Unnamed 2 player slim upright with rotating monitor

[WakiMiko]

Hello everyone, first time builder here!

The cabinet is based on Koenig's Project MAME because I've always liked its shape and I wanted a slim cabinet.
I also took a lot of inspiration from the various projects based on Project MAME as well as other builds in this forum so thanks a lot everyone, you have been a great help.

This is pretty much my first woodworking (well, MDF-working) project ever and I'm really Really REALLY slow. The pictures in this first post are from summer last year, so I have some catching up to do. Back in november I posted a thread about my monitor rotation, which I've slightly changed since then. More details about that in a later post.

I'm using 19mm MDF for the sides and 12mm MDF for pretty much everything else to keep the weight low.
I added some height to both the control panel and the cabinet itself compared to the original plans. The CP now sits at about 100cm from the ground (original was like 91cm which felt too low, I'm fairly tall) and the cabinet is about 180 cm tall (original was 160cm).

After a rough cut with a jigsaw, I used a cheap router to cut all sides, even the straight ones, using parts I cut off earlier as a guide for the copy bit.



I used this thing to make templates for the three curves. You screw it it to the soon-to-be template and use it as a guide for the router. If you don't mind filling up screw holes, you could even screw it directly to the final workpiece and skip the template.



It worked really well, perfect curves. It feels like the 5 cm radius I have below the control panel is about the smallest curve you can achieve with it though, it won't bend much further.

Some action shots:





MDF makes a lot of dust:



First side cut:



The second side was much easier and faster to finish thanks to the copy bit.



I didn't like the sharp corners so I decided to round them (again using the copy bit and a kitchen utensil that had the corner radius I wanted as a template). The round corners should also make the T-molding easier to apply.
I even rounded the corners on the bottom because I'm going to have T-molding all the way around the sides.







This was the first time I've worked with a router and I was really liking it. That is, until my cheap PoS decided to die on me. Well, it didn't die completely, but it only turns on the highest setting now which burns the MDF like crazy. So cutting the slots for the T-molding had to wait for now and I started working on the bottom plate instead.

For some reason I used 16mm MDF here instead of 19mm. I hope that is enough to bear all the weight. The sides are quite heavy already.



For easy moving of the cabinet I added wheels and leg levelers. Even on the lowest setting, the levelers were higher than the wheels so I had to install MDF "spacers" between the wheels and the bottom plate.



The wheels stick out further on one side of the brackets than the other and I wasn't sure in which orientation to mount them.



After some experimenting I put the smaller side towards the back so the cabinet can be positioned closer to the wall.

My back plate is going to be indented 1cm but for the tilting of the cabinet to work without the corners of the sides touching the floor the wheels have to be in the absolute back. So I made more spacers, this time using 8mm MDF which, together with the wheel mounting brackets, add up to about 1cm.



I added a power and an ethernet socket. I couldn't find a cheap RJ45 case mount thingy, so I went with a simple cable coupler.





More pictures and text soon!

[yotsuya]

OK, tell the truth - you hired a professional photographer to take photos of you routing. Because those photos are ---smurfing--- awesome. 

[WakiMiko]

My brother took those pictures, glad to you like them! It's also his camera (a Nikon D5100).

[EMDB]

Nice start. I'm glad to see my thread inspired you as I recognize quite some details 

You will like those leg levelers and wheels for both moving the heave cab and very stable standing 

I decided not to have a mains connector on the back as it prevents you to put it close to the wall. My cabinet has a fixed cable exiting from the bottom.

Nice gadget to route those curved parts. I did mine free-handed folowing the curves I drew using all kinds of rounded objects 

[keilmillerjr]

Awesome! I have the same wheels and leg levelers, and was trying to think of how I am going to mount them to my cab (currently just a sketchup file). What are you using for the reinforcement wood? Any accurate dimensions on them? Thanks!

[WakiMiko]

Nice start. I'm glad to see my thread inspired you as I recognize quite some details 

You will like those leg levelers and wheels for both moving the heave cab and very stable standing 

I decided not to have a mains connector on the back as it prevents you to put it close to the wall. My cabinet has a fixed cable exiting from the bottom.

Nice gadget to route those curved parts. I did mine free-handed folowing the curves I drew using all kinds of rounded objects 

Yeah the legs and wheel are really nice, I'm glad I picked them up.
Regarding the power connector, I figured I could use an angled plug to get the whole thing closer to the wall.

Awesome! I have the same wheels and leg levelers, and was trying to think of how I am going to mount them to my cab (currently just a sketchup file). What are you using for the reinforcement wood? Any accurate dimensions on them? Thanks!

I'm not sure what type of wood it is, might be spruce or pine? The strips are 21mm square.