Mass Effect Drinks Cabinet

A friend wanted a drinks cabinet to fit in a rather awkward corner to house all of his alcohol. Apart from being a storage cabinet he also wanted it to be able to hold some bottles upside down to be used with optics and have a Mass Effect N7 logo painted on it. Oh he also wanted it painted completely in black gloss!

As always I have a YouTube video documenting the build but more detailed instructions follow below, I hope you enjoy it!

Tools

- Pencil, measure and square

- Bevel gauge

- Wood saw (crosscut and tenon/back saw ideal) or a table saw

- Jointing plane or jointer

- Smoothing plane

- Chisel and mallet

- Clamps

- Drill and screws

- Small nails/panel pins

- Paintbrush

- 240 grit sandpaper

Materials

- 6.5m (21' 3 15/26") of 4cm X 4cm (1 9/16" X 1 9/16") wood for the frame

- 160cm X 61.5cm (63" X 24 3/16") sheet for the back (or 7 or so pieces of long pallet wood if you don't have that!)

- 160cm X 70cm (63" X 27 9/16") of 25mm (1") plywood for the top, shelves and drink holders

- 12 lengths or so of 90cm (35 7/16") pallet wood

- 87.5cm X 81.5cm (34 7/16" X 32 1/16") of 5mm (3/16") plywood for the back of the cabinet

- 1m (39 3/8") or so of bungee cord

- 4 X 25mm (1") conduit clips

- 2 litres of black gloss paint

- Red and silver model paint

Making this cabinet completely from reclaimed wood was a challenge and perhaps the back board was the most challenging part of all. Luckily I had some long pallet wood pieces that I was able to make a panel from, it would have been easier to have a large sheet of wood for this purpose though. I jointed all the sides of the pallet wood with a jointer plane and glued them together to make the desired shape of the backboard as seen in the plans.

After that it was just a case of making the frame work and attaching it to the back board. I started with what would be the back of the cabinet and screwed it into the back board. I then used a piece of string and a bevel gauge to help me determine the angle I'd have to cut on the two pieces that would be at the top and bottom of the frame on the front of the cabinet. After those were cut and attached I just cut some pieces to go across the board to help hold the shelves and top more securely.

I thought I'd give the lower half a coat of paint as this area would be tricky to get to later. I then just cut the top, the middle shelf and the bottom shelf to the sizes determined in the plans and screwed them onto the framework. I noticed a little bit of movement when pushing against the top so I decided to add two braces to help keep it rigid and then gave the whole thing a coat of paint.

Needing a post to hang the door on I decided to also make it support the edge of the middle shelf just to give it extra strength.

I planed down some pieces of pallet wood and chamfered the ends as they were a little proud of the top. This then determined the width of the door which was very simply made with a Z frame and plenty of screws. I used little shims from folded up card to keep the door from the edges when I fit the hinges. This also helped to jam the door into position whilst I was concentrating on screwing the hinges in.

After that was done I attached the plywood backboard and painted the whole thing in another coat of black gloss.

The handle was rather simple, I just used a bevel gauge to get an angle I liked for two wooden blocks. Then with a 25mm (1") drill bit I drilled a hole into each block and pushed some metal conduit inside the holes. I didn't put any glue or anything inside as the wooden blocks were drilled into the door and made it impossible for the conduit to move.

As the logo was going to be silver I picked a piece of silver pipe to have a little continuity in the piece. It was then just a case of covering the handle in masking tape while I painted the wooden blocks.

Having to make the drink holders was the other rather difficult part of this project. In the end I settled on a kind of scooped out plywood section that would hold four bottles using bungee cord. The section below this would have 4 conduit clips on it to hold the neck of each bottle. The size of the curves to hold the bottles is entirely up to you, I made mine ever so slightly bigger than a wine bottle and it seems to work great. Just remember to put a little bit of bend in the elastic when you're screwing it between each curve. If you make it too tight then the bottles will be very difficult to move and replace.

Not being able to use masking tape as a template for the logo for the fear it would peel the paint off, I decided to try it freehand. Now this wasn't perfect but it was the best I could do! I made an outline of the logo first using a silver pen. I used a kind of model paint to make the logo and it took about 3 coats.

After that was dry I was able to screw on the bungee cord and the conduit clips.

After it was made it luckily fit into my brother's truck (just) and then we had to carry it up three flights of stairs which wasn't fun but it was great to see it in its final resting place and used for the purpose it was created for. The cupboard inside has ample storage for all his drinks and the drink holders will even hold square shaped and oversized bottles.

All in all it was a rather challenging and very different build but it was very interesting and satisfying to make.

If you enjoyed that Instructable and want to keep up with other things I make and see progress photos of all my builds as they happen, then please give my Facebook page a like and head over to my YouTube channel.

Thank you for checking this out and I hope to see you again soon.

Clint