Thread: Basic box strength

Gday Rick, welcome aboard!

Mate, the questions you are asking are a bit on the general side, you may have to define your plans a bit better and ask more specific questions. But anyway, here goes.

The difference between butting sides to ends or vice versa is nothing really for your project. Routing a trench (or rebate or rabbet) to house the joining member will help make a stronger joint, one more resistant to twisting forces. As you've said, screwing & gluing is the go.

As to crossmembers or lipping, you need to look at how the bed will sit on the base, does it need to be supported across it, how thick is the timber for the sides & ends, etc. Get clues for this from the existing base. May also be worth looking in a furniture shop, bed retailer, or whatever to suss out (=investigate) how manufacturers have made their designs strong enough. Check out bed plans on the net maybe.

Have a crack at adding pictures (under 100K) or drawings/plans to your next post to follow up or clarify specific points.

Good luck......stay involved .......cheers..............Sean, bed sore

Thanks for the reply scooter;

It was a general question I suppose. But that is what it boiled down to. I guess I was wondering if a butt joint on a box made the assembly stronger if the longer sides are butted over the shorter ends.

For my project, it really didn't matter. I realized that making bed box springs in that manner would make the whole assembly very heavy. To heavy in fact. Also, using the original design I calculated it would have taken me 5-6 2 hour nights to construct it. And the materials would cost me about $100 bucks for the cheap stuff.

I revised my plans two nights ago and went with a much lighter and cheaper design for the queen split box spring assembly. I went out that night and purchased the wood, cheaper but still $75.

Basically a it ended up being two boxes each 30"x80" for a whole assembly of 60"x80". Each side of both boxes were made up of two 1x3 runners enclosing (above and below) 4 - 2x6x6 blocks. At the top and bottom of each box I ran 2 (above and below) - 1x3x30 crossmembers to square each box. Then I ran 15 1x2x30 cross members across the top of the boxes. I finished both boxes in about 5 hours last night.

The boxes ended up being very light but very strong. Each box squared up great and put side by side the whole assembly ended up being 60"x80". When I measured the assembled frame in which the box springs and mattress will set, it measured 60 1/4" wide; I didn't measure the length considering the frame was open ended.

Maybe someone can answer me this: I measured the frame to be 60 1/4" wide, I built each box 30" wide and side by side they do in fact measure 60".

But when I placed the boxes in the frame it was a very VERY tight fit in which I had to slightly 'convince' the assembly to set in the frame. And it still measures 60" wide.

As a new hobbist, I have no idea what's going on. I've seen similar things in other projects (I.e a workbench and router table, both of which the tops fit down around for a 'press' fit that seemed to tight once it was complete.)

-Rick

Things I have learned from this project.

In making the 30 crossmembers I didn't want to measure each one individually to 30". So I measured one cut it, used it to measure the second, dropped the first, cut the second, used the second to measure the third and so on and so forth.

I found when trying to nail the cross members that most of them needed to be recut because they were about 1/8 - 3/16 too long.

Lesson learned, to take a shortcut like this either:

1. Cut the first one about 1/16 too short and use that one through out to measure.
2. Check your cuts every 5 pieces or so and re-measure a master piece.

-Rick

Originally Posted by scooter

The difference between butting sides to ends or vice versa is nothing really for your project. Routing a trench (or rebate or rabbet) to house the joining member will help make a stronger joint, one more resistant to twisting forces. As you've said, screwing & gluing is the go.

When making a bed, the joins always fail not from the gluing, but from all the screwing.

Lesson learned, to take a shortcut like this either:

1. Cut the first one about 1/16 too short and use that one through out to measure.
2. Check your cuts every 5 pieces or so and re-measure a master piece.

Rick, there's no need to cut the first one short. Cut it to length, use it to measure throughout, use a sharp pencil and always cut right up to the "correct" side of the pencil mark. They should all come out the same.

That's if you really don't want to measure each one.

Rick, good to hear you got it made, thanks for coming back to us & letting us know how you ended up going about it.

Lignum -

Cheers..............Sean

Originally Posted by CarpeNoctem

Maybe someone can answer me this: I measured the frame to be 60 1/4" wide, I built each box 30" wide and side by side they do in fact measure 60".

But when I placed the boxes in the frame it was a very VERY tight fit in which I had to slightly 'convince' the assembly to set in the frame. And it still measures 60" wide.

As a new hobbist, I have no idea what's going on. I've seen similar things in other projects (I.e a workbench and router table, both of which the tops fit down around for a 'press' fit that seemed to tight once it was complete.)

Rick..

When you measured the frame, did you measure the in-side dimension or the out-side dimension? If you just layed a tape measure across the fram you probaly added the thickness of the two side rails. Also if you did the inside of it did you measure it at the top of the rail or the bottom where the box will sit. Uasly cheap angle iron like used in beds frames is thicker at the bottom than at the top. Angle iron Drawn out to the shape, not milled, will have a round bottom too. this will not alow your box to sit in it all the way making it tight.

And as far as you other prodjects being off. take a good look at your tape measure. Notice that the end moves about 32ed, some time a 16th back and forth. This is for carpenters. When you hook a tape over the end of a bord and measure out 6" you really get 6" + that 23ed, In this case you "CUT THE LINE" ( meaning you cut with you saw over the line, Not cut on the waste side of the line ). This way you get a 6" board. So if you hold your tape to the inside of a prodject and pull your tape to the other side, remember your adding the 32ed or 16th. I allways " Burn an Inch " I hold the tape to where
the one inch mark is at the place I want to start and them measure, and -1 inch. Just little tricks you lear with time.

Originally Posted by junkboy999

Rick..

When you measured the frame, did you measure the in-side dimension or the out-side dimension? If you just layed a tape measure across the fram you probaly added the thickness of the two side rails. Also if you did the inside of it did you measure it at the top of the rail or the bottom where the box will sit. Uasly cheap angle iron like used in beds frames is thicker at the bottom than at the top. Angle iron Drawn out to the shape, not milled, will have a round bottom too. this will not alow your box to sit in it all the way making it tight.

I measured the outside of the box spring and inside of the frame.

Maybe the thicker angle iron is the issue here.

Originally Posted by junkboy999

And as far as you other prodjects being off. take a good look at your tape measure. Notice that the end moves about 32ed, some time a 16th back and forth. This is for carpenters. When you hook a tape over the end of a bord and measure out 6" you really get 6" + that 23ed, In this case you "CUT THE LINE" ( meaning you cut with you saw over the line, Not cut on the waste side of the line ). This way you get a 6" board. So if you hold your tape to the inside of a prodject and pull your tape to the other side, remember your adding the 32ed or 16th. I allways " Burn an Inch " I hold the tape to where
the one inch mark is at the place I want to start and them measure, and -1 inch. Just little tricks you lear with time.

I bet this is a lot of the problem. However, I always measure with the same measuring device; so given that the two measurements are in fact equal.(regardless of accuracy of the device)

thanks for the 'cut the line' tip.

-Rick