dungeonmastr
Member
Strong to the Finich / Cause He Eats His Spinach / He's Popeye the Cabaret Man!
Well folks, it's time for another scratch build! This one's still in progress, so this won't be a complete wall of text right off the bat.
Several weeks ago, the wife and I got all the cabinets moved into the back room after deciding to sell the now horribly uncomfortable futon. Once everything was in place, I noticed that there was enough room for "just one more" and noted such aloud. Surprisingly, this was not greeted with the admonishment one might expect. She approved, but the line was now drawn - nothing more here until we have a house next year. There wasn't too much space available, so whatever it was going to be had to be small. After stumbling across Phet's old thread a long while back, I was intrigued by the concept of a Nintendo cabaret and tucked the idea away at the back of my mind. Now it nagged at me like a hackneyed '50s sitcom wife, imploring that its existence be made manifest. But what life to breath into it...?
Popeye, of course! My favorite Nintendo game, and probably one my favorites overall, lovable ol' Popeye was going to get a brand new home. I'd had the board for a while now, but nothing to put him in since Donkey Kong came back from channelmanic early last year. After toying with (and drawing up) the idea of using a 19" monitor, seeing as 13" ones aren't exactly common, I happened upon a little WG 13K7301 with a bit of burn-in, but that was otherwise practically brand-new looking. Once my heart was set, I started working on plans. It took a few weeks of work in my spare time, but I came up with a set of drawings that looked both pleasing and somewhat accurate. Once satisfied, I was off to hill country to spend a weekend with Dad...
So, cutting the cabinet walls on this thing went a heck of a lot quicker than the last couple. Once the plywood was cut to width (or depth, I suppose), it was just a matter of taping the drawing to the top sheet, stacking 'em, clamping 'em, and taking a skil saw to the setup. For this build, 5/8" Chinese birch was used - this was more experimental than the previous builds, so we went with a wood that was much less expensive than primo, furniture grade plywood, and could be easily sourced and replaced if we goofed up.
Blocking the outer bits of the frame was a cinch...
The top and back-top, not so much. This style of cabaret has no blocking supporting either of these panels, so either dowels or biscuits would be needed. I don't know for sure how NoJ would have done it, but I'm assuming they would have gone with dowels, since a drill and jig would make for quick work. This baby, however, would be getting biscuits. Since I have no experience using a cutter, this wound being a cool learning opportunity. It was nowhere near as difficult as I thought to line up the walls and panels, nor was it difficult to make the cuts. I only really made one screw-up, but it was easily correctable (just a slightly off angle on a cut). The t-molding grooves were also cut at this time.
Once it was ready to assemble we needed to move fast. The glue set fairly quickly and the top panels took a little longer than we anticipated to get lined up perfectly, so the rest of the cabinet needed to be put together with a sense of urgency so we could get the clamps on. After some final checks to make sure everything was in place, we were just about ready to call it a night.
Once assembled, it was time for a hot meal, a refreshing beer, and a shower.
Well folks, it's time for another scratch build! This one's still in progress, so this won't be a complete wall of text right off the bat.
Several weeks ago, the wife and I got all the cabinets moved into the back room after deciding to sell the now horribly uncomfortable futon. Once everything was in place, I noticed that there was enough room for "just one more" and noted such aloud. Surprisingly, this was not greeted with the admonishment one might expect. She approved, but the line was now drawn - nothing more here until we have a house next year. There wasn't too much space available, so whatever it was going to be had to be small. After stumbling across Phet's old thread a long while back, I was intrigued by the concept of a Nintendo cabaret and tucked the idea away at the back of my mind. Now it nagged at me like a hackneyed '50s sitcom wife, imploring that its existence be made manifest. But what life to breath into it...?
Popeye, of course! My favorite Nintendo game, and probably one my favorites overall, lovable ol' Popeye was going to get a brand new home. I'd had the board for a while now, but nothing to put him in since Donkey Kong came back from channelmanic early last year. After toying with (and drawing up) the idea of using a 19" monitor, seeing as 13" ones aren't exactly common, I happened upon a little WG 13K7301 with a bit of burn-in, but that was otherwise practically brand-new looking. Once my heart was set, I started working on plans. It took a few weeks of work in my spare time, but I came up with a set of drawings that looked both pleasing and somewhat accurate. Once satisfied, I was off to hill country to spend a weekend with Dad...
So, cutting the cabinet walls on this thing went a heck of a lot quicker than the last couple. Once the plywood was cut to width (or depth, I suppose), it was just a matter of taping the drawing to the top sheet, stacking 'em, clamping 'em, and taking a skil saw to the setup. For this build, 5/8" Chinese birch was used - this was more experimental than the previous builds, so we went with a wood that was much less expensive than primo, furniture grade plywood, and could be easily sourced and replaced if we goofed up.
Blocking the outer bits of the frame was a cinch...
The top and back-top, not so much. This style of cabaret has no blocking supporting either of these panels, so either dowels or biscuits would be needed. I don't know for sure how NoJ would have done it, but I'm assuming they would have gone with dowels, since a drill and jig would make for quick work. This baby, however, would be getting biscuits. Since I have no experience using a cutter, this wound being a cool learning opportunity. It was nowhere near as difficult as I thought to line up the walls and panels, nor was it difficult to make the cuts. I only really made one screw-up, but it was easily correctable (just a slightly off angle on a cut). The t-molding grooves were also cut at this time.
Once it was ready to assemble we needed to move fast. The glue set fairly quickly and the top panels took a little longer than we anticipated to get lined up perfectly, so the rest of the cabinet needed to be put together with a sense of urgency so we could get the clamps on. After some final checks to make sure everything was in place, we were just about ready to call it a night.
Once assembled, it was time for a hot meal, a refreshing beer, and a shower.
