Wet Bar Completed w/ pixs

[Lars Thomas]

Hello all, I've been working the past few weeks on my basement wet bar. It consists of 8-1/2' of cherry cabinets of traditional construction and your basic laminate top. Because of a relatively low ceiling (about 7' in that area of the basement) the uppers are 24". All cabinet boxes are 1/2" birch. All drawers are 1/2" dovetailed maple. The bases where made sans toe-kick, so they just sit on a built up 2" x 4" base. Check out the figure in the lower left door panel - pretty cool, eh. Cabinet hardware has not yet been selected,

I wanted to go with granite counter surfaces, but just couldn't see spending more on the counters then the entire rest of the project.

I counters were made with an MDF substrate and Wilsonart 'granite' plastic laminate.

Thanks for looking. Lars

[Mark Stutz]

Lars,
Beautiful craftmanship! The crown molding adds the illusion of height, so the ceiling really doesn't appear to be only 7 feet. Did you use a stain or toner? What type of finish. I would consider pulls that "disappear" and don't detract from the cabinets, such as turned knobs made from the offcuts of the same cherry. Whatever you decide, this is beautiful!

Mark

[Todd Burch]

OK everyone - Lars is finished with his basement - party @ Lars' house next weekend!!!

And you know Lars, everyone will congregate around the wet bar ("kitchen") too!

Good job. How long did it take? How much time over these past "few weeks?"

[Ken Fitzgerald]

Lars, beautiful work! I like your raised panel doors!

P.S. When's the party referred to by Todd? I drink Bud Light! CU there!

[Jim Becker]

Outstanding, Lars! Those cabinets are super.

[Jerry Olexa]

Lars, Excellent Job! Very professional! Curious how you finished the cherry. I always have difficulty w sapwood, evening stain,aging effect etc Also where did you get the beautiful Cherry lumber? Looking for some myself (I'm in the general NW Chicago area) . Great looking results! Thanks in advance Jerry

[Dick Parr]

Looking Good there Lars!

[Steve King]

Lars,
Nice looking job, I take it you like Coca Cola By the way how old it the cola machine?
Steve

[Ken Salisbury]

A very nice job. I have one question however,

Where is the Bud Light neon sign ?

[Bob Marino]

Beautiful job, all around, but am especially curious about the stain and finish on those cabinets.

Bob

[Waymon Campbell]

Very nice workmanship Lars. Like everyone else, we need details on finish!

Next to the coke sign I would recommend a Jack Daniels sign to compliment it!

[Byron Trantham]

Love those cabinets! Really handsome.

[Lars Thomas]

Thanks for the compliments. Some of yall had a few questions . . .

Mark (and others), the finish is two coats of General Finish (GF) Danish Oil for color toped with several (3-5) coats of GF Arm-R-Seal semi-gloss. Each coat was wet-sanded to 600 (or more). I learned from here that there is more to life then Minwax. I cut around all of the sap wood, so I did not need to use any toner.

Todd, you just missed the party by a day or two. We had the inaugural poker night on Friday. The bad part about that I wanted to get the counter finished so it would be one less un-finished project at my house. I got the sink, faucet, trap and supply lines all plumbed with an hour to spare. One problem, no tail pipe, or whatever the piece is called that comes out of the bottom of the sink. I had to declare defeat . . .at least it looked good. Although anytime your in the neighborhood (Chicago-Western burbs), feel free to swing on by.

As for time, I would guess the elapsed time has been about 6 weeks. I have about 40 hours invested. Might be one of the first projects I've actually made 'money' on. We got a quote from the borgs of about $2,600 (cabinets only). I have about $600 in materials. That's $50/hr.

LOML was concerned about the amount of time it would take for me to make them. So I approached this like a project at work. I put together a spreadsheet calculating the cost to build each cabinet. Then I sold LOML on a proof of concept consisting of two upper cabinets. If I could get them built quickly enough and within budget, I would get the green light to build them all. If not, I had two nice cherry cabinets for the shop or garage. All turned out well. She has begun talking about new cabinets for the kitchen, uh oh.

LOML really doesn't care for laminate surfaces, but she is away this week-end. So we'll see how she likes this one on Monday. Again worse case, I have a nice laminate miter station. There is less than $60 in materials, so no big deal.

Jerry, surprisingly enough, the lumber is from Rockler (Schaumburg). I had to pick up a few things there, then was planning to head down to Owl hardwood in Lombard. That had some decent looking stock and they met Owls price. They usually don't keep too much on hand, so my order about wiped them out. I usually get all my wood at Owl, but also head out to Kirkland saw mill occasionally.

Steve, Yes, I guess you could say I have an affliction to Coca-Cola stuff. My grandfather worked there for 35 years, so guess you could say it's in my blood. The vending machine is an un-restored Vendo 81a from the mid-50's. It's a 10c machine. It still works like a champ, gets good and cold.

Waymon, the Jack sign would be a nice touch. But I also like the Bacardi signs. I'll keep my eyes open for one of them.

Getting back to the hardware . . .I'm still undecided. But I have found that hardware is not really 'required' All of the doors and drawers are back cut at 10 degrees, which makes for a decent pull, I suppose.

[Dan Mages]

Very nice work there!! I have a basement that needs some cabinets, if you are not busy. If you are looking for a good source for wood in the Chicago area, you might want to check out OWL hardwoods in Des Plaines. They are off Dempster and Graceland. They beat Rockler's pricing and quality on lumber.

Dan

[Kelly C. Hanna]

Nicely done! You did a great job of staining and finishing...looks beautiful!I love the Coke machine. They are very pricey these days, you have a classic there.