Whew! Twenty days since the last update and the TV Lift Case is finished and it is in our living room. Well, return with me now to twenty days ago…

After getting all the fabrication done and dry fitting everything I took it all apart again and began sanding. And sanding, and sanding. There are a lot of pieces, and it took about three days total to get everything sanded through three grits 120,220, and 320. I set up a work table so I could sit down while I was sanding. I can tell you my hands and forearms were sore after holding a running palm sander for three days.

Next came applying the finish. This time around I decided to do WATCO Danish Oil with a WATCO Wipe on Polyurethane top coat. I didn’t immediate know which shade of their Walnut Danish Oil I wanted to do so I made a couple of sample pieces with the full finish.

I tested the Medium Walnut (Left) and Dark Walnut (Right) and both me and my beautiful and talented wife liked the Dark Walnut. It seemed warmer and since I was trying to come close to a similar finish on furniture we already had in the living room it also matched better.

Then it was on to a couple of days of applying the finish. One challenging thing was finding space in the part of my basement shop that is warm enough this time of year. I managed to cram everything into the heated space to make sure that the finish would cure properly.

Then I went off to New York for New York City Winter Jazz Fest, three days of wonderful music, great performances, and just hanging out in New York. It also gave the Danish Oil time to completely cure before I started on the three coats of wipe on poly which took a couple of long days. With four hours between coats I caught up on house work and stuff in between.

Finally I assembled the doors and glued them up, a bit tricky because of the way I made the frames for the acrylic, instead of just framing them and installing them from the back the acrylic is actually in a groove inside the frame permanently. Not the way you’re supposed to do it but it’s how I did it. There was some juggling to get all the panels and mullions in place, but I managed to do it.

And then… some electrical work. All along I had wanted to have some kind of safety switch to prevent the lift from going down when the swing arm was extended. With some advice and moral support from my brother the electrical engineer I was able to come up with a circuit that used a micro-switch to disable the lift motor unless the swing arm was completely closed and pressing in the switch. It works great, the only addition after initial testing was a strong magnet on the swing arm bracket to hold the swing arm closed when it is folded up. Turns out the weight of the TV causes it to drift open without it.

I was able to get the same connectors that the manufacturer used to connect the motor to it’s power supply and controller. This meant that I could patch in without cutting any of their wiring. I got some small project boxes to house the micro-switch and the connector for the motor. I found a good place on the frame to bolt the case on so that the switch trigger would contact the swing arm only when it was completely closed.

Then it was finally installation day. With the help of my beautiful (and strong) and talented wife and a dolly and some rope and some ramps to get out the front door, we were able to move the old TV Cabinet out of it’s place. Before hand I had to extract all the cable and streaming and dvd gadgets and their cables. I also had to finally get rid of all of our old VCR tapes that were in the drawer and hadn’t been touched in decades ( yay de-cluttering! )

We also brought all the parts of the new case upstairs and staged them. I reassembled it in the living room and installed the lift, a power strip, cable box, roku box, dvd player, optical to analog audio adapter, and of course the TV. I put felt on the bottom front edge of the TV because it does droop on the swing arm a little and contact the top of the case, the felt lets it just glide across. Here’s a video of it installed and in operation.

Finally, I installed the inside LED spot lighting and put some of our nice artifacts that we’ve collected inside. I think it looks nice with the TV deployed and without.

I’m very happy with how it came out and how it functions. Next up is moving on to the matching side table that is part two of this build.