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Step 9Choose A Finish For the End Table/Magazine Holder
Any of a number of finishes can be used, depending on the look you want to achieve. Acrylic paints are an excellent choice. Using basic painting techniques, a faux-wood look can be achieved quite easily. Or, you might want to cover it with colored papers, cloth, oil based stain, etc. That choice is up to you!
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Your main problem, strength-wise, is that the corrugations cannot take a point-weight. Basically, they are the first point of contact for anything, and your top layer will collapse, despite (or because of) the number of layers beneath it.
A spread weight is better, but can still be affected where the 'top' meets its supports.
I have found that brown (wrapping/parcel) paper over a layer of wallpaper-paste (essentially creating Papier Mache) can add strength
You can significantly increase the point weight (and spread weight) strength with nothing but cardboard, kraft tape, and glue, but it is tedious.
Instead of using flat pieces of cardboard for the horizontal sections, cut the cardboard across the grain at the thickness you desire, then glue the individual pieces together end-up. Once done, use the kraft tape (or the parcel paper) to cover the entire piece - wrapping the tape parallel to the vertical pieces. Make sure it is nice and tight. Note that the tape (or paper) is critical to the integrity of the shelf, and it is important to have pieces of tape that wrap all the way around the shelf.
This provides incredible stiffness to the pieces by simply reconfiguring the grain in a more ideal direction. In order for an object to break the table it must be heavy enough to tear the tape by tension only, which is pretty difficult. You could probably break it by pounding on it with something, but less than that wouldn't likely cut the mustard. Basically, if you can tie one end of craft tape to the object and lift it, it won't deform the shelf. You'd probably be surprised what you can lift with that tape, and in most cases you'll have four or five pieces of tape resisting, not just one.
You can do this one better by placing another layer of cardboard on the top and bottom - again with the grain parallel to the vertical strips. This is more difficult to plan out but is a little less tedious to build and is even stronger than just the tape - and it looks better.
You could use really cheep 2mm ply wood or you might even be able to recycle some wood scraps from somewhere.
So in essence this is a fantastic instructable which I will attempt to make this weekend if LOML (aka SWMBO) lets me have some shed time by my self! LOL.
Keep up the great work.
Salu2