I have seen lots of examples of resin pour furniture on social media recently and that has made me want to have a go at making my own. I like to learn by doing and experience mistakes so I can learn from them. This is my first experience of making some resin pour furniture.
I started by picking out some thin planks of timber from my wood store. The on I picked had a nice natural edge so I cut it in half and turned the natural edge in on itself.
I planed the and sanded the surfaces and then added a draft edge to enhance the shape of the top surface. This was a mistake at such an early stage as it made the resin pour leak of-very the edge. I should have added the draft after pouring the resin. This was the main lesson I learned.
The next stage was to pour the resin. In order to do this I had to build a frame to hold the timber in place and set the gap for the resin. The timber had to be clamped in the frame and then I mixed the resin ready to pour.
There is part A resin and part B and when mixed there is a catalytic reaction that makes the resin harden. I mixed some blue pigments of different shades into the resin so I could create an ocean water effect. The resin generates heat as it reacts so I poured it in 3 stages so as to avoid problems from too much heat.
Using a heat gun enabled me to mix the resin shades nicely and achieve a gradient effect.
In the next photo you can see where I made the mistake of planing the edge of the timber before pouring the resin which made a sharp edge. I then had to re-plane the resin edge and sand the resin a lot. You can also see that i overfilled the resin on the top surface of the table and because of this I had to sand down the resin and then work hard to regain the polished appearance of the resin.
Here is the completed table top:
I had originally wanted to manufacture my own table legs but my limited knowledge of welding and desire to complete the table stopped me and I settled for buying some standard, off the peg table legs.
I was really pleased with the outcome of my side table. Most importantly, I learned many lessons about working with resin for future projects.
