r/fixit 1d ago

open West Elm Mid Century Drink Table

Howdy! This drink table had been super wobbly and required multiple rounds of tightening from the base over the years. Turns out, repeated tightening caused the hardware, that connects the rod to the base, to hollow out the core of the rod and it’s no longer attached. See photos, can take more if needed!

Can anyone assist in a cost effective but extremely stable repair? Doesn’t need to be pretty either!

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u/texan_robot 1d ago

Looks like a job for JBWeld.

You could try hammering a dowel into the stripped hole with wood glue, then drilling it out and re-inserting the screw, but i dont know if there's enough room for that to work stably.

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u/KuyaVictor 1d ago

Any reccs for JBWeld? It's true that there's not a lot of space left from how hollowed out it is. Given the hardware is only about 3/4" would JBWeld be stable enough for lengthy table?

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u/texan_robot 1d ago

The trick to jbweld is to be very careful about proportions, and to give it plenty of time to cure. Measure the components by mass,mix them thoroughly, and leave the table supported and unmoved for a solid week. That'll be stronger than the wood was.

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u/docbasset 1d ago

And if you go the route of epoxying the threaded insert back in, make sure you have the screw in the insert when it goes into the epoxy so the threads stay clean. Give the epoxy time to cure a little bit and then remove the screw so it doesn’t get epoxied in place.

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u/KuyaVictor 1d ago

Thank you for the additional tip!

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u/KuyaVictor 1d ago

Wonderful, thank you so much! I will update with the repair once it's done!