Bunk Beds, Day 5 - Part 2

26 June 2013

Bed is assembled (mostly) and in the bedroom. Mattresses are on the top and the bottom, mattress covers are on. Let's go onto how I got to where I finally am now.

Like I said earlier, plane, cut, assemble, done. Well, almost.

I did get the last three boards planed this morning. The only hitch there was that the three boards were still fairly wet, so the planing didn't do a whole lot.

Brought the head and foot boards into the bedroom after removing the box springs and moving the furniture out of the way.

Once this was done, I had to drill and attach the bottom outside spacers, lower long rails, middle spacers, upper long rails and then three of the tops. Next came the slat rails (these sit inside the long rails and hold up the slats that in turn hold up the mattress.

Next came the slats...

You may notice the wood mallet on the top bunk. This is what I used to "finesse" some of the top slats into place. It turned out that the top bunk is about 3/32 narrower than the bottom bunk and therefore needed slats that were just a hair shorter. This would normally be a fairly simple job. Throw the slats on the miter saw and have at...unfortunately, my daughter had gone to bed in the master bedroom. The master bedroom is about 15 feet away from the miter saw. This meant I went to the job with a tenon saw, shooting board and plane.

10:30 PM...

Mattresses are on the bed. Bookcase has been moved to the end of the bed. Storage is underneath the bottom bunk.

Tomorrow, I'm going to need to get up early. The guard rails for the top bunk need to be planed. The ladder rungs and guard rails need to be routed. The front needs to be drilled and screwed together. Then it's ready for Kenny and Jenne and the niece and nephew. I think the morning work is going to take about an hour.

After that's done, I just need to pack everything to be able to backpack with my three brother-in-laws and spend another night or two in Portland with the rest of the brother and sister-in-laws.

Next week's project is going to be fixing this mess:

The current bookcase situation in the home office is this sorry excuse. The replacement is going to be an oak bookcase with two or three main sections, about 6 to 6-1/2 feet long with movable shelving. I'll use red oak plywood for the case and shelves, then solid red oak for the trim and shelf fronts. Estimated time is another five days. I can't wait to get started!


I do want to send a huge thank-you to Matthias Wandel. His plans for a twin over twin bunk bed made this one possible for me to build. His website is pretty amazing. The things he does with wood are wonderful and ingenious.

Finally time for some rest. I'll make one more post on this project tomorrow after the front is up.