Today's project

Does it come apart? I assembled the reception desk I made for a Pilates studio onsite. It was the first time it was all together. Very suspenseful!
 
I have a pic of the inside too.
It is indeed laminate, Formica brand in this particular case. The lighter gray (Fog) is smooth and matte finish. The darker gray has a tiny grid texture to it, kind of feels like a window screen when you rub it.
The raw places at the ends are covered by matching file cabinets, when installed, and an access panel covers the center after the wiring is completed on-site. It attaches to a wall at the open end.
This one is fairly small as far as what I usually build and has good access to the building where it will end up, so it is fully assembled, except for the cabinets. This doesn't happen often, they are usually bigger, L shaped or U shaped, so most of them have to be built to be disassembled.
As far as the building of such a thing, it's mostly about layers and order of operations. Normally, with something like this the counter top would ship separately, so there would have to be clearance for that where the vertical drop comes down to it. Then the top would be shimmed up to meet it. That tiny gap is then under the overhang of the top, rather than on top where you could see it. It is easier to build that way, but since this has so little overhang, it I didn't.
It's all glued with contact cement and flush-trimmed. Back to the layers/order thing again, it's all about getting that right or you make it hard on yourself later. Years and  building hundreds of these things helps.
I have tons of pics, if you are interested. I just have transfer them to this computer.
The unit immediately it is more typical. It is already disassembled because of the door size at the job-site. It isn't much different in size, but still wouldn't fit.
The one way back, is a quarter round with flat wings going out from it. That one is 4 pieces in the wall itself. The lower counter top is laminate too, it is right in front of it on saw horses, still raw. Then it gets a Corian upper top, both tops are in 2 pieces also
 

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Great work! I struggle like crazy trying to get the incredibly crisp edges on laminate. I also get a little scrape from a router bit now and then. I wish I had those laminating skills!
 
Thank you Jason888.
It has as much to do with the tools as the technique. I always use an oversized bearing to cut about an 1/8" overhang first. That takes a lot of the load away from the final-pass flush-trimming cut. Then use a beveled bit, either a "no file" bit, one of the "euro" style bits with the square bearing, or even a router that has a follower bearing that is separate from the bit. This will keep you from skinning the laminate on the adjacent face.
Whenever possible in places where the faces are at an angle greater than 90 degrees I will miter the laminate or the panels themselves to keep from having a bigger dark line.
If you see my other post, titled "another reception desk", you can see this. The substrate is not mitered, but the laminate itself is. There is no line at all with this, but it takes a bit of practice to stick it properly. It can really only be done with smaller sections. I pre-laminate larger parts and miter the substrate too. Then the DF500 comes into it aligning them.
 
Thank you for the advice! Everything you wrote made complete sense, I could quickly pick up a couple things I've been doing wrong. You explained it in the most simple terms possible. Damn, I want to laminate something now!
 
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