Patrick Giagnocavo 717-201-3366 declared on Saturday 09 July 2005 10:29
pm:
Sat, 2005-07-09 at 23:20, Andy Wallis wrote:
I'm now looking around for a heavy-duty table that I could put about
200 pounds on without worrying if it will crash to the ground or
warping in a few years. Most of the results from searching do not
give stress limits; they usually only display the weight of the
table. Does anyone have recommended products that can handle such
strains and not break the bank?

Get in touch with a place that has used office furniture. They will
have 1960s-era steel desks that will hold a mainframe :-) And they
will be cheap.

I got my desk from our University's salvage operation $10 or so, and
built of really nice and thick (probably 1" thick) wood. See if you can
find a university surplus operation around where you live. Baring that,
a used office furnature place might be a good thing to try, or shop
around near dumpsters in commercial areas :)

Pat

Sun, Jul 10, 2005 at 12:27:01AM -0400, Aaron Finley wrote:
Believe it or not, IKEA. The vika desk with steel legs ran me $89. The
desk top is 63x31 and is two inches thick (!), finished in beech veener.
I like the NRDEN (kitchen table?)
Bill

Sun, Jul 10, 2005 at 02:10:54AM -0500, Bill Bradford wrote:
I like the NRDEN (kitchen table?)
I'm really must be an old fart. I remember when it was a bombsight.
National Lampoon also satirised as the "Norden Bussight".
Geoff.

on 7/9/2005 9:27 PM Aaron Finley wrote:

Believe it or not, IKEA. The vika desk with steel legs ran me $89. The
desk top is 63x31 and is two inches thick (!), finished in beech veener.

I like the Ikea Jerker line. You can get a desk as table, or you can get
the model I got that has the desktop and a secondary shelf. Put the
desktop up high and use the shelf down below for holding your CPUs (like
a graphic artist workstation), put the desk low and use the shelf as
overhead storage. Add-on bits, including a shelf extension to add a
second shelf. I've got a ton of books sitting over my desk now.

The one problem -- Jerker isn't exactly cheap, but it's not hideously
expensive, I think it looks very clean and sharp, and it's held up under
a couple of years of constant abuse for me. Good stout construction,
easy to put together, and it never fails to draw comments.

Andy Wallis <rawallis (AT) panix (DOT) comwrote:
[]
I'm now looking around for a heavy-duty table that I could put about
200 pounds on without worrying if it will crash to the ground or
warping in a few years.

My desk is cheap crap made of laminated chipboard bought from MFI who
were not known for quality at the time. It can easily cope with over
200 pounds because I can sit on it and it doesn't complain.

It's 14 years old and doesn't seem to be ready to fall apart quite
yet. It's looking a bit battered from moving house too often, but then
again, so do I :)

Peter Corlett wrote:
Andy Wallis <rawallis (AT) panix (DOT) comwrote:
>>I'm now looking around for a heavy-duty table that I could put about
>>200 pounds on without worrying if it will crash to the ground or
>>warping in a few years.

My desk is cheap crap made of laminated chipboard bought from MFI who
were not known for quality at the time. It can easily cope with over
200 pounds because I can sit on it and it doesn't complain.

It's 14 years old and doesn't seem to be ready to fall apart quite
yet. It's looking a bit battered from moving house too often, but then
again, so do I :)

I'm using a piece of workstation furniture that I bought from an office
furniture place about 11 years ago now. I bought it as a discontinued
model at some absurdly deep discount from a list price around $1200.
It's roughly L-shaped, 78" on the long axis by 66" by 24" deep, with an
inch-thick particle-board top in three sections on a steel cantilever
frame. I've been planning to build a new top for it, not because of sag
(it's had a Sun 24" GDM-W900 and a second 21" monitor on it for five
years now and hasn't sagged), but because the granite-printed paper
surface on the desktop started peeling a couple of years after I got it
and it looks ugly.
(Also, when I build the new top, I'm planning a redesign that'll add 12"
to the shorter arm and six inches of depth at the ends of both arms,
giving me more usable space and room for a third monitor if I want. I
may possibly add built-in overhead bookshelves at the same time or later
on, if I can decide on how I want to do the bookshelf frame -- ideally
welded square-section steel tube to match the existing frame, but right
now I don't have access to a welder.)

Not that this helps your question as far as specifics of what to buy
now, but furniture of this type will pretty much just go on forever. I
suspect I could probably rebuild engine blocks on it. I avoid that
Sauder crap like the plague -- they're totally useless, flimsy garbage,
mostly rickety student desks for high-schoolers with the hutch
rearranged to cram in a 14" monitor, a keyboard tray screwed on
underneath because there's no room for a keyboard on the desk top, and
relabelled as computer desks. They don't even make good firewood.

Ceva had some workbenches in the former lab that they were using as
storage that were of similar construction to my desk, but even heavier
guage. (The frame is welded 2"-square steel tube instead of 1".) I'd
have loved to snag one. Unfortunately, following the recent Israeli
coup and the new CF's plans to sublease half the office space, they're
probably in a dumpster or a landfill by now.

Jul 10, 2005, at 10:07 PM, Aaron Finley wrote:

Eric Webb wrote:
>>
>Ahh, was just waiting for the opportunity to bring this up I've
>been
>piecing together a woodshop as a second hobby and am working on the
>desk at
>the link below okay, so it's not original design, but I need some
>help at
>this stage. My #1 problem, though, is ever having the time to get
>out and
>work on it. Damn SAP.
>>
>
I am the same way. I bought a $700 Jet table saw around Christmas and
it
is STILL in the box. I keep telling myself that I can do without the
$700 because a table saw, once set up, is something that can be kept
for
life. Time is definitely the number one problem.

I too will raise my hand and grumble about time. I have tons of small
projects that need to get off the ground. I have hand and power tools
out the wazzoo. I like many of you have no time. :(

My servers sit on whatever I could scrounge/build/get cheaply at the time.

desk is a decent looking smooth door laid across 3 matching file cabinets.
I trued it up so it fits right, looks sharp, and has a convenient hole
at rear center (where the doorknob would go) for cables. ~3'x7'. I
already had the file cabinets and the door was rescued, so it cost me nothing.

Another is a lab equipment rack that came from the local Apple factory when
they shut down. Blue power-coated steel, heavy rollers, the thing would
probably hold 1000lbs. It's about 5' wide, 3' deep, has an adjustable shelf
that is 3'x5' mounted about knee level, an arm that sticks out in front with
a shelf about 1'x5' made of that black acid-proof countertop they use in chem
labs which I use as the keyboard/mouse shelf, another adjustable shelf about
1.5'x5' which I use for monitors, and one more 1.5'x5' fixed shelf at the top
(about 5' above the ground) Everything including the adjustable shelves is
held together with heavy duty bolts. (1/2" diameter shafts, heads marked with
SAE J429 designation) The shelves themselves sit atop steel crossmembers for
strength. I think I paid $50 for it.

Last are a couple of "Gorilla racks" I picked up at Sam's Club. Steel shelving
with 3/4" particle board tops, maybe 2'x7'x7'. They can be assembled as a single
7' tall unit or two 3.5' tall units. I built one as two 3.5' desks (low ceiling)
and manipulated the other to make a 3.5' desk with a 2-shelf hutch above it.
-DanD

Mike Meredith wrote:
Yes. It's about time that people buying office furniture realised that
one size doesn't fit all, and that they need to get properly adjustable
desks. I have the opposite problem, and my desk at work is sitting on 5
wooden blocks.

Yeah, I have trouble getting high enough desks. I like a worktop height
of around 30", and most office deska are several inches below that.

Sun, I believe, issues fully adjustable workstations for everyone for
exactly this reason.

Mon, 11 Jul 2005 @ 14:31 -0400, Nadine said:

I like the idea of those aluminum folding tables, but I'm short,
and really need a keyboard tray on top of a low work surface.
This has been a real problem in my work offices.

I'm not short, and generally it kills me to have a keyboard on the same
level as the desktop.

Either that, or the keyboard trays used are such crap that it hurts to
use them for long.

But what really ticks me off is how they arrange office furniture so
that my back is to the door of my area. I *hate* that.

I want to face any incoming paths, but a lot of cubicles are put
together so that your back is to the opening.

The other one that bothers me is walls that are just high enough to be
in the way, but too short to offer you any reason for them to be there.
I think 4-5 foot walls should be banned.

Sun, 10 Jul 2005 @ 22:10 -0400, Mike Nicewonger said:

Jul 10, 2005, at 10:07 PM, Aaron Finley wrote:

Eric Webb wrote:
>>
>Ahh, was just waiting for the opportunity to bring this up I've
>been
>piecing together a woodshop as a second hobby and am working on the
>desk at
>the link below okay, so it's not original design, but I need some
>help at
>this stage. My #1 problem, though, is ever having the time to get
>out and
>work on it. Damn SAP.
>>
>
I am the same way. I bought a $700 Jet table saw around Christmas and
it
is STILL in the box. I keep telling myself that I can do without the
$700 because a table saw, once set up, is something that can be kept
for
life. Time is definitely the number one problem.

I too will raise my hand and grumble about time. I have tons of small
projects that need to get off the ground. I have hand and power tools
out the wazzoo. I like many of you have no time. :(

I don't have a lot of tools, but I have enough to do some things.

My problem isn't time right now, it is the fact that I have N things,
and space for N-M things, so certain projects just never get physically
accessible.

Charles Shannon Hendrix wrote:
The other one that bothers me is walls that are just high enough to be
in the way, but too short to offer you any reason for them to be there.
I think 4-5 foot walls should be banned.

Ah yes, cube walls that keep you from looking out without standing up,
but let every random passer-by look in

Tue, Jul 19, 2005 at 10:55:30AM -0400, Charles Shannon Hendrix wrote:
Mon, 11 Jul 2005 @ 14:31 -0400, Nadine said:
>
>I like the idea of those aluminum folding tables, but I'm short, and
>really need a keyboard tray on top of a low work surface. This has
>been a real problem in my work offices.
>
I'm not short, and generally it kills me to have a keyboard on the
same level as the desktop.

Either that, or the keyboard trays used are such crap that it hurts to
use them for long.

Never found a keyboard tray I could use. I'm 5'7" and generally have
the keyboard on the desk/table, with the monitor on a stand of some
sort so I'm looking straight into the screen, not down or up at it. If
possible, the screen has a slight downwards tilt to it, to minimize
glare off the lights in the ceiling.

But what really ticks me off is how they arrange office furniture so
that my back is to the door of my area. I *hate* that.

I want to face any incoming paths, but a lot of cubicles are put
together so that your back is to the opening.

Hate that too. A few gigs back, we never really got out of
startup-mode. The folks that sat out in cube-land just had cubes for
dividers, their desks and stuff weren't cubicle desks but regular office
desks, so they all turned them around so they were facing out while
sitting in their cubes. They had to squeeze by on the sides, but they
all seemed to prefer it that way. They could also just look up and
ask the person across the walkway a question w/o anyone having to turn
around. (I was in an office, so I didn't have to deal with that).

Suckiest cube arrangement I had was the gig after that. We were ALL
in these phone-center cubicles. Not even cubicles, more like just the
corner of a cube, back was open to a walkway, just enough space on your
desk for your monitor and keyboard. IT was near the main entrance, so
nearly EVERYNE in the company walked past my desk multiple times during
the day.

The other one that bothers me is walls that are just high enough to
be in the way, but too short to offer you any reason for them to be
there. I think 4-5 foot walls should be banned.

We've got those here. Hate them too.