To adapt the existing drawing table to be the base of the vacuum table, I had to drill a hole:

Then I attached a flange (lots of caulk) to the bottom side of the board. A length of old vacuum-cleaner hose I had got threaded into the flange:

After a few coats of polyurethane on the working surface of the vacuum table, and the creation of a slightly-raised bar to hold the clamp hinges:

All that was left was to assemble the table. I want to be able to take this thing apart for maintenance if I need to, so I opted not to glue the working surface to the base. Instead, I used a nice bead of caulk to seal it pretty well, and screwed it together.

The finished table below, with the shop vac hooked up. I tested this thing by clamping it together before I screwed it together, and it really worked pretty well. It exerted even more of a grip on the paper than I thought it would. Now the test will be doing some test pulls from the screen – I do have some concerns that the squeegee will pick up the texture of the drilled holes and impress them into the paper. Only one way to find out…

Total time: probably about 6 hours. Total cost: $0. (I built this with scraps and miscellaneous parts I had on-hand.)

Before final assembly, my daughter and I had a lot of fun reversing the airflow and playing “air hockey” with a jar lid.

Now the frame has been clamped to the working surface.

And I drilled the 609 holes on a 1″ grid to cover the size of a 22.5″ x 30″ sheet of paper.

Some of the holes were a bit rough on the inside of the working surface, so I opened them up by hand with a scribe.

This new piece is hanging at Davidson Contemporary this month, in a really nice spot that has a sort of framed view from the entrance. We’re still trying to work out exactly when my exhibit will be next year. Sam’s two most recent suggestions were March and July. Any date we choose, I still have to get the work done before April, when the baby comes.

02081107
acrylic on canvas
36″ x 36″