Meccano Chest Completed

[Bryan Nuss]

Finally completed my Meccano chest yesterday. It took me almost a month to design and make it. I used oak plywood with solid oak trim.

It will house my 5000 piece (not including nuts & bolts) Meccano collection which my father started in 1954. The set (about the equivalent of at least two No. 10 sets, plus extra electric motors) weighs about 200 lbs, hence the use of 3/4" plywood drawers with 1/2" bottoms, all dadoed. There are 257 separate compartments made out of 1/8" plywood. I shellaced all of the inside parts and used 3 coats of satin wipe-on poly on the exterior. I got the 150 lb. drawer slides and brass hardware from Lee Valley.

Now all I have to do is fill it up!

Thanks for looking.

Bryan

[Jim Dunn]

That's some kinda beautiful work there Bryan!

Bit I got a ? What's Meccano:confused:

[Dave Richards]

Nice cabinet. You did an excellent job with that.

Jim, Meccano is similar to Erector Set. That ring a bell?
http://www.btinternet.com/~a.esplen/images/beam1.jpg
Here's an example of of Meccano model.

[Bryan Nuss]

Hi Jim,

Meccano is a model-building set consisting of mainly metal plates, girders, strips, gears, motors, etc. joined together with nuts and bolts. It is the precursor of the Erector sets.

I will post photos of the drawers when I fill them up.

[Jim Dunn]

I've had an erector set in the past and legos, but Meccano is new to me.
I just kept evey thing in a bag in the closet. Nothing this nice!

[Jim Becker]

You have some nice curl in those cabinet sides, there, Bryan. Nice job on this project!

[Dan Gill]

Beautifully executed. I eagerly await the pics of it when it is full.

[Dan Mages]

Wow!! That is one nice cabinet that you made! I wonder if I should make one for my old collection of legos?

[Lou Morrissette]

Nice work, Bryan. You have a lot of patience to install all those dividers. Nice design....clean and functional.

Lou

[Tyler Howell]

Bryan,
I can see I've truly lived a deprived childhood. That's some cool stuff.
Thanks for the lesson Dave and Bryan. Great storage cabinet
Do they still make Meccano. and has it gone digital??

[Bryan Nuss]

Hi Tyler,

Yes, they still make Meccano in France, plus a fairly good number of specialty suppliers in India, Australia, Argentina, USA and Canada. The Hornby/Meccano factory in England shut down many years ago. There are still thousands of enthusiasts around the world. A google search on "Meccano" yielded 416,000 hits!

Thanks to all for the compliments.

[Donnie Raines]

Looking good. Me likes.... :cool:

[George Grubaugh]

Beautiful cabinet! I do wish you guys would quit telling me stuff like " I designed & built it in about a month" though. I see about a 6 month project there!

[Frank Pellow]

That's a great purpose-built cabinet Bryan. As an avid user of Meccano when as a kid, it makes me very nostalgic to hear about it and I certainly envy you and your collection. I will be very very interested to see pictures (and I hope there are lots of them) of the filled drawers.

For those of you wondering about Meccano and Erector, when I was a child I had both and they were fully interchangeable. In Canada, we purchased Meccano but my American relatives sent Erector components to us as gifts.

[Jerry Olexa]

You are a patient man w all those dividers But an Excellent job!! Looks good. You should br PROUD!!