Incredible Table a must see!

[Jon Lanier]

http://www.abum.com/36687/Expanding-Table.html

[Bill Wyko]

OH MY, Thats it, it's over...I give up.:) That is incredible! Thats got to be one of the finest pieces of wood work I've seen. It fits together perfectly too. WOW. Nice post.

[gary Zimmel]

NOW THATS A TABLE......

Can't even imagine how it would be built..

[Dan Barr]

anyone know where to get one or got the directions on how to build it?

ciao,

dan

[Brian Keith]

Dan I remember a year or so back that table made it rounds on here. If you do a search you might get it and I believe there was a web site on it also.

[Denny Rice]

That is the coolest table I have ever seen. We have to find the plans to build this table.:)

[Darryl deHaan]

This is the guy... I think.

http://www.dbfletcher.com/

Darryl

[Tim Malyszko]

That is so freakin' cool. Thanks for posting.

[mark page]

The company TS Berry makes one that is a manual pull out pie wedges with butterfly triangular leaves to expand it. I haven't seen one like this being an "automatic" version. Looks quite nice.

[Charles Wiggins]

That is the coolest table I have ever seen. We have to find the plans to build this table.:)

You might want to start with this one (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z3YCo0l0-PI&NR=1) and work your way up :D.

[mark page]

Charles,
That is the TS Berry table, or a copy of it. We sold a design at the furniture mart I worked for. IIRC about $2200 for table alone.

[Jeff Cremers]

anybody find out any information about this one.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BSMYj60ZgT8&feature=related

[Jim Kirkpatrick]

The DB Fletcher table is designed for yachts. Price ranges from $50-$70k!

[Keith Cope]

Those are pretty amazing. 50-70k is a tad spendy for a table! But if you buy a yacht like the one in the DB Fletcher video you probably don't mind so much...

[Rob Wright]

Here is another one that I followed the building blog on:

http://www.waterfront-woods.com/

He goes into some go detail on the mechanism.

-Rob

[Richard M. Wolfe]

Nice looking piece and amazing construction. Yeah, it was on last year sometime.

I was thinking of getting one but I don't have a yacht to put it on. :(

Hey, wait a minute! I forgot about my Italian villa. :D:D

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

It is a made from machined steel, good bearings, and a fair bit of engineering. The rest is window dressing.

[Mitchell Andrus]

Another - anyone of us here could make this one.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BSMYj60ZgT8&feature=related

Check the related posts - lots more.

[Chris Padilla]

Our own Rick Christopherson made a table kinda like that but not quite as fancy.

[Rick Christopherson]

Our own Rick Christopherson made a table kinda like that but not quite as fancy.Not quite as fancy? :confused: Yes, the DB Fletcher Table is very cool and I would like to design one like that. However, my table is motorized and his table isn't. :p My customer only has to push a button to open the table. His customers have to spin around the table, and break out in a sweat while wearing their fancy tuxedos. :D

I have had this video on my computer for almost a year but I never got around to processing it into an mpeg and uploading it until this morning.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MJ5eHtCvUjc

This is a video that I made after I installed all of the mechanical hardware, but before the wood tabletop was installed onto the hardware. I needed to make a trial fit of all the hardware to ensure it was functional, and then tore it all back apart to install the wood components onto the hardware.

The video shows the top side of the mechanical system as it opens and closes with the motor concealed under the table.

[Jim Barstow]

How abou this one?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WR931mtC3l4&NR=1

You could use it as a mobile base...

[Jochen Schroecker]

This is the guy... I think.

http://www.dbfletcher.com/

Darryl

Hello everybody,
Yes, that is the fletcher table. Costs for it 2007 was € 80000,- ($ 124000,-).
Please allow for a few weeks lead time!

Yoman

[Scott Myers]

While this is an old thread, I have been wanting to build some sort of expanding round table. Some good info was collected here.

I did want to add that someone mentioned that the very expensive DB Fletcher table isn't motorized. This is incorrect. It is indeed motorized and requires either DC or AC power - buyer's choice. One could not drive the mechanism and gearing by pushing such a complex and high gear ratios by hand. Somehow, the thing senses when you start to try to move it and assists you in opening it up.

My guess is that at the heart it is driven by a slew ring drive of some sort; a sort of high precision large lazy susan type bearing with a bronze worm gear drive. At least that is where I would start from a design standpoint. That is a standard available product that can be driven by any type of motor. In my profession, I sell these slew ring drives and it would be the perfect thing to base such a design on. But a slew ring drive assembly of the appropriate size would start at about $2,000 at an OEM level, perhaps more. My cost isn't much less.

One other thing to note about a DB Fletcher table; it is perfectly round in the small or expanded configuration due to integral inserts in the outer ring that raises up when it is in the small configuration. The outer radius of the pie pieces are made to have the large expanded radius, so this is the "magic trick" that is used to make it perfectly round on both configurations. It's no wonder the thing costs so much. Forget the exotic wood and woodworking costs, the engineering and drive mechanism took a lot of time to come up with and could easily respresent 2/3 the cost of the thing in the low volumes they build them in. I note one can be had for as low as $34,000. What a bargain!

Regardless, I think I will stick to manual leaves and expansion and stay away from engineering any exotic substructure. I just want a table that is round and can stay fairly round when expanded! But my hat is off and I bow to anyone that takes the time to work on such complex designs.

[Lucas Bittick]

Amazed at the Fletcher table. I have never seen anything like that!

For those interested in a bit of furniture history, the expanding round table was invented patented by Robert Jupe in England in 1835. It had removable leaves. A Google query for "Robert Jupe" or "Jupe Table" will yield good results, and you can see some pictures of very fine furniture.

As cool as the new Fletcher table is, as Mr Myers wrote above, the mechanism is insanely complicated. Those interested in making an expanding round table could easily duplicate the original Robert Jupe design as a more accessible alternative.