CD Storage, some Dummy Plans

CD tower

In the old days, back before people just bought music in digital form and stored it on the cloud, bits and pieces of plastic littered the world. We're talking about compact discs (which you may remember, we called "CDs") and their protective jewel cases. Heck, some on our staff are old enough to remember 12-inch LP records, even 45s! But we digress. Storage of CDs has always been easy to come by and fairly inexpensive, but that didn't stop Suite's Dianne Christensen-Hermance from insulting the carpenters of the world with the "instructions" she published in "How to Build a CD Tower."¹ If her name rings a bell, perhaps it's because Dianne's been here before with another set of mangled carpentry instructions. 

Careful reading of the instructions suggests that Dianne wants you to make a box about six feet tall for storage. The idea (we think) is to store the CDs in their jewel cases, lying flat, with the label sides out. So far, so good. Both the instructions for constructing this edifice and its overall design are, however, "deficient." 

Hermance's parts list is funky to begin with:

• A: 2 sides 73½" x 5¼" (1-inch stock)
• B: 2 ends 5" x 5"
• C: Top and bottom 8" x 8"
• D: Base 11" x 11"
• E: Back (¼-inch "particleboard"') 72½" x 5¾"

Right away our staff carpenter wondered why the top and bottom are only five inches wide, while the back is 5¾" wide. Turns out that Dianne wants her readers to  "Cut an 3/8-inch wide by 1/4-inch deep rabbet joints along both sides of pieces of the first two pieces you cut.or the A pieces The rabbet joints will help the particleboard backing to fit flush against the rest of the tower." Ummm: first, why "both sides"? Second, you don't cut a "rabbet joint," you cut a rabbet. Third, perhaps you need to research what "flush" means, Dianne! But there is, of course, more. The instructions tell you to glue the hardboard (which she calls "particleboard") into the rabbets to form the "main tower." After the glue dries, you are supposed to "Squeeze out a thin line of wood glue along the three sides or [sic] pieces B of the upper and lower pieces of main tower and push it into place."

Where? On the top? OK, if we think about it for a while, we get it... After all that's dry and you've "installed" (her word, not ours) some finishing nails, you stick on the top and bottom and the base. Once you're done, Dianne says...

"Install CD holder strips if desired. Plastic CD holder strips can be purchased from a home improvement retailer. Pull off the paper adhesive backing and secure the strips on the inside of the tower."

OK, fine. Dianne's poor instructions notwithstanding, there's a serious problem with this design. Did you catch it? we did: a CD jewel case is 5" wide, so your CDs would never fit in Christensen-Hermance's "tower" if you install those handy CD strips (which, by the way, are hard as heck to find and cost almost as much as a free-standing CD rack). Even worse, if you didn't include the CD strips, all the CDs you placed in your new rack would form a single stack. Heaven help you if you want the bottom one...

For crappy instructions and even crappier design, the Antisocial Network is pleased to award Dianne Christensen-Hermance our coveted Dumbass of the Day. We just hope she doesn't try to build a trophy case for it...

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