​Blue Barrel Folding Tabletop Mark 1.5

[Guest]

The Mark 1 folding table top works well, it is just heavier and need be, and not very elegant.



I found wide cedar boards at the local lumberyard, but only in really long, rough cut planks. I don’t need a dozen+ feet of length, and don’t own a thickness planer. That seemed like a lot of extra work, and not exactly an everyman solution, although I may yet try some cedar.

Or even, eventually, a UL version with foam core, cloth and epoxy; I’m not sure why, all that extra work to save the weight of a couple cans of pale ale. . . . .meh. . . .

As a ubiquitous Home Depot materials solution I opted for a 2 x 4 foot sheet of ½ inch birch plywood. I could have used ¼ inch but wanted the extra stiffness for the wider overhang on a 60L barrel tabletop, without adding stiffening ribs underneath. We shall see how that works.

It won’t be that much lighter than the Mark 1, which is ½ inch thick scrap plywood covered with epoxied on ¼ inch Lauan, but should provide good design implementation and construction practice before I find a suitable cedar board and haul it two counties over to a friend’s planer

Shop Day 1 (for time comparison think “Alan starts building a canoe”)

That single 2x4 sheet of birch plywood is large enough to cut Mark 1.5 tabletops for both a friend’s 30L barrel and for our 60L barrel. The 30L top is a squared circle 19 ½ inches wide, identical in size/shape to the Mark 1. The 60L tabletop is 27 inches wide between the circle sides, and either will fit inside their respective barrels (once the barrel has been partially emptied enough they make an OK divider)



From a frugal Scot’s perspective I like it; not a lot of wasted wood. One odd stylized arrow leftover, to be determined painted for turn-here party directions or medieval cosplay battle axe, and a couple of curved slices.



I ran an RO sander across the cut out pieces, mostly to remove my Sharpie and pencil lines, and then ran the non-hinged perimeter edges across a ¼ round router for some countertop curvature elegance.

One coat of epoxy resin on the bottom, two on the top. The epoxy may have been superfluous had I simply used multiple coats of spar urethane, but epoxy I got and epoxy is easy.



Now the waiting game for cure and dry time begins.

 

[ThreeScoutDad]

I have used 6mm (1/4") 5 ply baltic birch plywood for a few projects, and am really happy how it preformed. It has no voids, good surface finish, and stays flat given the number of ply's. A 5' x 5' 6mm piece weights 22 pounds. They also make a 7 ply 9mm (3/8"), which assume would be half again as much weight. I pick this up at a local lumber yard/saw mill, however, it should be available at multiple locations, and i know Rockler sells it in small odd sized pieces.

 

[Guest]

Shop Day 2 (actually some days later; Alan has somehow finished stripping the canoe by now)

I went and jinxed me with “epoxy is easy”. Those pieces all developed amine blush. Both sides, one epoxy coat and two. They have “cured” for another day and need to have the blush removed before a light 220 sanding, alcohol wipe and a coat or two of spar urethane.

Meanwhile I can cut the donut rings for the underside. That ring serves only to trap the tabletop centered and keep it from sliding side to side. It doesn’t need to be thick, or heavy.

For the Mark 1.5 tabletops I opted to cut some circles from lightweight minicel exercise flooring. Namely one scrap piece 16 ½ inches square. Since I only need half-circle rings I could have used even smaller scraps, but I had the perfect leftover piece to slice up.



Ohhh, I like it, little waste. Split circles for the 60L, spilt circles for the 30L, and a center circle piece that can be inset atop a naked 30L barrel lid to make a cushion top ottoman footrest. When the ticks or ankle biter stable flies are bad, and some footsie elevation is appreciated, I do enjoy a full sized camp chair and a tall elevation ottoman





Hmmm, I do like the economical design shape of these simple birch plywood economy folding tabletops. I oughta trace out 30L and 60L templates for future reference. Maybe make a couple extra copies, just in case. Easy as Sharpie marks on a roll of brown paper.



Shop day 3 (Alan has made a carbon seat pan and foam/carbon gunwales at this point)

Freaking amine blush removal. Well that was yucky stuff; every time I touched the wood pieces my fingers were greasy. I didn’t want to spread that crap onto every surface I might touch in the shop, so I had at it before I contaminated anything in the shop.

West System Amine blush is water soluble; the recommended solution is simply warm soapy water.

I went a few steps further; I washed every piece with soapy water and a fresh/clean rag per piece to remove the worst of the amine grease, then lightly Scotch-brited each piece (waiting for the Missues to ask where that 3 pack of ScotchBrite pads under the sink went), rubbed the pieces down with clean water and paper towels. They were not greasy after that, and never became so again

Amine blush is a PITA.

With the amine blush removed, the result I believe of using “fast” hardener in high humidity without peel ply - not actually such a “fast” combination when I add in the time spent on blush removal - I could finally sand the epoxy coats.

Light 220 sanding passes with the RO, followed by an alcohol wiped epoxy surface. Cleaned and prepped, and it was time to top coat.

BTW – A spray bottle filled with alcohol is really handy in the shop. And economical in alcohol use.
BTW II –Also a spray bottle filled with soapy water. No more fetching a pail and adding water and detergent. Right there on the shelf at the ready, soapy water and alcohol spray bottles. Sometimes it’s the little things.

I rolled out/tipped out that everyman ubiquitous 1[SUP]st[/SUP] coat of Helmsman spar urethane. That looks nice; I like the routed edge and darkened plywood perimeter stripe. Tres elegante, much more stylish than the crude scrap wood Mark 1.

 

[latremorej]

Very nice! Will you also be adding the small net and maybe a cup holder or two?

 

[Guest]

Will you also be adding the small net and maybe a cup holder or two?

The little net trash bag absolutely, that little touch is great for meal prep trash. I just need to find the right sized little mesh bags.

I thought about using a hole saw to cut out a circle and adding a cup holder from a defunct folding chair, but I’d rather have all of the table flat surfaced so I don’t accidentally set something on the edge of a hole and tip it over.

Shop Day 4 (Alan has outfitted the canoe, and is test paddling it by now).

I can live with that spar urethane job. Sadly I went overlight on the 2[SUP]nd[/SUP] coat, and it doesn’t look as good as the first coat. Screw it, I’m not rolling and tipping a third coat of urethane. Two coats of epoxy and two coats of urethane may be overkill, but it is freaking plywood. And the tops may be used as cutting boards.

Next up, hinges. I again went with an everyman solution, little 2 x 1 3/16 inch brass hinges from Home Depot.



I had a faith in those; the identical hinges in the Mark 1 which still look and work just fine, even after sundry salt water trips. Plus the brass screws provided with those hinges fit ½ inch thick wood.

For some belt and suspenders action I roughed up the bottoms of the hinges and G/flexed them to the tabletop, and added a drop of G/flex to the pre-drilled pilot holes before screwing the hinges tight. They ain’t coming loose, so I hope I got it right.



I’m on a fit out roll. Time to install the minicel split ring keepers on the bottom. I had pre-cut those on Shop Day 2. They are not perfect, but they are unseen on the bottom in use and don’t need to be attractive, or perfect.

I centered the lids on the barrels, measured edges equidistant and Sharpie marked the ring outlines for contact cement application, leaving a little fitment slop in the minicel keeper rings so the top will drop easily into place.

Three coats of contact cement on the minicel, just one on the urethane/epoxy tabletop surface, Pieces numbered so they set inside their respective Sharpie outlines again.



A little heat gun action and they will (have to) do; they are not coming up now. I learned a couple of things about cutting narrow minicel donut rings. And I’ll eventually add a bead of Plumber’s Goop along the minicel-to-tabletop edges for surety sake.

While that contact cement sets up I can cogitate the placement and length of the double-sided Velcro straps that fasten around the barrel handles to hold the top securely in place.

Two 12 inch long strips of double sided Velcro will do nicely, screwed into opposing side of the folding tabletop. That length works for the handle uplift both our 30L and 60L barrels.

I want to melt & seal the screw hole through the Velcro with a torch and 20 penny nail, so I might as well hot cut & seal the ends of the Velcro to length while I’m heating implements.





Not too shabby for a sheet of birch plywood, and not hard to make. Yeah, my 60L tabletop halves didn’t quite match in circularity. I’m still learning.



I like them as a Home Depot materials solution. I still need to find a couple of wee mesh bags to hang for trash containment, and add the deck hooks to hang them. Having that little trash net off the side of the table is a huge meal prep boon.

 

[Alan Gage]

So what did the weight end up at?

So little actually hangs over the edge of the barrels I'd think 1/4" cedar would be more than enough, even it if wasn't fiberglassed. Send me a message with your address and I'll get something sent out. Might has well give me the dimensions of the table top while you're at it. I see the 19.5" circle but how long is the squared off edge?

Alan

 

[Guest]

So what did the weight end up at?

So little actually hangs over the edge of the barrels I'd think 1/4" cedar would be more than enough, even it if wasn't fiberglassed. Send me a message with your address and I'll get something sent out. Might has well give me the dimensions of the table top while you're at it. I see the 19.5" circuit but how long is the squared off edge?

Some finished weights:
Mark 1 30 L barrel top, plywood and lauan weighs in at 3 lbs 8 oz
Mark 1.5 30 L barrel top, birch plywood, weighs 2 lbs 12 oz. dang, that is still three cans of pale ale weight I coulda brought.
Mark 1.5 60L barrel top, birch plywood, weighs 4 lbs 9 oz. That’s almost 6 beers. Maybe I give that one away too.

Squared circle dimensions as I cut them to fit inside the respective barrels:

The 30 L barrel top is 19 ½ inches wide across the round sides, 17 inches across the flat sides, with 5 inches of overhang off the lid.

The 60 L barrel top is 25 ½ inches wide across the round sides, 23 ½ inches across the flat sides, with 6 inches of overhang off the lid.

FWIW total materials used for those 30 L and 60 L folding tabletops:
2x4 sheet of birch plywood ½ inch thick ($20)
Four brass hinges and screws ($6)
One roll of Rollo One-wrap Velcro “bundling strap” (double sided Velcro). 12 feet for $6, which was 8 feet more than I need. $4 for what I used. That stuff is awfully handy to have around, think paddle straps and such. This stuff:
https://www.walmart.com/ip/Velcro-One-Wrap-Strap-12/19535849

Exercise flooring for the lid ring. Six sheets for $15, also handy to have around. I used part of 1 sheet, call it $2 in minicel.
Epoxy, spar urethane, contact cement, brushes, rollers, maybe $5 total

 

[Chip]

I won't feel to sorry about Mike's weight trade offs. Something tells me when faced with a dilemma like table top vs. beer, Mike's solution is bring both!

But, I was reminded of an Annapolis area canoeist who makes a living in marine carpentry. He decked his canoe with okoume plywood which he waffle-ized on the bottom side to reduce weight. He takes a router and strategically removes plywood, leaving the underside looking like a waffle. So, waffle-ization might save you a beer's weight. Also, once waffle-ized and strapped in place, it's unlikely you will need the foam rings to hold the top in place. With the top of your barrel covered by foam, the waffle pattern ought to get a pretty good bite into the foam and hold still. There's a few more ounces for the beer load.

It's interesting Mike brings this up contemporaneously with the wannigan thread. What is a barrel but a round wannigan minus the attractiveness of wood? With the table top, the barrel will have all the utility of wannigan and double as a table. Doesn't everybody love a two-fer? And there's even some wood grain to look at! Winner!

 

[Odyssey]

What is a barrel but a round wannigan minus the attractiveness of wood? With the table top, the barrel will have all the utility of wannigan and double as a table.

Yes, now you're getting it. There are compromises to be made between barrel & box & sack as the food/kitchen relates to form & function & fashion.
I've tried the sack and have moved on to the barrel, which I'm fairly happy with. I may next try the box (wannigan). The durability/weight tradeoff has been won by the barrel IMO, but I'm not convinced that can't be changed with a well designed wannigan. The flat worktop surface provided by the box but lacking in a barrel is a challenge Mike is meeting in this thread, and doing admirably so.
I'm not sure a wannigan can match the "sealability" of a barrel, but there's that word - compromise - again.

ps After a beery evening this past weekend I was sitting in the dark fumbling with design ideas for my state of the art wannigan, and hit upon a barrel-box fusion idea...shaped like a wannigan yet lightweight plastic like a barrel. And then realized "Oh yeah. that's called a cooler." I called it a night then and there.

 

[Guest]

ps After a beery evening this past weekend I was sitting in the dark fumbling with design ideas for my state of the art wannigan, and hit upon a barrel-box fusion idea...shaped like a wannigan yet lightweight plastic like a barrel. And then realized "Oh yeah. that's called a cooler."

Ah, the DIY faux wood grain Igloo cooler:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJMeVtBvZ18

It’s worth watching if only for her off-color commentary.

 

[Sven]

I love the ingenuity here.

I have not weighed my cedar strip wannigan yet, as it is not complete. I am expecting dry weight t be about 6# after fill coats on the outside only.
That is before I fashion a backpack harness for it as well.
Surface area of the table top will be huge at 18" x 28"
It will be a lot lower to the ground unless I fashion some legs for it.

Durability of the barrels is much greater. Compromise...

I do agree with Alan that a cedar strip top would be plenty strong, especially if laminated with fiberglass on both sides, as the lid for my wannigan is surprisingly rigid.

I am enjoying this thread. Lots of great ideas here!

 

[deerfly]

latest in portage furniture!

I love this kind of stuff... I think we all do it to some extent, constantly looking for that slightly better solution to what ever it is we're flirting with at the time. Necessity, the de-facto mother of invention isn't always on our minds. Sometimes thinking up something just a little better than what we have is enough motivation to create and experiment. Material lessons learned along the way are probably far greater than the intermediate product anyway.

The core foam evolution should be interesting too. You'll have to settle on a sensible thickness and density, you'll have to maneuver around screw holding issues for the hinges and other bolt on ideas. You'll muse over the various glass options, plain ole' e-glass, or splurge a bit for s-glass or carbon/kevlar hybrid, then there's basalt/innegra, you could even get the fancy checker board weave and wile away the wee hours in camp playing chess or checkers.

With a can of pale ale being the new unit of measure anything is possible...

 

[Odyssey]

Aaahh, the wood grained faux finish thing. I've done some in my time, with pretty good results even if I do say so myself. But never a plastic cooler lid. I'd never have thought of that. Kinda garish and gauche. And the minister and congregation wouldn't have been pleased if I'd described the chosen colour for the church pews as "poo poo brown". But anyway,
...I'm thinking people are getting carried away with techie applications for just plain wood. Spar varnish would suit I think. It was never intended to be a submersible suitcase. Marine paint faded from years of intense checkers games and portage foolery would also look appropriate. But now I'm wandering far off the thread trail, best get back to Mike's table top adventures. I'm waiting for the beer kegger idea, taps on the side for the Yuengling. "Will that be Black & Tan, or Porter? Choose your medicine." I'll portage that.

 

[Odyssey]

"I'll portage that." Umm, no I won't. 60L weighs over 130 pounds, so the barrel o'beer will need to be lightened somehow.
Hm, not sure how I'll do that exactly.

 

[Guest]

With the top of your barrel covered by foam, the waffle pattern ought to get a pretty good bite into the foam and hold still. There's a few more ounces for the beer load.

Good point about the questionable necessity of the split rings on the bottom. Even without a routered waffle surface it would be easy enough to make a rough textured bottom that would grip nicely on the minicel pad I have glued on our barrel tops. I didn’t weigh those narrow circles of exercise flooring minicel, but I doubt two of them weigh even 1 ounce.

That ring circle mostly helps to make sure the tabletop is centered on the barrel for better balance. Without the minicel glued in place I could have just routed a shallow U channel on the bottom to fit the lid rim.

That trapper circle on the bottom is the legacy of the failed first concept “table ring”. My initial concept was simply to have a hinged donut that rested slightly below the lid.



That split-level top looked like a guaranteed knock something over and spill surface, so I just skinned the plywood donut I had made with some Lauan for the Mark 1, with the top resting flat on the lid.

The enlarged barrel top work surface idea was sound, and provide much more usable work space, but having a flat surface all the way around was more user friendly.

Surface area of the table top will be huge at 18" x 28"

Hmmm, that got me wondering just how much more flat usable surface the folding tabletops provide. Both barrels have minicel exercise foam on the lids, one piece inset and one slightly larger piece glued atop that, which makes the tops is a little wider than naked lids.

Multiply Pi with the square of the radius (r) [SUP]2[/SUP]
Or, math isn’t for everyone, find a circle area calculator on-line

http://www.calcunation.com/calculator/circle-area.php

30 L lid enlarged with minicel = 78.5 square inches
30 L folding tabletop = 290 square inches (approximately, I deducted for the flat edge circle loss)

60 L lid enlarged with minicel = 143 square inches
60 L folding tabletop = 500 square inches (with deduction)

Pie are square, tabletops don’t need to be round. Two hinged pieces each around 10 x 20 inches for a 30L barrel would be even easier to make. Just remember not to set the quart of Mickey’s Malt Liquor way out on the corner.

(Correction, two 9 x 20 pieces would fold in half to fit inside the 30L barrel.

 

[Guest]

garish and gauche.
intense checkers games and portage foolery would also look appropriate.

Garish and gauche eh? That sounds like a Hawkeye line from M.A.S.H.

On a composite top, without some attractive wood grain, I would be tempted to at least epoxy over a checker board, or crosshatch a Pente board, or decoupage something like old playing cards.

Or something useful like a long section of cloth tape measure. Or a numbered betting grid for where the next fly will land.
(#27, I cheated and left a smear of honey there)

If I used different pigment colors in small batches of epoxy on the raw fiberglass I wonder if I could get my Jackson Pollock on?

Garish and gauche, garish and gauche!

 

[Guest]

I'd think 1/4" cedar would be more than enough, even it if wasn't fiberglassed. Send me a message with your address and I'll get something sent out.

Alan, that is a very generous offer, and I’ll take you up on it. It is silly as it is for me to fret about saving a single can in beer weight, but I am enjoying making these. And I can keep the 30L and 60L versions I like best, and give the rest to friends.

Shop experiments aiming for lower weight will soon be underway. How low can I go? Lookie what Mr. Postman done brought me; two 10 inch x 20 inch pieces of kevlar covered foam.





Thanks Istiophoridea Guy. Even without the squared circle excess cut away those two pieces together weigh 11 oz. I see a folding 30L tabletop that weighs less than 1lb. That is some ultra light weight and uber stiff material, only 3/8 inch thick

It is so well cut; so square and true, so John Prine level on the level, without any frayed or raggy edges, that I may just leave it square

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bXUGi0CsKS8

(Those, and the lyrics to Paradise, get me right in the feels)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DEy6EuZp9IY

 

[latremorej]

Yeah man! I can't wait to see the results! I was pondering the idea of a foam and fiberglass wannigan a while back but the price was way too much!

What kind of foam is in the middle of that sandwich? Something a person could purchase at a big box store?

Jason

 

[Guest]

Shop Day 5 (Alan has started yet another canoe)

I took the Velcro straps off to fix a couple of mistakes. Which I had corrected on the Mark 1 but forgotten about on the latest versions. Glad I didn’t epoxy those screws into place.

I had melted the screw holes at 6 inches, in the center of the Velcro strip. It is much easier to fasten and unfasten the Velcro if the screw hole is 3 ½ inches from one end, and screwed into position under the tabletop with the 8 ½ inch long end towards the middle of the table. That way the longer end can pass through the barrel handle and be wrapped around on the outside of the short end.

I had also neglected to fold over and glue little ¼ inch tabs at each end of the Velcro strips. Those little non-stuck tabs are a lot easier than picking at black Velcro in the dark with short fingernails. A little smear of G/flex, fold over, wax paper cover and binder clip took care of that.

I added the little perimeter bead of Amazing Plumber’s Goop and called it a full day’s work.

 

[Guest]

Ooops. 60L barrel folding tabletop Mark 1.51

Well, hell, I really am not as smart as I look.

The 60L folding barrel tabletop does NOT fit inside the 60L barrel. It is 1 ½ inches too tall. Guess I should have paid more attention and test fitted the tabletop pieces before epoxy, urethane and hinging. Call it a 23 ½ inch circle to fit inside the 60L barrel.



Easily rectified, I cut a flat edge off the circular sides to reduce the in-barrel height.



Hey, whadda ya know, the folded top not only now fits, it stands up better as a center divider inside the barrel with a flat edge on the bottom. And now the edges are even.



A run across the router and a little sanding action and next time I have epoxy and spar urethane out I’ll seal the edges.

I like it. I’ll square that circle on four sides from now on. Better to make the design mistakes on the birch plywood versions, and it is good to know that even the ancient geometers were “challenged by the axioms of Euclidean geometry”.

Yeah, that’s it, it was a simple Euclidean geometry mistake on my part.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Squaring_the_circle

Maybe the ancient geometers weren’t as smart as they looked either. Or they lacked a circular saw to fix their mistakes.