My Ikea desks are beginning to lose the plastic coating where my arms rest when typing turning them from comfortable to razor like torture device. I could just replace them both but…

… we have 4 spare large pieces of toughened glass that I thought I could repurpose into a desk.

The existing desk space is 3m x 0.75m
The glass sheets a 1m x 1.28m

I was thinking that I might use 3 of the glass pieces to replace the existing desk and have an L shape desk. It would basically be as-is but with the L bit against the far wall.

So far, so good. Now what do I do about legs. I was thinking something nice in wood as you will see them through the table top. Apparently it is not advised to nail the glass to the legs so do they just rest on rubber grommet? They are damn heavy.

Any suggestions welcome as I am just at planning stage now.

My first thought was something like this around the back to support the weight evenly and hide the wall and wires behind. It could have some artful holes carved through to add interest and let the cables trough where required.

Now how to support the front or what other options?

Glass is a horrible surface to work on.

It really is. you’s also need quite the structure to keep those glass sheets from sagging and getting out of plane with each other.

Flip it round… nic wood top floating on a glass surround?

WCA DIY project – Check
Lots of glass – Check

Bookmarking for near inevitable serious injury and gruesome photos.

I’d avoid a glass top. You will spend more time wiping smears and fingerprints off the glass than working, its also noisy and a hard edge to rest you arms or elbows on.

Glass is horrible, noisy and harsh.

Stick a bit of hazard tape over the damage to your existing desk. Job done.

Sounds like that plan is cancelled then.

Thanks for the input though. Saved wasting time and effort.

Any ideas what to do with the glass panels?

DIY skylight?

Any ideas what to do with the glass panels?

DIY Garden Pavilion ideas?

Just store the glass for when you inevitably put the end of a ladder through one of the panels?

The panel are amazingly strong. The reason we have spares is because when they were originally being delivered they weren’t correctly secured so as the guy on the back of the truck loosened the strap half a dozen dropped 8 feet off the back on the truck onto a concrete kerb stone. Just a couple were shipped. They let me keep the four unchipped ones rather than taking them back.

I was originally planning a new shed but MrsWCA is not keen on another shed.

Any ideas what to do with the glass panels?

Houdini

So how hard is it to join planks to make a useable desk?

What wood would you recommend?

How thick a plank should I use?

I sanded down some disused scaffold boards and fit them together with a pocket hole jig back when IKEA tops were out of stock. Ended up pretty happy with the result, on top of an IKEA standing desk leg. Someone on her has done a much prettier job than mine

Don’t listen to the naysayers, go for it! Needs some steam powered rotary threshing machinery though and you should probably build it on the roof.

rsl – that’s not a bad idea, I have the adjustable Ikea legs on the desk at the moment. I might pop down the wood recycling yard tomorrow.

You could just mend the edging on the current desk.

What is it, like a melamine/Formica sort of thing?

You can buy rolls of edging and stick it on with contact adhesive for best strength, otherwise self adhesive stuff.
Maybe a different colour would look edgy and cool.

The hardest part might be chipping off the old stuff.

Or just use real wood, iron on stuff maybe, though it’s not so durable if you’re scraping your arm over it on a regular.

Other idea could be get some birch ply (though it’s frikkin expensive currently) and cut it to overhang the existing desk enough to glue on another narrow strip all round to keep it in position and make it look well sick.

I’ve got a funky gaming desk which effectively has a ginormous mouse mat as the top surface.

I wonder if you could get hold of neoprene and make Something similar although I suppose finishing off the edges would be tricky.

1m is pretty deep for a desk. You could get three sets of IKEA Alex drawer units and sit a couple of panels on them with some little rubber feet as standoffs (assuming the panels are super heavy they won’t move).

You can get quite a nice desk with the Alex drawer/ cupboard units and a big piece of worktop. We have a comfortable space for two of us with 4 legs, one drawer unit in the middle and a 2.4m x 600mm white worktop. Complete with monitor/ laptop stands it’s got loads of space to work.

You could build yourself a glass fetid sex pond with those spare panels.

get a sheet of 19mm oak veneered mdf

Other idea could be get some birch ply (though it’s frikkin expensive currently)

All wood is (although Birch was expensive to start with). Producer on my next job phoned to reassure me that in the light of current supply issues they’ve upped their budget by 25% – I had to tell them our timber supplier had dropped by earlier in the day to say stocks have actually quadrupled in price.

I swear I bought the cheapest dirtiest 2x4s in b&q 6 months ago for 2.50 now they’re 7.50

So how hard is it to join planks to make a useable desk?

What wood would you recommend?

How thick a plank should I use?

Stop overthinking, just buy a 3m * 1m kitchen worktop – job done.

Kayak = I was thinking of cladding the existing desks in some way but they are standard Ikea corrugated cardboard with the white plastic coating, similar to what you are suggesting.

It is for a change and a project as much as anything, replacement Ikea desks would probably be the cheapest option.

Glass was only considered because I have 4 sheets of it to get rid of

You could use the glass if you built a box around the underside, that would support it no bother. You could then put all your computer innards inside the box, add some lighting and you have a fancy PC case desk. Water cool it for extra danger points.