wires. These parts went in first because it would have been to difficult to do it later with the motherboard tray in place. One nice thing about a removable motherboard tray is I can fix everything to it before placing it in the case. Here you can also get a good look at the PCIe extension cable I used. This one is from Thermaltake is is super high quality. I think LTT did a video on daisy chaining these together and was able to do like 5 or 6 before they had any performance loss. It was also flexible enough to go behind the motherboard with ease. MB tray and GPU installed. It was at this point I realized I didn't like the way the PCIe cable looked so I made an acrylic cover for it that I attached with some 3M adhesive. You'll see in the finished pics. When installing the pump, I realized I needed to make a couple of spacers for the pump bracket. I just tagged these in some matte black paint, and because they have the same profile as the mount they are hardly noticeable in the final product. Close up of the 8pin front panel connector I made. I love the final details. Also you'll notice the rails are looking a little beaten up. The paint on them hasn't had enough time to cure So its lifting in the high friction spots. Luckily you wont see that when its installed into the shell, but I'll end up repainting these later. Also the white specs you see is dust. It'll get a thorough cleaning before is done. Unfortunately that is all I have for the final assembly. Like I said, I'll go back and take some photos of the rest of the process when I refill the loop. When I get back from the movies I'll post the finish photos!
  4. Here are all the parts that will be going into the build. Still need to cut and sleeve the fans and pump headers. Front Panel Rear Panel Frame assembly complete. Just doing another test fit in the exterior shell. Everything is good to go for components.
  5. Alright time for paint! First thing, obviously, was to disassemble the entire case. Here you can see all the parts that need to be painted. This is all the parts for the internal frame. 24 individual pieces. I just wanted to get everything laid out before I started surface prep. I was in a bit of a hurry at this point in the project. And paint is one of those things that should be rushed. Here you can see that I've sanded all the panels and parts up to 220 grit. I also washed all the parts with soapy water to remove all oils and other various substances that may have adhered to the surface. This is critical step as anything left on the surface will absolutely ruin the finish. All the panels should be handled with gloves past this point. Getting the parts laid out for paint. I placed a drop cloth over my two work tables and raised the panels. I hope to one day build a booth where I can hang the parts. It results in a much better finish. I messed up part of the finish on the rails along the edges because how I'm painting them here. Next time if I have to paint this way I'll elevate the parts on some wood blocks to minimize the surface area contact between the parts and the table. It's what I get for rushing paint. Before I sprayed the primer I wiped all the parts with a tack cloth. I'm using a grey filling primer. I shot 2 coats and then sanded with 800 grit wet sand. Then washed the parts again. The surface is pretty smooth at this point. I used a tack cloth to wipe the parts down before spraying the first coat of paint. I decided to go with a matte black finish. I like how it doesn't show finger prints as easily and its easier to paint. I ended up going with 3 coats, with a light wet sanding with 1000 grit in between coats. Also if you are new to painting and you are painting in your garage, please be sure you have good airflow to remove the paint fumes. You do not want to be breathing this stuff in and be sure to wear eye protection and a good respirator. Ok now for the fun part! On with final assembly!!!
  6. Thanks man, I really appreciate that. And yeah its a lot of material to get through. I wanted to be thorough so that others could learn from it. Its pretty cool what you can do in your own garage! Being innovative is a lot of fun. And that's crazy about your finger, its either a small world or this is a common injury among modders.
  7. Ok I still have some frame mods I need to do. I need to make a ton of ventilation holes. So what I did to make this look as clean as possible was mocked up the panels in illustrator to size and made a hole pattern that I could tape to the panels. I could then follow that up with a punch to center mark every single hole. This is how the pattern looks after being punched. I made this test piece before I committed to the hole thing. The punching actually added a lot of stress to the aluminum. So I heated it up with my heat gun for it to settle back down. I used a drill press to drill out every hole. This took a little time but I'm happy with the result. After that I chucked up a larger drill bit in my hand drill then counter sunk and debured the holes from both sides of the panel. This cleaned up the holes and allows for better unrestricted airflow. Next I made a power supply shroud. I think it just makes builds in general much better. Plus as there is literally no room for cable management in the case it'll be nice to have an area to hide a few extra connectors that I'll need to make for the lighting. Here you can see how I attached the shroud to the motherboard tray. Just some small 15mm aluminum angle. The bracket are contact welded to the motherboard tray. It was at this point that I realize I was going to starve the PSU of fresh air if I didn't help it out a little bit. I used the same method for drilling the holes in this pattern. Should help the PSU get plenty of fresh air. I decided to remake all the PETG tube runs. The ones I made earlier in the project had been scratched up from the mock up. I also need to drill another hole in the top panel to mount a pass through fitting for the fill port of the reservoir. This will also act as a structure element to keep the reservoir for tilting. I used an extension fitting and a male to male adapter to secure it to the pass through fitting. I also decided to move the drain valve to the other side as I had way more room over there. It is connected to a Q fitting that has 5 ports on it. The inside port is connected to the pump outlet with another male to male rotary fitting. The valve is connected to the left port with a male to male rotary fitting. The top port has a multi-link compression fitting. The rear port has a stop plug, and the bottom port will have the temperature prob for the loop coolant. Full mock up is complete. You can see I also added a handle to the rear panel. This will make it way easier to pull the frame out of the shell. I used a standard drawer pull from the big box store. Now I need to disassemble and paint and finish the custom wiring! So damn close!
  8. Time to start cutting into that walnut. But before I show that process I wanted to explain a little bit about wood prep. When you are working with hardwood you have to take into consideration that it flexs and warps in different climates and temperatures. For this reason when you purchase rough sawn stock you need to let it acclimate to your environment. The material I used sat in my shop for about 3 months on a known flat surface before I even began to work on it. And a couple of things are happening here. One as wood dries out it starts to release stress causing it to warp and cup. So it is best to let this take place before you begin your project. Walnut is actually fairly stable in my experience. But it all depends on your climate. Now that my stock has acclimated, I rough cut the pieces to roughly their final dimension. I do this to release any further stress that may be release after cutting and also gives me a little extra material to work with to help eliminate snipe which I will get into later. Here are the boards rough cut. I still need to rip down the boards to their rough widths. Again leaving some room for jointing and squaring off on the table saw. Here is my setup for milling these boards. I first joint one edge and one face. The jointed edge and face gives me reference faces to square off on the table saw and thickness plainer. The job of the joiner is to give you a perfectly flat edge. So when you look at a piece of stock, it will typically have a bow side and a cup side. You want to join the board cup side down so that you remove material off the front and back of the board. You don't want to put a lot of force down onto the board where you might force the cup out with pressure. If you do that, once the board goes through and you release the pressure the cup will return. The goal is to get a true flat surface. Once you have a flat surface, you can then use that surface to use as a reference to get a flat edge. You place the flat face against the fence of the joiner and remove the cup on one edge. After you have your true edge and face. You can then rip the board to its final width on the table saw using the true edge against the table saw fence. After that you then use a thickness plainer. The thickness plainer is just that, it makes boards the same thickness. Now the reason you need to have a flat face is that these plainers use rollers to feed the board into the cutting knives. This pressure will usually force the cup out of a non flat board so when it comes out the other side the cup will return. But if you have your true flat face from the joiner, then the thickness plainer will reference off that face accurately and give you a true square piece of stock. Final thickness 3/4" perfectly square all around. Just laying out the boards picking the best faces before I cut everything down to its final length. All the stock is now cut to its final dimension. I also marked the boards at this point so I can keep track of what is what when I start cutting the joinery. Main joinery cut. This time it was an absolute breeze and didn't run into any complications. I still need to cut the grooves for the rails but I can't find a picture of it... Each group above is a panel. Left panel - top panel - right panel Time for the glue up. The joinery came together so perfectly that I didn't need to use cauls to keep the boards flat against the tension of the clamps. (If you want to know more about what cauls do, check out this link: http://www.woodmagazine.com/woodworking-how-to/shop-tips/keep-glue-ups-flat-with-these-toothy-cauls Here I'm laminating two pieces of maple sandwiched around a strip of walnut. Should give a great accent to the front of the case. After the glue dries, I'll send it through the thickness plainer to make it flat across the the seems. So rewarding. This was probably one of my favorite parts of the project. After glue up I went to work on the maple inlays. I had no idea what I was doing here. This is my first real wood working project, I've never worked with hardwood before this. But I do know how to work a table saw. And cutting thin strips of wood isn't exactly easy. You can't just set the fence 1/8" from the bade, it just isn't safe. So instead you use a wider piece and set the table saw fence so that the off cut (the piece to the left of the blade) would be 1/8" thick. Then you just keep moving the fence over 1/4" at a time (taking into consideration the thickness of the blade, in my case it was 1/8") and cut out a bunch of strips. Chances are you'll mess up some of the inlays, so its best to have some extra. Here is how I cut the inlays. I used my scoring knife to make a light pass to cut the fibers then used a little pressure to chop through it. Worked pretty well. If I were to do it again I think I'd use my pull saw. Don't be stingy with the glue. I used my finger to ensure the entire surface area was covered in glue. The inlays are proud by about 1/16 to 1/32 of an inch. This allows me to use a hand plane to make it flush with the rest of the surface and then finish it up much easier with a random orbit sander later. Thought this would be a good point to test my glass panel design. So I dropped in the tempered glass and it was a perfect fit. Looking good! 120 grit sanding. I'll go over it with 220 before finish. Maybe even 350. I probably could have got these miters a little tighter but I was just eye balling it and I feel it still came out pretty well. All the inlays are done! Now all I need to do is cut the rabbits in the panels so that I can assemble them together! Dry fit. This is getting rather exciting for me. So much time and work to get to this point. To see an idea come to fruition is extremely rewarding. I just wanted to make sure the rabbits came out ok. Now I need to get a few things done before I do the final glue up. I needed to finish the front panel before I could glue the case together. This is how I marked the position for the male 8pin connector. I just put it into the female connector and then clamped the case together around the frame minus the top (so I could see of course). I then just used a thin sharpy to trace the edges around the connector. At this time I used a router to hog out the material where the LEDs for the rear I/O will go and then cut the acrylic to fit the opening. Then I soldered and sleeved the leads for the rear I/O LEDs. The sleeve really helps to clean up the look but also makes a nice tight friction fit in the groove cut for the wires as seen below. The LEDS sit deep enough into the panel that they wont interfere with the rails of the frame. I just super glued the LEDs in place. Sanded the clear acrylic with 120 grit on a random orbital sander. Doesn't defuse the light all the way, but definitely helps. At least you cant see the strips directly. Now to wire up the front panel. I drilled a hole for the switch, and then I soldered the leads for the power button and then covered the contacts with heat shrink. So funny thing about this switch. All the RGB lighting that I'll be using in the case is common anode meaning all the RGB share a positive common instead of a negative common which is common cathode. The RGB headers on the motherboard are also common anode. But this switch was common cathode. So I actually had to replace the LED inside the switch. Not fun at all. It took me a while to figure out what was going on. And I ended up playing around with some bread board circuits to figure out how to wire up this switch to the RGB lights once I replaced the LED. The RGB leds I had were low voltage some where around 2v to 3v. And the way an RGB strip works is that it sends 12v down a rail and then there are capacitors that connect to that rail to take it down to the right voltage. That is what is simulated up above. Also this is where the name of the project was born. This was a nightmare at first getting this figured out. But going through the process I learned a decent amount about low voltage electrical engineering. Much like how this entire project has been one large learning experience which is why I was kind of hooked on the breadboard theme for the name. Left RGB strip installed and sleeved. This was a challenge. I had to get 3 wires per pin for the 8pin connector. The RGB leads were split between the power switch and the left and right strips that go down each side of the panel. For the leads going to the switch for the RGB i just used dupont connectors (basically the connector inside a usb header). They hold really well to the pins. One more test fist before I finished up the sleeving and wires on the front panel. But looks like all will be good. I'm missing my finished picture but at least you get the idea. The Moment of Truth! Shell glue up. The glue up was pretty strait forward. I glued the panels with the internal frame in place which helps to keep things aligned. I had more clamps along the length of the top. But I forgot to take a picture before the glue dried and this is me in the middle of removing the clamps. At this point it was time to do the final sanding of the case. I went from 120 to 220 to 350. After that I blew off the dust and used a tack cloth to get any residual saw dust off the case. I applied my first coat of tung oil. Cut down with a little bit of mineral spirits to help it absorb into the wood. She's a thing of beauty. Rubbing on the oil was definitely another highlight. Watching the natural grain pattern just spring to life. After this first coat cures, I'll tough it up with 1000 grit sand paper and then do another coat.
  9. So the material I want to work with is walnut and maple. I have two lengths of rough sawn stock in walnut and two short scrap pieces of maple. The walnut stock was about 5' 6 1/2" x 4 1/4" x 7/8" thick and the other board was 64" x 4 3/4" x 7/8". So I needed to use the stock wisely. This was the concept rendering I came up with. Here you can see how each panel will be made up of 4 pieces jointed together to make a panel that will include some maple inlays. Now I needed to come up with a way to cut the joinery on a table saw. I could of bought some super expensive router bits that are typically used to make cabinet doors. But like I said they are very expensive, annoying to setup, and it wouldn't give me the look I was going for. So I came up with my own joint that can be cut on the table saw. It acts similar to a coping joint. Here you can get a look at its complexity. But in actuality it is rather simple to cut. The joinery on the piece you see here is done with 8 different passes on the table saw. Now all the pieces will have the same cuts that you see on the left side. The lateral pieces will have the tongue groove cut on the ends. Should be fun right?? haha Here is one of the vertical pieces. As you can see this one doesn't have the tongue groove. This is the rear right stile or vertical piece. It has the channel for the Rear I/O LEDs. Front stile/vertical piece. Yes I know I misspelled "stile" in the photo. In wood working, vertical pieces are referred to as stiles and the horizontal pieces are referred to as rails in relation to a hand rail. Makes it easier to understand. Alright before I started on the hardwood I wanted to test this with some MDF. MDF is stupid cheap and if I messed up I could quickly cut another piece to work on. I first cut all the pieces to their final dimensions before I started the joinery. MDF is great for this purpose as it is usually perfectly flat and even thickness. I then labeled all the pieces so that I knew what was what when I started to cut. Here you can see the first two passes. I first cut the deepest grove as I wont have much reference surface later as I move along. Also besides the first deep cut, all subsequent cuts will be at the same depth, so this helps improve accuracy by not constantly changing the height of the blade. Also, when you make an adjustment to the table saw fence, it is important that you run all the same cuts at the same time. No matter how good you may think you are there is always room for error when adjusting the table fence and it may not always be exactly where it was for the other cuts if you moved it for whatever reason. So even if you're off on your measurement as long as all the pieces are the same, it wont matter. Third pass. This pass set the thickness of the tongue. The rest of the material can now be hogged out with a few more passes. Forth pass. Fifth pass. So 5 passes is all it took to get it to finish the main part of the joinery. Here you can see all the rails for the panels. This took two passes to get the 3/16" thickness. Dry fit. Here you can see how the panels can now be joined. When they come together they create the windowed opening and provides all the needed lips and groove for the glass panels. This is what that deep groove was for. Once you have your glass panel in place. I can use this panel retention rubber to hold the panel in place. It has fingers the fit inside the groove. It is very secure and allows me to remove the panels if I ever need to refinish the case. Or repair a broken pane. Alright I think I'm actually ready to start on the real deal now. I know it looks like a lot of work, but I learned a lot through this process and should help make the next steps much easier.
  10. Before I worked on the hardwood version. I wanted to build a shell out of plywood to make sure my design would work out. I mocked up a design in sketchup before I got started. This is the design for the left and right panel. There is a rabbit along the top and the front to allow for the front and top panel to be joined. There are slots that run the length for the rail system. I just cut these with a single kerf width on the table saw. Also I'll route another rabbit around the inside of the window to allow me to secure an acrylic window from the inside. Lastly there is a dato slot on the back (left side in this picture) for the rear I/O LEDs. This has a small lip all around the edge so that I can seat a piece of frosted acrylic to help defuse the light. This is the top panel. Similar construction to that of the side panels, just thinner. I first cut the rabbits on the left and right panels. I then marked out where the window would be cut out. I'm using 1/2 baltic birch plywood for this. I used a router with a strait edge to cut the first panel. This wasn't as accurate as I would have liked and required a fair bit of sanding to get the opening the way I wanted it. For the second panel. I used some scrap pieces of wood to create a guide all around the panel in which the router guide would follow. This made for a far more accurate cut and I was able to use it for the other panel as well to clean it up to the same size as this one. I used the same technique described above to cut out the rabbit on the inside. Only this time the bit depth was set to half the thickness of the material. The other side before sanding. Again same process for the top panel. This was just a test fit around the internal frame. The openings are in the right spots and I can move on too creating the rails. I wanted to wait to do the rails in case I needed to make the windows larger. For the rails I used 4 lengths of 15mm aluminum angle. I pre-drilled evenly spaced holes that I'll use to attach the lateral supports on the frame. Here you can see my solution for connecting the power button, front LED lights, and Rear I/O lights from the internal frame to the exterior shell. This 8pin connector will act like a harness, so that when you slide the internal frame into the shell, it will mate with a corresponding male 8pin on the shell. I held it in place with some crazy strong adhesive glue. I I tested its durability with a hammer and the connector stayed in place. As I was working in this area, I went ahead cut a hole for the power pass through and secured it with 6/32 screws. I'll be making a custom length cable for this later in the build. Also you can see where I attached the rails to the frame. They are attached to the lateral supports. I used a chisel to make a seat for the male end of the connector. There is also a channel under it to allow room for the wires. I'll be gluing this in place as well. I used a single kerf cut to make a channel for the wires. The LEDs site in the channels on either side of the front panel with a piece of acrylic on top of them that makes the back surface of the panel the same thickness all the way across. Here you can see me routing the wires for the left side. I left them long and then ran them through the connector as pictured. I then trimmed them flush with the top of the connector. This way when I go to crimp the pins, they'll be the perfect length. This part was a huge pain in the ass, but well worth the effort. Lighting for the front panel is finished. I'll be adding the rear I/O and power switch later. Next I needed to add the diffuser strips. These are pieces of acrylic that I sanded down to make it frosted. This will capture the light from the front panel LEDs and transfer it to the front of the case diffused. They are glued in place. Just testing the result here. I'm really excited how well it worked out. At this point I'm pretty satisfied that the design is going to work. Now I can take what I learned and start working with the hardwood. But first I need to go back to the drawing board in sketchup and figure out a new solution as I won't be using solid pieces of hardwood and then cutting a hole out of it. That would be a huge waste and way too expensive.
  11. So fast forward a few months. I had to put this project on hold because I had so many other projects going on and I had time. Sponsorship! I've been in communication with Daniel over at Singularity Computers for quite some time now. He has been following some of my builds and he was looking at my progress on this build and decided he wanted to sponsor a few of his products. He ended up sending me his Protium Pump & Reservoir DDC mod kit and some Ethereal Single Res Mounts. I was so excited for him to launch this new product. It is by far and away one of the best pump/res configurations I have ever worked with. I was very humbled for him to sponsor these products. This is the D5 version. The pump top and res are the same. The coolest thing about the way his res works is how you attach the top and bottom. If you want to make a pump/res config, you just screw off the top of the pump top and screw in the reservoir. And for the top, it works off a compression collar design, meaning you don't have to over tighten or leave it loose to get the ports lined up the way you want. You just align the top where you want it and then tighten down the collar. Genius. So of course I want to use this product but I've already designed the frame around the EK pump/res. And while I could make it fit in the frame, I also want to use his mounts. So I needed to make the frame a little longer. I think it was by 15mm or so. Also the first frame wasn't exactly as square as I would like. So I decided to take what I learned along the way and remake the frame. And it worked out perfectly. I was able to reuse all the panels I had made and only had to rebuild the aluminum angle. And now the frame is perfect all around. This time instead of drilling the holes for both the vertical support and the lateral support that it would connect to at the same time. I pre drilled where I wanted all my holes to be. Note the vertical supports don't need to be threaded. This allows me to be far more accurate in my placement of the screws. I marked of the locations symmetrically all around the case, the used a punch to make a divot in the metal to prevent the drill from walking. Here you can see those divots. Test fitting the configuration. The inlet/outlet tubes of the reservoir work perfectly here. There is just enough room on either side of the mount for them to pass unobstructed. I'm not sure if this was intended by Singularity Computers, but it just goes to show the great design. I used a 3.5" hole saw to cut out the fan holes. It is the perfect diameter for 120mm fans. I center punched the panel so that the hole saw pilot bit wouldn't walk. Also when making a cut like this it is best to use lower RPMs and a coolant/lubricant. I just used a can of WD40. This resulted in super clean holes that took almost no filing at all. Now next time I would do this a little different. I put the fans in place and then marked where I needed to drill and tap the threads to secure the fans. And they aren't perfectly aligned. Next time I'll print a template with the center mark and marks for the screw holes. That would have been far more accurate. But this works so moving on. A series of photos of the new frame fully assembled. At this point I can start on the exterior shells.
  12. Hey guys, so it was about this time in my project when a terrible accident happened. Up until this point I have got away with cutting the aluminum sheet on my table saw with no issues. But that stops now. While cutting a panel the off cut of aluminum grabbed the blade and kicked back nearly severing my index finger! If you are one of those, like myself, that wants to see pictures, I've provided a link below. It is a bit graphic, and not for the faint of heart. But it is a good example of why it is so important to be safe if the work place. Especially when working with powerful tools. WARNING: GRAPHIC CONTENT, Do not click this link if do not want to see the result of this accident. You have been warned. https://imgur.com/a/t5FQD So to make a long story short. This ended up taking a good 2 to 3 months to heal. I'm happy to say I have since made a full recovery and only lost a little feeling on the right side near the laceration. Luckily I still have feeling in my finger tip. Feeling is actually starting to come back, freaky. But anyway, after reflecting on this accident, which wasn't cheap, I took a hard look at my work environment and knew I needed to do something to be safer and to be more productive. If I'm going to keep doing this kind of work I need to be properly tooled. I set a budget of $2500. The amount that my finger cost after insurance! I figured I could at least spin that much and the wife agreed. She doesn't want me loosing any fingers! When she initially found out what happened she was worried it was my ring finger haha. (we're newly weds) So my current shop setup was less than ideal. I was using a table saw that was on a stand that came with it. It was a co-workers saw that he used for home remodels and really wasn't a great saw. The fence was impossible to lock square to the blade, most likely what resulted in my accident. (Binding happens if it is not square) And I had no support for cuts other than the table saw surface itself which was rather small. Also I was using folding table for my work benches. My shop doubles as my garage so I need to be able to clear out the space in the event of sever storms and what not. It's been hailing a lot in North Texas over the past 3 years. So I set out to design some tables and benches that could be compact and roll away, and this was the design I came up with. This will allow me to have two tall work benches and well as a table saw height bench. The two table under and roll in and out on casters and then connect together so I have a large infeed/outfeed table around my table saw. Here is how the tables turned out. This has been super helpful in so many ways. Definitely gives me much more room to work with and a much safer environment. Anyways, on with the build.
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