It's taken me about 7 months, one heart attack, torn leg ligaments, not to mention a bl@%dy sore backside 
, but finally.... finally my bed project's completed.
No pics as yet, so a description will have to suffice for now...
The spec was to build a queen sized double bed, designing around an absence of box springs, and allowing for future instalation of under bed storage. A ton of thought and engineering went into making slats that behave like parabolic springs in order to provide both comfort and physical strength. Both the head and foot boards are infilled with five elm raised panels in an oak frame, oak legs, braces and rails.
Part of the challenge was designing the bed without the use of hardware to connect the rails to the head and foot board; the end result being some very large through M&T joints, secured with vertical rosewood wedges through the through tenons.
Last part of the job was completed last night prior to a scheduled inspection by the end recipients this afternoon. As this was the first opportunity to load test the slats I set at it somewhat gingerly, sitting on one end of a slat and bouncing on it, finally causing its brace to fail (blown sliding dovetail housing causing a glue joint failure) at approximately 5x it's designed load bearing capacity. The failed housing was replaced and the slat reassembled just prior to the arrival of the recipients.
Although this wasn't the first time they'd seen the project, it was the first time that the entire thing has been fully assembled; their reaction made the bruised backside seem almost worthwhile (although I gotta find a better way to load test stuff in future).
All that remains to be done is shoot some pics for the portfolio, and ship it out to them, hopefully doing both this coming weekend.
I learned a ton of new (to me at least) techniques during the build, gradually phasing out use of the wood munchers as my range of hand planes increased; my 6" jointer wasn't used at all during the build, the thicknesser was last used to mill the rails to just over final size. All the other stock preparation and finish smoothing was done with hand planes. Excluding rail and stile construction, this was the first time I'd tried M&T joints of any kind, ending up with multiple examples of blind, through and through tusk tenons, their construction achieved by a combination of jig guided router and hand tools of various descriptions.
For the record... an 18" backside first decent at 1G, landing on the upturned corner of a narrow load bearing brace brings tears t yer eyes.. trust me....
Nusre... the Linament Please....????
, but finally.... finally my bed project's completed. No pics as yet, so a description will have to suffice for now...
The spec was to build a queen sized double bed, designing around an absence of box springs, and allowing for future instalation of under bed storage. A ton of thought and engineering went into making slats that behave like parabolic springs in order to provide both comfort and physical strength. Both the head and foot boards are infilled with five elm raised panels in an oak frame, oak legs, braces and rails.
Part of the challenge was designing the bed without the use of hardware to connect the rails to the head and foot board; the end result being some very large through M&T joints, secured with vertical rosewood wedges through the through tenons.
Last part of the job was completed last night prior to a scheduled inspection by the end recipients this afternoon. As this was the first opportunity to load test the slats I set at it somewhat gingerly, sitting on one end of a slat and bouncing on it, finally causing its brace to fail (blown sliding dovetail housing causing a glue joint failure) at approximately 5x it's designed load bearing capacity. The failed housing was replaced and the slat reassembled just prior to the arrival of the recipients.
Although this wasn't the first time they'd seen the project, it was the first time that the entire thing has been fully assembled; their reaction made the bruised backside seem almost worthwhile (although I gotta find a better way to load test stuff in future).
All that remains to be done is shoot some pics for the portfolio, and ship it out to them, hopefully doing both this coming weekend.
I learned a ton of new (to me at least) techniques during the build, gradually phasing out use of the wood munchers as my range of hand planes increased; my 6" jointer wasn't used at all during the build, the thicknesser was last used to mill the rails to just over final size. All the other stock preparation and finish smoothing was done with hand planes. Excluding rail and stile construction, this was the first time I'd tried M&T joints of any kind, ending up with multiple examples of blind, through and through tusk tenons, their construction achieved by a combination of jig guided router and hand tools of various descriptions.
For the record... an 18" backside first decent at 1G, landing on the upturned corner of a narrow load bearing brace brings tears t yer eyes.. trust me....
Nusre... the Linament Please....????
