Your Projects

Great job Kyle, your coffee table looks really sharp. I'm glad that some of my bottle caps went to good use

with the top frame done and ready for epoxy, I moved focus on the bottom shelf. For this I wanted to do something simpler and easier to acquire than the bottle caps of the table top, so I came up with this design. Something similar to the diamond pattern of the bottle caps on top, but not so busy or difficult to make.

so I drew up this design and laser etched it into this 1/4” Baltic birch. I came up with the idea of staining the diamonds in a gradient pattern. I used Saman water based wood stains. I really like these stains as they are low odor and have really vibrant colours. However, they do not have as many shades of stain as I used here, so I had to blend the different shades to get the gradient effect. I used their emerald green, navy blue, and golden wheat stains for the diamonds, blending them to get the desired effect. I then used their black stain for the background to really make the colours pop. Next on the to do list is to finish the frame for this board to go into for the bottom shelf, epoxy a clear coat on the bottom shelf, epoxy the bottle caps into place, and then assemble the full table together.

chiseling out some slots for the beams to slot into. At this point I made an error and chiseled out the wrong side of the center line. These are both supposed to be the same. Luckily I was able to flip the piece over and chisel out the other side, correctly this time. But now I have a notch I need to fill in and patch.

After notching all the pieces i was able to do a dry fit. This was the first time i was able to turn my pile of wood into something resembling a coffee table.

I decided to paint the back board black. After painting I used biscuit joints and a Brad nailer on the underside to secure the frame and back board together.

experimenting with different patterns for the table top. At this point I technically had enough caps to fill in the table, but I am unable to finish the pattern without patches of random caps.

making the frame for the table top. I am making the table top frame and the lower shelf frame out of walnut and the rest out of red oak, originally I wanted to make it entirely with walnut but at $16/bf I decided the red oak would be a more affordable option.

I cut this groove into the inside frames for the 1/4 plywood base board to fit into. This board will be what the bottle caps are epoxied onto.

i cut out the base board and started experimenting with bottle cap patterns. I decided to go with a purposeful pattern over my initial idea of just a random dispersion. I am going with a diamond pattern.

My slow progress on making a coffee table with an epoxied bottle cap top on if.

starting this project summer 2020. Been working on and off since then.

my initial concept. Designed and modeled in auto cad.

Getting the ‘X’ legs fitted together. I used multiple cuts with a crosscut sled on the table saw to get the touch slots and then chiseled the rest away manually to get them interlocking flush.