Tabletop

Torsion box, 1/4" ply skin.

existing

table.

Anything using wood will be heavy, but relatively low cost.

Anything using a foam or honeycomb core will be light weight, but not cheap.

Lew

I just did this using 3 hollow core bi-fold doors (for a rectangular table). Fairly light, fairly strong, fairly cheap. (each door was $5 at a local used building materials store - Construction Junction, in case you are in Pittsburgh). I screwed them together along the solid wood edging. This will obviously only work for a rectangular table.

Regards, Jeff

Chris,

Here's one for you that is light, super strong and won't sound hollow when you knock on it. A torsion box can be made using many different materials and methods. I've seen layers of heavy-duty, waxed cardboard used between sheets of ply and veneer to build a custom designed table presented in FWW a few years back to the idea below. I have made and still use, 4' x 8' light weight, temporary worktables using torsion box construction. Done right - they are very strong. So give this idea some consideration.

Use 1/4" or 1/2" ply glued to the dense, pink Owens-Corning "Foamular" insulating foam - or the blue stuff from 3M. It comes in 1/2", 1", 1-1/2" and 2" thicknesses. Use plain old wood glue to attach the ply to the foam and then edge it as you like.

The foam cuts very easy and having just insulated my basement with it I've used every tool I have I think to cut it - from a blade to my tablesaw. Actually great stuff to work with and it is used widely for other arts and crafts, modeling, stage props, etc. It can be painted, sanded and worked like Balsa. It's also relatively inexpensive. A 24" wide x 8' long sheet,

Bob S.