Product: TNT Babelle, DIY CD storage tower
Manufacturer: not for sale, TNT DIY design
Approx. cost: 35 US$-Euro
Author: Stefano Monteferri

Babelle tower finished

Foreword

Time passes, the number of our CDs rises, and ye olde and trusty Babele (only one "L": here the Italian article) is just not enough. So we end up with storing our CDs spread around the house, not always in the most appropriate places...

So what now? A phone call to ask the local carpenter to make a new (and costly) piece of furniture, made to measure to fit that strange angle (provided we have one) where we could not place any of our "good" furniture and that, most probably, we'll never be able to move from there (so the price rises, and the funds for CDs shorten...)?

Not at all! Let's arm ourselves with glue and good will, about 35 Euros (that's what I spent, wood cutting included) and, with tape measure in hand, ride to the nearest (and cheapest) wood/DIY center, determined to build the new cd storage tower proposed by TNT Audio - the Babelle (two Ls :-)! (French pronounciation, please)

How to select the tables

The stuff

I personally wanted (and succeeded in!) spending as little as possible, so I went to a well-known store and bought two planks (2.5-cm thick pine), each 4-m long (the standard dimension in that store) and about 30-cm wide.

I had the first plank cut along its length, thus obtaining two planks, the first measuring 400x17 cm, and the second measuring 400x13 cm.

The 400x17 cm. one was then split into two 200x17 cm. planks (green coloured in the plan).They will be the sides of our Babelle.

Now, split exactly in two the 400x30 cm. plank, thus obtaining two 200x30 cm. planks. One of them will be the rear wall of our tower (yellow coloured in the plan).

Cut the other 400x13 plank into as many 30x13 (or whathever the width of the plank you'll use as the back) pieces you can obtain (with a 13 cm width, you should obtain 13 of them). Those pieces will be the tower's shelves (orange coloured in the plan).

Finally, from the 200x30 cm plank you will get both the top (blue coloured in the plan) and the base (red coloured in the plan), thus finishing your work. As an example, a 37x20 table for the top and a 40x25 cm. one for the base should be more than enough.

One step of the work

How to proceed

Place on the floor (or on a table) the rear 200x30 wall, pencil on guidelines and glue on the shelves using ordinary white wood glue, leaving an space between them of about 12,7 - 12,8 cm. The picture on the left should be explanatory.

Let everything dry, then glue both the side walls and, when everything is dried up, glue the top and the base, and that's all!

The finished tower should look like the CD storage tower "Babelle" you can see in the picture at the start of this article. If not, maybe you screwed up your measurements... :-)

Of course, once finished the Babelle, you can "treat" the wood to give it your favourite color (I personally used just one layer of mahogany penetrating paint, applied with a cloth).

If you followed the suggested measurements, you should now count on a total storage capacity of 390 CDs. If you didn't, the storage capacity will be given by the following formula: width (in cm.) times shelves number - for instance, 26 (cm. - width) x 12 (shelves) = 312 (CDs).

It's easy, isn't it? As well as easy (and cheap) you'll have the satisfaction of having made your own Tower of Babelle...

Ciao!

© Copyright 2000 Stefano Monteferri - http://www.tnt-audio.com

Translation: Carlo Iaccarino
Supervision: Geoff Husband