Factory Cart Table DIY { Restoration Hardware Inspired }

Hello all! Ok so today I'm very excited to post about one of my proudest DIY projects yet. I know I have been posting mainly about room makeovers lately, but that's not all I'm made of peeps! Little did you know, I have a strong passion for building furniture or up-cycling thrift store {and/or garage sale} finds. I think it all came from my love for turning something old and dingy into something new and beautiful. Oh... and that whole [I'm not a millionaire] thing! C'mon, we all work on a budget, right?? Anyways - I would say about 80% of my home decor & furniture is built from either antiques, DIY pieces,  or thrift store up-cycles. So you might be wondering... what in the world is so special about this post? Well remember this little inspiration photo I posted a while back?

Yes, that's right.  The Factory Cart Table from Restoration Hardware. Oh how I love thee. I have been drooling over this dang coffee table ever since it came out. But... I wasn't drooling over the ridiculously expensive price at a little over $1000. Yeah, I'll pass. I've actually seen some of the authentic carts go for around $1600. I can't even fathom that!??! But as much as the price scared me off for a while, I eventually came around and realized that I could totally make this. It took some convincing when I presented the idea to the hubby, but he eventually came around and we became dedicated to the cause! We were literally both constantly looking on eBay, Etsy, antique stores - you name it - for supplies to build this thing without making it look tacky or fake.

So I'm sure by now you are wondering how much this project ended up costing. Well, if I must say so myself, it all added up to around $150!!! Isn't that pretty darn good?  Some of the supplies we already had, but most of them we didn't. The $150 price tag included the vintage cast iron wheels as well:)

Warning - This was not an easy (or short) process, so this might be a long { how-to } post. Sorry y'all! Here is what we started with in the beginning:

We found a pair of 12in. diameter { authentic } cast iron wheels at $25 a pop at the Fort Worth Flea Market. AMAZING. Especially considering I had been seeing smaller ones on eBay for over $100 per pair.  Score!!

A few days later, I found the exact casters I needed on Etsy for only $40 for the pair. They were about 5in. in diameter and a little over 6in. tall. Exactly what we needed. Yay!

Here is the list of supplies that we used/bought. Some if it might seem odd at first, but you will find out why later.

** Ok pause! I have to interrupt here for a second.  The hubs just got home from work and is completely making fun of my descriptions/supply list! And yes... I have to admit, I am describing these supplies as a girl. A self proclaimed girly girl who has no idea what most of the REAL names are. And hey, I might be a girly girl, but I do know how to hold a hammer, ok??! I like to say that I'm the brains behind this project, and the hubby is the hands. (Minus the antiquing, painting, sanding etc. - that was all me my friends!) But needless to say, this was for sure a team effort here! OK, here we go!

List of general supplies:

Textured spray paint

Matte black spray paint

Lumber (I used decking wood. You might want to use your own measurements to fit your space, but I did consistently use 6in. wide planks throughout the project.)

 - 8: 6in. wide boards to build the top

 - 2: 6in. wide boards for the long sides

 - 2: 6in. wide boards for the short sides

 - 2: 6in. wide boards as supports underneath (not seen when finished)

Stain of your choice

Sand paper or electric sander (I used both)

4 Corner pieces (I think we used an L bracket of some sort?)

Nails to nail in corner pieces (We used roofing nails)

Bolts (16 of them - 2 per wood panel, and we had 8 panels of wood which made the top of the table)

Nuts

Washers

Clamps - 4 - 2 for each side (to hold the casters in place on the sides)

L Brackets to make the table sturdy

Anything to beat up the wood to make it look old (hammers, chains, etc.)

To make the axle: 

(We did not have the authentic axle making supplies that we needed, so we had to get creative. We got all of these supplies in the plumbing department at our local home improvement store.)

** Make sure to measure the width of your wheel opening and make your measurements off of that. Our diameter was a little smaller than an inch, so we had to buy 1/2in. diameter tubing for the axle. We literally had to make 5 Lowes trips to get this right. If the cast iron wheel hadn't been too heavy to lug around, we probably would have just brought it with us. Oh well! Lesson learned.

Axle - 24in. 1/2 dia. tubing (this is smaller because it fits into the 2 T-shaped tubes)

2 T-shaped 3/4in. dia. tubing

2 6in. long, 3/4in. dia. tube

2 round base's 3/4in. dia.

2 1/2in. end caps to finish off the wheels

Not sure the real names of any of the plumbing supplies we used, so here is a picture that might help you when you go to your local home improvement store.

Ok now if that wasn't confusing enough...We're finally going to get down to the good stuff! The tutorial!! Here is a helpful layout of our process:

Whew! Ok so I'm sure your on information overload by now, but calm down my friends, we can do this! Now that you've seen our process, I will attempt to describe it all to you. Wish me luck!

First, we made all of our measurements on how big we wanted the table. Since we already had our wheels, we knew how tall it was going to be, so we went from there. I spray painted all the hardware {including the wheels} and let it all dry outside for about an hour or so.

We then went to Lowes and got the wood cut for us. Much easier that way. We had to make a few tweaks after we laid it all out at the house, but at least the majority of the cutting was finished. We created the basic box first with the outer pieces of wood & tacked in some nails to hold it in place. We then added the supports as seen here:

We used L brackets to keep them sturdy. Then we began bolt in the top boards into the supports. Two bolts per board as seen here:

 

The hubs pre-drilled the holes to make it all fit nice and easy. We then flipped it over and tightened the nuts into the bolts. By this point, the top of the table was very sturdy. Yippee!

The next step was to take care of the wheels and attach our {home-made axle/wheel combo} to the supports. The top was still up side down at this point. We left it that way and attached the DIY axle. This might help you understand:

We then flipped it back over and attached the casters. The casters weren't quite tall enough, so we had to add a little extended piece of wood to really make sure it would stay in place. We used some clamps found in the hardware isle at Lowes. See pictures below to understand what I mean. We bolted these clamps in and tightened them VERY tight.

And finally, we added the corner pieces! We nailed them into the corners with our roofing nails. They were large enough to cover the holes of the L bracket corner pieces, but short enough to not crack the wood. Perfect:)

Whew! Ok I don't know about you, but I'm exhausted! Can we get to the fun part now?? The pictures!!!

 

For those of you wondering how I aged the wood, I will be posting about that soon {HERE}. But until then, I hope you have enjoyed my recent project as much as I did! I sure am happy we dove into this. It was a bit intimidating at first, but totally worth it!

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