Master carpenter Dominik Huber from Sankt Roman in Austria has built a masterpiece of a sideboard on which wines can be presented and drunk. An invisible guide, which is supported by a gas pressure spring, allows the upper component to be moved. As this movement is not visible at first glance due to the integration, a surprising effect is created.

When the sliding section is in its end position, it is a comfortable height for a bar. As soon as the element is pushed to the side, the barman or sommelier can reach into the glass body with the wine bottles placed inside. There is a curved presentation surface in which three vertical glass swords illuminated from below with LEDs are inserted. This creates the impression of floating wine bottles. As Dominik Huber reports, this image was spoiled during the initial assembly: "Unfortunately, I was not yet familiar with the ACE shock absorbers when I started my work. For this reason, I initially installed a model from another European manufacturer. But I was dissatisfied with their performance."

The gas spring that was initially procured was intended to support the muscle power to allow the large upper element of the slide bar, which is made entirely of Ast oak veneered panels, to glide effortlessly along the heavy-duty rail, which was also installed invisibly. However, this effect did not turn out as desired. Dominik Huber was unable to find a solution to the problem from this gas spring manufacturer. Instead, he came across Hans-Jürgen Greindl, the head of ACE's Austrian representative.

When the sliding part of the Slide Bar is open, a height is created that invites you to linger with a glass of wine and also gives the sommelier the opportunity to reach the bottles in the glass body. © ACE

He recalls: "Mr. Huber was initially uncomfortable about not having one of our company's springs installed, especially as I had to point out a few technical sticking points to him. But you don't have to be a gas spring expert to be such a good joiner." After the consultation, it was clear that a gas spring with minimal static and dynamic friction was required, as the extension force could not exceed 20 to 30 Newtons. Although ACE's industrial gas springs are characterized, among other things, by the fact that they can be quickly integrated into existing designs, the two decided to work with this gas spring when optimizing the masterpiece due to time constraints.

In the course of this, they adapted them to the slide bar in the best possible way by draining most of the damping oil to minimize friction and end-position damping. Dominik Huber also improved the sliding movements by adding more mass and changing the guide. Hans-Jürgen Greindl took care of the fine-tuning on site at the master school in Hallstatt. A happy Dominik Huber reports on the result: "I am allowed to exhibit at the furniture gala in Hallstatt in January 2021 and will also be represented at this year's Lignorama masterpiece exhibition in Riedau. There, my masterpiece will be honored as one of the best twelve workpieces of the year. I also have Hans-Jürgen Greindl's brilliant service to thank for this."

In order to optimize the slide bar and bring it to series production readiness in the furniture scene, the plan is to replace the original gas spring with an optimized one from ACE. This will be a GS28 component with a stroke of 650 millimeters. The ready-to-install, maintenance-free, self-contained systems from ACE are durable and filled with a pressurized nitrogen gas. They are supplied individually with filling pressure according to customer requirements, whereby the extension force can also be subsequently adjusted via the valve. A wide range of attachments simplifies installation and makes the gas springs suitable for use in many different industrial fields. as