Low Bunk Bed - By Brian
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Essential Low Bunk Bed by Brian James
Essential Low Bunk Bed by Brian James
I adapted the plan to make a stand for our printer and shredder. Except for one board, I was able to use scraps so my total out of pocket was $9! I did plane the 2x material to 1 1/4”, and also used 2x material for the base to add a little strength to hold the shredder. Thank you Ana White, for generously sharing your plans!
I used Ana's Farmhouse Potting Bench plans and modified it to be more compact and left out the x detail. I built it for under $40 in material.
Modifications for Shopping and Cut List - Construction and placement is same as Ana's original plan, so make sure you look that over.
3 - 2x6x8
3 - 2x4x8
1 - 2x2x8
FOR 2 Legs
4 2x6 @15.5"
2 2x4 @34.5"
2 2x4 @54"
(cut the 34.5 and 54 out of 1 board and repeat)
2x2 Cross Supports
3 2x2@28"
2x4 Cross Supports
2 2x4@28"
Center Tabletop Support
1 [email protected]"
Bottom Slats
4 [email protected]"
Tabletop Boards
3 2x6@36"
Top Cap Board
1 2x4@37" leaving 1/2" overhangs
This was a Christmas gift for my husband, who has resurrected his old turntable. I wanted the stand to be the same height as the chest I had previously refinished to house our stereo and cds. I also wanted to have two shelves for vinyl, so I modified the Channing bookcase to fit.
Mon, 02/26/2018 - 20:53
My husband has been looking for a stand for his turn table and this one looks perfect! Do you mind my asking for the adjusted measurements? I’d love to see if we could make one for him, if you don’t mind sharing. It looks fantastic!
Sat, 12/01/2018 - 12:11
Apologies, I have not checked the site in almost a year. The height of the unit is 37,3/4' tall, the shelf widths are 14" inner width, and the spacing between shelves is 13" between the lower 2 shelves for vinyl, and 5" for the top shelf (for brushes or an occasional CD. Hope that helps.
These planters are exactly what we needed to warm up this blank siding! The smaller planters are made from pine, the larger from cedar.
I wanted my kids to have more space in their shared room, but I did not want to pay a ton of money for a new bunk bed. My husband and I found a plan for this bunk on Ana-White and fell in love with the design. It turned out so great that we will still be using it in our next home whether it's needed or not. We did change a couple of things on the plan that we didn't care for. The first is that we added a side rail for safety. Secondly we also traded the 1x6 boards on the head and foot boards for 1x4s on the top but kept the 1x6s on the bottom.
Mon, 01/09/2012 - 17:39
With pocket screws on the bottom and then one screw through the 1x4s into the post before the 2x4 on the top goes on. And then the 2x4 is screwed onto the 1x4 and post with trim screws.
Wed, 03/28/2012 - 13:02
Cost us about $300 and over an entire weekend of time spent on this project.
It's not for beginners. My husband has had many many years of experience in carpentry and woodmaking.
Good luck to you.
Also, he changed a few things in the plans we found in order to make it look better.
Thank you
Jillian
Wed, 03/28/2012 - 12:59
Cost us $300.00 to make and almost non-stop making it for the whole weekend. And then stained for hours.
This is with many years of experience in construction and woodmaking.
This is not a beginners project and then expect it to look amazing.
My husband changed these plans a bit to make it look better than the other ppls that we've seen on here.
But, good luck to you and make sure to have plenty of room and time.
Also, we had to make this bed in 10-15 different pieces and put together in the bedroom we wanted it in. There is absolutely no way it will fit otherwise.
Jillian
Sat, 10/25/2014 - 22:25
I don't see how you could put the fill/twin over a queen since the queen is longer. Obviously you could spin the queen around and make it an L-shape but then you are looking at a different build.
Sat, 10/25/2014 - 22:28
I really like the look of this ... I'm going to try to replicate!
What does the bottom of the guard-rail look like? Did you space out your slats a little more than the original design? I like the 2x4 topper instead of the 1x6.
Sat, 02/28/2015 - 16:46
We made this bed over the course of a week, both of us have extensive experience in woodworking and building. Ours is very wobbly on the long axis. We had a friend who is a structural engineer come in and take a look. He offered suggestions to shore it up and nothing really worked. The 3/4" overlap is not enough to secure the side rails, imo, and we used a variety of brackets to make it not wobble, to no avail.
This bed is coming apart in a few weeks and will be stored. If it is ever used again, it will be as two separate beds. I spent about $400 on this. My son never felt safe sleeping on the top bunk and has slept on the bottom exclusively.
Just my $0.02.
Made from the modified Mimi's Faux Mantle design from another brag post.
Tue, 12/19/2017 - 22:01
Are you able to tell me how wide this is from the end of one bookcase to the other? I'm trying to find out if it will fit in my living room. Thanks!
I just finished shelves on both sides of my garage using your video. I built a coat rack and boot rack. I also made space for tall items like tools and ladders near the garage door. I had to also build in a gun safe, freezer and my work bench. Everything came together and now I have everything in bins on shelves.
Gary Hoffman
storage for totes - can be made to accommodate any size totes - just adjust the measurements basically it is "ladders " 2x4s for legs 2x2s for "runs" 2x4s across the bottom & top this is in a basement with short ceilings so if you have a taller space you can go taller or you can go shorter.
I recently had a workshop built and I have been trying to now work on the furniture for it. My first project was this workbench inspired by the plans "garage workshop workbench". I added drawers on each side and will probably end up adding a shelf in the open area as well after letting my kids finish decorating the top. It's already a nice addition and I may build a smaller version for my garage. I added casters and have the option to roll the table around or have it stationary.
Tonie
After scouring the internet for a piece of furniture that could hide my shredder and act as a filing cabinet, I decided to look here, and lo and behold, Ana had posted this project the week before. It was literally an answer to prayers!
I had a lot of leftover plywood that I cut to size to build this project. The drawer slides were the most expensive part of this project. It was pretty tough and I made a lot of mistakes, but I am very happy with it. It was just what I was looking for. Installing the drawers was the hardest part of this project. I made the shredder compartment to fit my specific shredder, and it barely fits. I already had drawer pulls and paint.
Fri, 12/04/2020 - 21:27
It's a hard working piece and you did a great job! Thanks for sharing:)
We needed a big sturdy table for 8-12 persons for our big dinning room but didn't want to pay 3000$ for it. Then i found Ana-white's site and thought "why not!". It's my first project, i started whit the bench and then made the table. All buy myself, my husby doesn't even know how to use a saw. He help me carry it inside thought ;) The plans were realy easy to follow. Somebody stop me, i'm refurnishing my hole house, i can't stop! In 2 months i'v made 2 dinning tables, 2 patio tables, 1 coffe table, 5 benches. So if i can do it, you can too!
I made this Ice Chest Cart for my son’s schools silent auction. It features a spigot for drainage, bottle opener, hook for a bar towel and I also set it on castors so it can be easily moved.
This was my first attempt after finding the site. I was so happy with the ease of the plans and the way it turned out i made the dining table
5 1/2W x 5 1/2L x 8H.
Ana made this project very easy for me. I did the main building while hubby cut the wood & helped drill in hard to reach areas. Thank you Ana for boosting my confidence. I’ve never done anything trike this.
This was an easy project to complete in an afternoon that does not require any advance woodworking skills
Wed, 11/26/2014 - 12:19
This project looks even better than mine! I love look with paint! Well done!
Wed, 12/10/2014 - 09:41
This is my second completed project with plans and ideas from your website. Thanks for your good work!
This dollhouse was super easy to make! Harper (the doll) wanted an open concept living/kitchen, and that is the first floor. Second floor are the bedroom and bathroom. Top floor is the closet. The roof is made from 3.5" slats of luan glued together and painted with black sanded paint. Notice the baseboards and crown molding? The window boxes are really cute, too! I still owe my granddaughter a garage and patio with pergola, and kitchen appliances and chairs, but that will wait until summer when she can help craft/build them.
Harper's bed is modeled after the farmhouse bed plans available on this site, but I used smaller scrap lumber. I wanted milk paint but was unwilling to pay the high price, so I bought a sample jar of antique ivory paint and watered it down. It turned out great!
We built these bunks for our boys, ages 4+6. The plans were super simple to follow. The frame was built out of scrap 2x6's and 2x4's. We did have to make a modificatioon on the ladder- it came up just short for some reason, so we added a 2x4 to the bottom.
Sat, 03/14/2015 - 20:26
Great job on the beds! That room looks awesome. I love the color selection.
In reply to Great job on the beds! That by handmadewithash
Sat, 06/20/2015 - 08:56
Thank you!
My husband calculated the dimensions to extend the plans from a queen to a king size bed. It was our first project together and we're both really excited about how it turned out!
Wanted to make a loft bed for my 4-year-old son's room that could accommodate a toddler bed beneath it for when my 1-year-old daughter eventually starts sleeping on her own. I was torn between the Chelsea and Cabin bed plans, but eventually settled on the Chelsea because I liked the look of the headboard better.
I looked through all the brag posts to get modification ideas. I ended up mostly stealing ideas from "chadwickstafin", and like him took the great idea from "groovymom2000" to use chalkboard paint (though I only used it to paint the side of the desk end, since I knew the bookshelf end would be mostly blocked by a ladder). I decided to skip the decorative feet and just extend my 2x2s to the floor for extra strength, a mod that most people appear to be doing with this plan. I saw some people using 2x3s in place of 2x2s for added strength, but I can confirm that 2x2s are plenty strong enough on their own (2x2s are stronger than people give them credit for, and there's 8 of them here to distribute the load).
Like chadwickstafin, I cut my headboard a little differently, and I used short lengths of scrap 2x2s cut at 45-degrees to brace the top and bottom corners of both end units. There is no wiggle to the bed at all, it's stabilized so well. I also added a middle support to the short rail, just for a little extra safety, and secured the inside ends of the railings to the headboard/footer with pocket screws. I skipped the filler pieces for the railing, and just did a little extra sanding to make sure all exposed corners were smooth and splinter-free. I made the opening to the bed a bit wider than the plans, 15" instead of 13". I used 2x3s for the ladder, which gave me the sturdiness I wanted without the full bulk of using 2x4s, which looked especially chunky next to a loft unit made with mostly 1x boards. I played with some different angles, but eventually went with a 15-degree ladder. There were some leftover plastic handles sitting in my garage (originally from an outdoor playset ladder before I replaced it with a climbing wall), so I added those near the top of the ladder for some extra safety. I put some color-changing strip lighting under the bed, so there would be plenty of light for the desk and bookshelves (my little guy loves to just plop down on the ground beneath his bed and read).
I spaced the 1x3 slats about 3.5" apart (used scrap 2x4 blocks as spacers). Because my wife or I will lay in bed and read to our son at night, I easily added a couple 2x2 support rails under the 1x3 slats for extra mattress support. I'm a big dude at 6'3 and 250 lbs, and the slats alone WERE strong enough to hold me when I did a test, but they bowed just enough in the center (unnoticeable to me up on the mattress, but I had my wife watching the slats for me below) that I felt I should add a bit more support. Now there's no bowing at all.
I also used Ana's Top Bunk Organizer plans to give my son a little extra storage up top (and a place to set a glass of water during the night), and painted it to match the bed's color scheme. Everything was sanded, painted, sanded again, repainted, and then given a couple coats of polycrylic (the painting process took longer than the cutting & assembly!).
Cost-wise I was extraordinarily lucky. We have a Habitat For Humanity ReStore near us, so I was able to get my paints and a 3x6 sheet of MDF for $15 total. I also had some rebate cards from Menards (regional hardware store, similar to Lowes or Home Depot), plus happened to go there on a week when pine wood was on sale, so I got all my lumber for less than $60.
I could not be happier with the end results, and my son absolutely loves his new bed.