For some time I’d been eyeing a steel & glass coffee table and planning this – so it’s with some degree of satisfaction that I present to you: my new display case!
The table was built from different sizes of steel square tubing and bits of round bar. The frame was in good condition, but still needed a little TLC to get rid of surface rust, so I coated it with rust converter. That aside, I set my plan in motion!
In order to make a display case out of it, it needed a bottom shelf. To this end, I measured the space and found it to be square (96cmx96cm) and then cut a bottom from several lengths of pressboard shelving. I screwed these tightly together with short wood screws and lengths of steel bracket strip.
After that, I test fitted the shelf to the frame and then installed it with brackets riveted to the frame on the outside edges, and screwed the shelf to the brackets.
Then it was time to spray paint the frame, which I did with regular aerosol spray cans of black gloss and allowed to dry. As you can see in the photos, I also employed a clever trick to allow me to pivot the table on the workbench so I could turn it to spray all sides of it – as it is rather heavy and I cut my left hand on one of the brackets! Please be careful!
That phase done, and with the paint dry, I moved the table frame and shelf indoors to its home spot, and prepared to finish the job.
I needed to lay a cover on the upper side of the shelf, and I selected a square meter of red faux velvet for the job! After that, I needed to install the side glass which I had cut at PG Glass. I had them cut so that they would slot beside each other, and hold each other up, so I didn’t need to make any brackets. Then it was time to install the lights, which were just a set of cheapie battery-operated fairy lights I got from the General Dealer for R40.
All I had to do next was to place the models I wanted to display inside and replace the glass top of the table! And voila!
That’s made quite a difference, eh?
Have a DIY week!
Cheers!
All material copyright © Christina Engela, 2022.