The Home Office Project

When we arrived home from our winter stay in Yuma, the end of March 2020, we went into the Stay-At-Home order. No going out, no going to the ham radio club meetings, no going to the store. You remember what it was like.
Well, I kept busy. In November of 2019 we had new flooring installed in 80% of the house. That meant all the rooms got cleared out so the old floors could be removed and the new flooring put in.

New Vinyl plank flooring in Living Room

One of the things that we did during this process was to convert the family room into the craft/hobby room. The Home Office, which occupies the smallest of the three bedrooms also needed to have something done to it.
The Home Office contained three desks, a filing cabinet, and a movable printer stand. One of the desks was a large corner desk that contained a "library" type shelving unit. The room looked cramped. There never seemed to be enough room for everything. Including my ham radio equipment.
So, I took pen in hand (OK, a drawing program) and designed a large office workspace. The three desks would go away, the movable printer cart would go away, but we would gain a lot of additional workspace.
We would put nothing on the walls, with the exception of one cabinet to hold the modems, routers and the like to support the home network.
The first challenge was finding cabinets for the workspace support. Most cabinets are 33 to 36 inches tall as they have a "toe kick" area which raises them up. Plus, I wanted better quality then the "buy off the floor" cabinets at the big box stores.
Google came through. I found a place called The Cabinet Authority. They sell cabinets for a manufacturer called Conestoga Wood Specialties. Conestoga has a manufacturing facility on the east and west sides of the US. What made them even more appealing is that the cabinets would be custom "built" but not assembled. Each cabinet would come "flat packed" on pallets. The only thing assembled would be the drawer boxes and the sliding trays.
After several phone calls to The Cabinet Authority to get the cabinet order correct, including which cabinet ends would be exposed, the type of wood, the style of cabinet doors and drawer fronts, the order was placed.
The cabinets arrived on a FedEx Home delivery truck about three weeks after the order. Indeed they were in flat boxes on pallets.

Flat packed and tied to pallets. Four pallets in all.

I had rounded up some help to unload, but FedEx sent a lift gate truck and a pallet jack, so the unloading process was pretty quick.
Once the floor was complete, we moved as much as we could back into the house and then left to Yuma for the winter.
Upon return from Yuma, I moved more things into the house and rearranged things in the garage so I had a place to work. I opened one box at a time and was astonished at the quality of the craftsmanship and material. Each box came with an inventory list and directions specific for that particular cabinet. I have to admit that I did not find the specific directions until after they were all complete, instead relying on the generic assembly instructions that are on The Cabinet Authority web site.
On the whole the cabinets assembled easily. One of the things that I had ordered was full extension, soft close drawer glides. These are manufactured by Blum, and install easily and work fantastically. To use these type of drawer glides, you do need to add a notch on each side the the drawer box in the back. Since I ordered the drawers with this specific glide, the drawer boxes already had the required notch.
When we ordered the cabinets, we ordered them made with paint grade Maple. The idea was to paint the cabinets and the work surface white before we installed them. After looking at the quality of the wood, painting was discarded in lieu of a clear gloss finish. You can order the cabinets pre-finished with your choice of paint, varnish, oil or the like.
During the assembly, I found it much easier to install the drawer glide supports on the interior back of the cabinet before assembling the back to the rest of the cabinet.It made things a lot easier when it came time to install the drawers.

Drawer Glide support attached to the back panel of the cabinet before assembly. The back panel was pre-drilled, making alignment/placement much easier.

The cabinets came in the basic pieces of the front frame, the sides, two support pieces for the top, the cabinet bottom and the back. The sides slide into a dove tail grove in the frame, the top support pieces slide into dove tail grove in the top, (one to the cabinet front, one to the cabinet rear), the bottom and back slide into similar type groves. Wood glue (I used Gorilla brand) is placed into the groves prior to assembly. The bottom is pinned or nailed (I used 18ga x 1.25 long nails in an air nailer) to the sides, and the back is also nailed to each side. If the side is not exposed you nail through the side, if the side is exposed you carefully angle nail from the back into the side. No nailing into the front frame.

Once I had the cabinet boxes assembled, I finished them with a minimum of four coats of Varathane or MinWax Gloss water base Polyurethane. The inside surfaces of the cabinets and the drawers come pre-finished with a clear coat. 

Finish applied waiting for final assembly

The drawer glides were installed. They simply slide onto the rear support and attach to the front frame with screws. 

The cabinet with the slide out trays is a little different in regards to the mounting of the drawer glides. Instead of mounting the glides front and rear, the glides mount on a .75x1.25 inch rail. The cabinet has in each of the four corners a vertical with notches spaced one inch apart. 

Verticals in cabinet corners

This allows you to easily change the height of the tray or drawer, by simply moving the rail to a different location.

Two rails installed. Note in these two photos, the drawer glide is NOT attached to the rail.

Completed cabinet with slide trays installed

The cabinet doors come pre-drilled for the hinges, you turn the door vertically to decide which way you want it to swing.
The Drawer fronts must also be installed to each drawer box. I laid a cabinet on its back, placed the drawer fronts in place on the cabinet where I though they should be (lots of measuring) Then traced the drawer opening on the inside of the drawer front. I used at least one roll of blue painters tape. I would applied the tape to the inside of the drawer face, then trace on the tape.

Drawer faces aligned.

I then laid the drawer front down with the interior surface up and aligned the drawer box to the outline of the opening. The drawer box cannot go on the bottom of the opening, so a a little trial and error was needed to find the proper location to place the drawer box on the drawer front. The drawer fronts were attached with 1.25 inch wood/construction screws. Drawer pulls would later be mounted with bolts going through the inside of the drawer box and through the drawer front.

Finished - with drawer pulls installed

The drawers fit on top of the drawer slides, and attach to the slide with a pre-drilled hole in the back of the drawer box on each side that slides onto a pin of the drawer glide. The front of the drawer is attached with a release/latch mechanism on both sides.

The orange devices are the drawer box front latches. Notice the notches on each side on the rear of the drawer box.

So, having the cabinet boxes built, the drawer glides installed and the drawer fronts installed on the drawer boxes, it was time to start installing them in the Home Office.

Putting cabinets in position

Once the cabinets were in the Home Office it was time to position them and make sure they were all level. This is when you find out how square the rooms in your house are and how level the floor is. I started with the first cabinet on the far right in the above photo. I got it level. I then put in the next cabinet set to the left. I got it level. I then checked between the two cabinets, (photo above), and found that the far right cabinet was 3/8 inch lower than the one to the left, but, individually they were both level. Checking the floor, sure enough, the floor was "crowned" in the center and sloped to the right. I shimmed the right cabinet up so it was level with the one to the left. What is next?
I positioned the cabinets on the left, leveled them to the cabinets on the right, and though some shimming was required, it was less that 1/4 inch. The initial layout was based on my design and measurements taken with the old desks in place. We wheeled the office chairs in and quickly found the the cabinets needed to be adjusted up to six inches to make everything work.
Now came the top. We looked at pre-made counter top, we looked at solid surface counter top and both were out of the price range for this project. We settled on using Maple 3/4 inch plywood. Now the hunt for that began. The biggest thing was I wanted then to cut the plywood to width, as I did not have the area to do that. Home Depot was the only place I could find that would cut it for me. So, off to Home Depot. Now this was middle of April and only a certain number of patrons could be allowed in at a time. I got there about 10AM and waited in line for 30 minutes. Then I could not find the product, even though it was listed as in stock on the web site. Finally a couple store employees assisted me and we found it still in the shipping bundle on the top of a rack in the lumber section. Then the wait for a fork lift, clearing a spot to put it, lots of wait time. I finally go my two sheets and asked if they would cut it. They initially said no. Then they said it would not be an accurate cut, it might be off by up to 1/4 inch. Fine cut it, I can't get it home in a 4x8 foot sheet. So, they agreed to cut it. It turned out to be 1/8 inch off.
Now this work surface was 10 feet long in one direction and nine feet long the other direction. The width was 28 inches. The cabinets are 24 inches deep, plus I set them away from the wall three inches to have a wiring chase. Width was fine, but length, I was going to need a splice and going into a corner I needed to have a joint.
I started by putting a couple coats of Polyurethane on each piece of plywood. Being water based, it dried quickly, so I was able to put on a couple coats a day. I sanded between each coat so I would have a smooth surface. I started by laying the work surface piece on the right hand cabinets (photo above). I knew it would be short as that was the 10 foot length. I squared it up and found that I had gaps more than 3/8 along the walls. Between the sheet rock and the "orange peel" finishing there of created a very uneven wall. I got it as tight as I could against the two walls, then laid the left hand piece of work surface on the cabinets, overlapping the right hand piece.

Left hand piece overlapping the right hand piece

 

Better view

The left hand piece fit tighter to the walls. Not as many or as wide gaps. I then marked the right hand piece for cutting. Moving these pieces of plywood in and out of the Home Office was challenging as I could not watch both ends at the same time. Some minor wall damage may have occurred.
I cut the right hand piece, test fit it, took it out, trimmed some, test fit, trim, test fit. You know the cycle. Since I had a joint, I needed to put not only a splice in, but I needed a support. I did not want a joint that would sag if it had weight on it. I was going to put a leg under it when it was suggested that I just brace the joint to the wall.

Splice point with brace to wall (to be added)

I then installed the right hand piece of plywood work surface. I attached the brace and splice to the underside of the work surface with wood glue and 1.24 inch wood/construction screws.

I notched the right hand piece of work surface for a cable raceway coming from the bottom of the electronics cabinet and put a similar notch on the far end for the power and network cables for the TV and the printer. Because the right hand piece was a foot short, and I did not have any plywood 28"x12", I made that extension out of two pieces of plywood. I joined then in a similar fashion as the corner joint.
To finish things off, I found some 1/2 inch Maple quarter round and some 3/4"x1/4" Maple screen trim at a local lumber yard, along with Maple wood filler. Adding the 3/4"x1/4" screen trim to the front edge of the work surface and putting the 1/2 inch quarter round against the wall has given this a much more finished look.

Corner seam filled

Quarter round being installed

Almost complete

Waiting to move stuff in

Drawers installed

So, there you go. I have since drilled holes in the work surface for grommets to bring cables through and installed keyboard trays at each computer position. Might add a couple more photos showing that, but after I clean all the stuff piled up on the top off.