Mini-loft Beds (updated 7-27-2010)

Dan Gonzales

Member
Messages
511
Location
Whittier, CA, USA
My girls are 5 and 6 years old and they share a room. We don't want them in a bunk bed and their toys and stuff get a scattered all over the house. So I came up with the idea of mini-loft twin beds. The mattresses are 3 feet off the floor and they will be able to put all their stuff underneath, or at least that's the plan.

They wanted painted furniture so I have built the frame out of kiln dried douglas fir (2x4's!) that I milled down to the dimensions I needed. The construction is a straight up panel frame with the panel milled out of MDF. Very low brow but it will work for the girls. In retrospect I think I should have gone with poplar instead of fir, I'll keep that in mind for next time.

All the framework laid out on the bench waiting for glue up. It's all been sanded and pre-fitted. I milled the edges of the panels with a router using a bowl bit.

mini-loft bed 1s.JPG mini-loft bed 2s.JPG mini-loft bed 3s.JPG

Glue up and clamping.

mini-loft bed 4s.JPG mini-loft bed 5s.JPG

Next I will build the ladders and rails. Then painting.

Cheers.
 
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Almost done. The rails and head/foot boards have been finished and painted. I built the safety rails and ladders, but I need to add another rail to ease the mind of SWMBO. The kids call her the Mominator. After that I will take the rails and braces off to finish in the shop. The beds are standard twins with the platform standing 40" off the floor.

Making square holes in the bed rails for the shop made "attachment system".

mini-loft bed 6s.JPG mini-loft bed 7s.JPG


Machining the hardware for the shop made "attachment system". I am using 3/8" square steel bar and 1/4"-20 knock down furniture screws.
mini-loft bed 8s.JPG mini-loft bed 9s.JPG mini-loft bed 10s.JPG


Inserting the square steel dowel into the rail.

mini-loft bed 11s.JPG


Bed rail connection.

mini-loft bed 12s.jpg


Overall mini-loft bed.

mini-loft bed 13s.jpg
 
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Very very cool Dan.:thumb::thumb::thumb: Oh i wish i was a young un again when i see that. Not wanting to add to the wish list ;)before you done Dan, but my son when he was that age he had a little bookshelf under those legs that came up about half height. Maybe two rows of books high. Top of the bookshelf served to be a Shelf space to put some nik naks or maybe favorite doll or could even be used to play house and serve as a table top if Dad made it fold down to the rear of the bookshelf.;) It will also serve to give that leg out in the middle of no where some protection and tie it back to the wall. Just some thoughts.

Great idea and man what a great idea for he assembly screws to use a square hole. Now i am asking myself why i did not do that when making my workbench.:D
 
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