Bottle Caps for a bartop?

Wow, now that is one of a kind. Great job!

a couple of additional thoughts on our pour...

They warn about the epoxy getting hot after it is mixed. This did not happen at all with the Bio Clear, and we had plenty of time (over 2 hours) to pour the bar. We actually used dixie cups to fill low spots since the epoxy doesn't flow real well over all the caps. It was nice and level and smooth by the time we were done.

Once the bar was poured, we spent over an hour popping bubbles with toothpicks. This worked really well. Just pour yourself a home brew, put on Dick's Picks #18 and start popping. If you want to avoid popping bubbles for an hour, I would recommend putting a couple of coats of polyurethane to cover the openings at the bottom of the caps. This would probably eliminate most of the bubbles.

The edge pieces of the bar weren't perfectly straight, so there were spots where the epoxy was perfectly level with the trim, but some other places there was up to 1/16" of trim above the top of the epoxy. I think if I were to do this again, I would use temporary edging, and remove it after the epoxy cured. you can then sand the edges and hit them with a coat of poly and it looks nice and clear and you can see the edges of the caps. I think that would be a nice touch.

Oh yeah, I forgot, it is 17 beer caps deep by 55 beer caps wide, minus 9 caps where the tap is going for a total of 926 caps (20" x 65"). I bought a gallon and a half of the Bio Clear epoxy and it cost $115.

Hey guys just saw this thread and thought I'd share my attempt at a coffee table. I actually built it before I saw this thread and used "Bar top epoxy" from Lowe's. It cost me $65.

I don't know if it would work with the epoxy you're using, but I saw a thread with a link to a bartop made out of old beer cases. Rather then using a tooth pick, he used a torch... I would definitely try it on a sample then risk your project, but sounds easier/less tedious then a toothpick. Bar tops look good guys!

I helped doing a small table a few years ago..project from hell !!..remember that as the chemical reaction takes plece,heat is generated..air under the caps expands and creates bubbles ..we found that a paint stripping gun would pop all the fine bubbles,but also speeded up the set time,,the slower it dries the better,but then dust becomes a problem..we ended up having to wet sand with 400,600,1200 and finially lacquer polishing compound...turned out ok,but what a job !!

To pop the bubbles on my table, I just blew on the still wet exopy. The air made a kind of "crater" and all the bubbles in the area poped. The exopy then self leveled so it wasn't much work at all.

years ago we built similar tables using corks instead of caps....for the bubbles we used a hair dryer that had a cold air setting. blew it across the table top and it worked just great. this was after wasting a few dollars on epoxy and materials to get the gist...hope it helps
btw great job guys looks outstanding also looking to do a similar top on the bar my son and i are building
anthony

just don't do what I did and start collecting bottle caps in a carboy.

Not to thread jack, my exgf wanted to do somthing like this but using diffrent malts for colors.

I got 400 caps so far for my table, some though have been damaged on oppening, guess i will need to do more work

salzar said:

Not to thread jack, my exgf wanted to do somthing like this but using diffrent malts for colors.

I got 400 caps so far for my table, some though have been damaged on oppening, guess i will need to do more work

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Get drinking! I hope she appreciates all of your HARD work...


Ex? That sucks... Have a homebrew!

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When my wife and I were dating, I made a table for her apartment. I used several hundred bottle caps (made a "star" design) then grouted between them. Turned out great. I didn't put anything over the caps (resin, plexiglas, etc...) because I liked the texture.

TexasBeer said:

When my wife and I were dating, I made a table for her apartment. I used several hundred bottle caps (made a "star" design) then grouted between them. Turned out great. I didn't put anything over the caps (resin, plexiglas, etc...) because I liked the texture.

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That's actually a really good idea, even if you want a clear shiny finish. You could tint the grout pretty easily to fill in the spaces between the caps and also keep them from floating up or releasing air bubbles into the epoxy of choice. You could do like a grey or black grout near the bottlecap surface and then epoxy and you wouldn't need near as much. They sell colored grout but you can do it yourself too using food coloring.