So, here are the pictures.

I love Wednesdays. There are few students in on a Wednesday (technically a “day off”), and thus there is space to work. Bought a plank of pine from the local supplier (Timberite), cost me £33 plus a few pence. Lugged it back to the workshop, created cardboard templates (already created paper ones, didn’t take long), traced the outlines and got to work with the jigsaw.

Sanded it down, using two belt sanders & the circular sander, as well as sandpaper. Glued it down, and left it overnight. The technicians here are great - one of them noticed in the evening, that my piece was started to bow under the pressure of adhesion, and reclamped it all around the edges. (Originally just left a heavy vice on top of it).

Now things started to go wrong. Why? I didn’t plan brilliantly.

Brief outline:

This started life as a ¼ scale table. However, I couldn’t get a pine plank thin enough, so the thickness is definitely not ¼ scale. WxH are however. On Thursday, I decided I would expand the design to include planting areas & a water reservoir. Why? Well, how do you repair a plant? Grow it/regrow it. Hence the areas for soil, so the table could be a a planter as well as a usable table, with it’s own irrigation system - hence the water reservoir.

To make this sections, I would need to cut into the wood - and at this point, there was only one tool we had that could do that. So I milled 15mm deep into the sections, and then took a mallet & chisel to the edges to clean up, making a rookie error in the process.

Finally, I manually sanded the interior edges and faces as best as I could.

This project was definitely a lesson in time management, planning - ensuring that the project design is nailed down before you start building.

“Think Thrice. Measure Twice. Cut Once.”