Flex with marble inserts complete (1 Viewer)

[Ted Drain]

I finished my flexy rack this weekend and wanted to share it with everyone. It's built from 3/4" plated steel rod from McMaster-Carr. The shelves are 2 sheets of 1/2" cherry plywood with cherry iron on edge banding. The whole thing is finished in Danish oil.
Each of the full shelves is 22" wide and 20" deep. The top layer of plywood has 4 6"x6" holes cut out of it. I cut a single 12" x 12" green marble tile into four pieces for each shelf and rested the tile on a sheet of rubber in the cut outs.
The cost breakdown for everything was (approximately):
$80 4x8 sheet of 1/2" cherry plywood
$20 50' of 1 7/8" wide cherry edge banding
$20 Danish oil and spray top coat
$70 for threaded rod, washers, nuts, and rubber sheeting
$40 for 4 1' marble tiles
= $230 + many hours of my time
It really turned out great (if I do say so myself)
I finished it just in time since my braided sleeving, shrink tubing, Belden wire, and Canare connectors are showing up tomorrow. It's time to clean up the clutter behind the rack with some custom cables! I'm using Belden 7710 (for component video) and Canare LV-77S for the audio/digital links. I'm going to use a Paladin crimping tool, 2 Paladin dies, and generic coax stripper. I'll let everyone know how it works out since these tools will be around $100 ($70 in crimp/dies and $30 in strippers) which would be a lot cheaper than buying the Canare tooling.

 

[Cam S]

WOW, that looks really good! Was the a reason other than aesthetics for the marble inserts? They make it look really good!

 

[Ted Drain]

Not really. Each marble tile is resting on an 1/8" thick rubber sheet so I guess it could help with vibration damping. I can't hear any difference in the sound though.

My thought process for the inserts went something like:
- Marble shelves would be great == huge $$$$
- 18"x18" marble tiles inset in the shelves would be great == big $$
- 18"x18" gloss ceramic tile would be cool - but, it was hard to find decent looking tile and the stuff I did find was around $8.50/sq ft.
- 12"x12" marble tile was also around $8/sq ft so I came up with the idea of using 1 tile per shelf and cutting the tile into quarters.

I was really just looking to do something a little different.

 

[Dave Poehlman]

Looks great! I like the look of the marble. And it should minimize vibration to your components. It would probably be more noticable with a turntable, but CD's (and DVDs too, I suppose) are subject to "jitter" when they encounter vibration.

Again, nice job.

 

[Kevin Deacon]

Wow, that looks great, but you may want to dust those spindles

 

[Frank Carter]

They are outstanding!