Fitted desk and bookshelves.

[pren]

Hi.

Just a quick one. No WiP's, I'm afraid.

I've just finished making and fitting this desk and bookshelves for my study/spare room.

The shelves are of a torsion box design, made from a top deck of 9mm MDF, a bottom deck of 6mm MDF separated by an 18mm x 50mm MDF frame. The shelf sides are screwed into the walls at 4 points.

I went with 9mm top deck because I though it would be more ridgid under the books. i think I could have gotten away with 6mm top and bottom. There's probably 20kg or so of books (and my wifes teddies :roll: ) on the lowest shelf and there's no sign of bowing at all.

I just need to run some caulk around the scribed frame and tis done.

One major cockup was that didn't leave enough room for A4 files. I changed the separation between the torsion box decks at the last minute. I had originally had the shelves spaced far enough apart to take files. Thes spacings, however, were marked on the shelf sides as centre lines for the torsion boxes. I made the shelves thicker but left the centre lines the same

Soooo, someone needs to make a small shelf unit to the right of this one to take the files. :roll: Ho-hum. :lol:

 

[cambournepete]

Looks good - I like the simple lines.
How did you construct the torsion box?
Did you rout any grooves for the cross pieces or just rely on glue?
How far apart are your cross pieces?
How did you attach the shelves to the self sides?

 

[pren]

Hi, glad you like it.

The torsion boxes were made in a similar way to a stud wall. The 'studs' were 50mm x 18mm MDF. There are three long strips (2 outers and one inner) running through the box with 2 short ones at either end connecting the three longer ones. The MDF decks were just glued and brad nailed on to the edges of these.

The shelves sit in 6mm deep rebates in the shelf sides. They are held in place with 3, 50mm screws in each end. The shelf sides are 1600mm apart.