Hi I'm Craig Phillips and in this video I am going to show you how to build your own
coffee table with storage space out of old recycled pallets.
And the tools you are going to need, a chop saw, if you don't have a chop saw a hand saw
is fine, an electric sander or a sanding block, cordless drills, screws, glue and a tape measure.
Although I have taken my pallet apart I am actually just going to put it together for
a dry run to show you where I got the inspiration to build a coffee table.
Now we all know what pallets look like, they have got three of these skids below and then
they have the slots fixed across the top of them, of course with gaps in between.
And you have the same along the bottom., this allows the forklift to go under them.
But I though putting two of them together would make a perfect coffee table.
But firstly dismantle it all, what I am going to do is fix these down but a lot closer with
no gaps in them for the top of the coffee table.
And then once I have completed the top side of it I will repeat this for the bottom side
of it and then simply sandwich those runs together and that way you have a bigger gap
for storage space.
I am going to cut these skids down, to a meter in length so they are the same size as my
slots to keep the table nice and square.
I can use them later for my legs.
I have cut three of the skids for the below and then I have got my slats which are a meter
in length so I am just going to place them a meter apart, put the centre one in the middle
and place a mark at 500mm.
And what I am going to do is just put a screw in there temporarily at the moment nice and
square.
So start with a pilot hole, drive one screw in, it doesn't have to be all the way at the
moment.
Just getting them nice and flush.
We know that is a meter apart.
Same again in the middle.
Just one as a temporary fixing because later on we will get glue under there and fix them
down but I want to get it square first.
And then I am also going to put a temporary one on this edge, quick pilot hole on both
sides, and a loose fixing.
Making sure you have got this edge flush, now what we have done is created our shape
and our size for our coffee table but what we do need to do is make sure that that is
square.
There is a couple of ways of doing it, one you can use your set square and level it up
that way or if you are working on a large workbench like this you can always take it
to the corners and line it up flush with there if we know this is true.
and then of course pull that edge up until it is flush with that end of the table and
that way we know that our two corners here are going to be nice and square.
Then the next stage is to bring some of our slots in and we can start to glue these and
fix them down permanently.
Two pilot holes in the end to stop them splitting and then two screws driven all the way down
so it holds it nice and tight.
Same again on the opposite side.
Squeezing them together so that we have got no gap in between each of the timbers.
Now if you find that this could have a little bit of movement on the table get your clamp
and just simply clamp it down.
Double check that it is flush with the end of the bench.
Now that last one that we put the glue on is screwed in to place, this first one and
the very end one here I'm going to take back off and then put some glue on there, and I'm
putting two screws in each end and fixing it down.
Making sure it is nice and flush with here, really squeezed in tight to the second to
last slat and then screw it down nice and tight.
Couple more pilot holes in here.
And then you do the exact same on that opposite
one there.
Then you can turn this over, that could be the top or the bottom of your table.
What we want to do if create the same as this again.
But how we do it first is we get some more of the skids, we place these on because we
want to double the gap size in between to give plenty of storage space.
So you offer it up to the back there so it is nice and flush, do your pencil line there
and it ready to cut.
Same again with the other pieces.
Offer it up nice and flush to the rear, mark them on the under side.
We are going to chop these down.
Now these are cut down to size, fixing them to there is really important.
And all we are going to do is use large 4 inch screws, but we are going to drill these
through the wood and counter sink them really deeply so the go in about 50mm into the timber
below to give us a good strong fixing.
We start off by drilling pilot holes in first, right the way down with them.
Then we swap the drill bit to a really large one about 12-13mm wide.
And then we have to counter sink the top of them, you want to send this down to probably
about that deep.
Right I will just clamp it to this to keep it nice and secure.
Plenty of glue along this edge.
Place them in, again it is always wise to clamp it down making sure that it is nice
and flush on the face of it, and also on both edges.
Then we can get our large screws and put the in the pilot hole and start them off and hopefully
these will screw right the way down through the clearance hole and grab that timber below.
Perfect, nice and solid.
That is nice and solid, do the same on them two.
The next stage is to fit the pallet slats on the bottom of it.
Again we are going to put plenty of glue along these edges and then we are going to drill
some pilot holes in the slats so they don't split.
Offer it up so that it fits nice and flush on the edges, and start fixing it down.
That is the top and bottom of the coffee table now complete, I am going to give it a good
sand up using an belt sander and then I am going to route a nice edge all the way around
the top.
Now we have sanded down lovely and smooth I have clamped it down to keep it nice and
solid to the workbench I am going to start routing it.
What I am going to do is route in a nice beveled edge all the way around all four sides.
Now in some of the pallets you have the small blocks which sandwich them both together.
You can use these on the four corners of your table to create little small legs but what
I am going to use is the off cuts that we had earlier from the skid sections of the
pallet.
And what I want to do is fix them so we create kind of a 'L' shape with them and then that
way they make a perfect corner leg.
Make four of them and the coffee table can sit on them.
But we need to of course fix them together, so what we are going to do is drill a pilot
hole in them first.
Nice and deep with a counter sunk piece on it.
And that way when our screw is driven in it sites nice and flush below the top of the
surface.
And then we are going to line them up and apply a small amount of glue on here.
And then I am going to clamp them together so they are nice and flush and tight.
Lovely.
Double check that you have got them nice and square before you tighten them up.
Yep!
And then to screw them into there I am going to also clamp it to my bench to make them
nice and secure.
Perfect.
So now we have one corner leg firmly fixed together which we will place down.
We will do three more of them and sit the coffee table on top.
Now you are ready to fix the four legs to the base of the table.
I am going to hold it in position, setting it back about 20mm there.
Make a little pencil mark where you want the leg, transfer that to the inside of here and
put a couple of little crosses in place to drill a pilot hole where we are going to screw
them.
Perfect.
Now I am going to put some glue on the bottom of the leg
and place that in position.
Then I am going to use a clamp to clamp it down, which is a bit tricky holding it in
to position.
Double check that it is on your pencil mark and squeeze it secure.
OK now put a couple of screws in the pilot holes and they can be driven in using your
screw driver.
Brilliant, now take the clamp off.
Once the glue is dry that leg is perfectly solid and all I need to do now is put the
other three on.
Now that is our coffee table now complete out of recycled pallet wood.
Now of course you can stain this or varnish it to your own colour that you choose.
If you want to see more pallet projects please visit the website, silverlinetools.com