Greencow_555

Hi folks, nice forum.

I am wondering if anyone could give me a little advice. I am looking to buy a small amount of hardwood to be a square frame around a king size matress.

I'm not rich or anything close, so cost is important, the look is not as it will be painted. I just need something that is very strong, and moderately priced. Can anyone recommend some woods that might suit my needs? I have never ordered wood before soI dontknow where to start,

Thanks in advance.
Gaz

housedocs

You can go with whatever kind of wood you want, even waterbed frames are usually just made of white pine, so it isn't essential to use a more expensive hardwood. HTH

__________________
All you need is ignorance and confidence and success is assured. - Mark Twain

Greencow_555

thanks for the reply. That eases things abit. My problem now is that I don't have enough knowledge about wood to decide what I want... Can anyone point me in the direction of somewhere I might find some info about wood cos google isn't helping me, or I am short on specific key words...

I look at lists of types of hardwoods but it may as well be foreign, I don't know what is harder, softer, cheaper or what?

Is there some nice standard relatively cheap wood that is just a common type?

Gaz

Gaz

MoJoe

Do a google search for "Types of Wood" and the top 3 results will give you good info. Fast growing trees (softwood) tend to be least expensive because you can harvest more board feet in a shorter amount of time.

wpd320

I've got a bed similiar to what you're describing, and I just used construction lumber. That is pretty much the cheapest type of lumber you are going to find at a lumber yard/big box place. It is the basic lumber used in construction, i.e. framing walls and roofs. I built a square base out of 2x10 boards and reinforced the middle area with a large 2x10 X member that runs across the square from each corner. Picture an X in a box. On top of this, I screwed 1/2" particle board for the main platform. So far so good; the bedframe is about 3 years old and has survived 3 moves.

747

Housedoc gave good advice WHITE PINE. That is what some nice looking fences are made out of.

karma_carpentry

Cheapest
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I built a couple beds for $30 in materials. I used ledger boards for the band (the perimeter of the bed) and a single 8' douglas fir 4x4 for the posts. Also a couple of 2x3's for the slat-ledger and then whatever you have available for the slats themselves.

Ledger boards are available in the box stores for maybe $8 = they are green wood - undried - and unplaned so they look furry. They're basically a green unplaned 1x8 pine board. But that's fine for me. It looks great and dried out on its own in a few months. But it's *not* good for painting. I suppose you could stain it if you wanted.

I countersunk and screwed the ledger board to the posts with some 2" decking screws. Then cut and fastened the 2x3's to the inside of the length-wise ledger board cross-beams, a couple of inches down from the top.

Then lay in enough slat material cut to the correct length on top of the 2x3's and voila - a bed for $30 or so.

(You could use 2x lumber for slats or 1x stock - whatever you have in scraps. Or you could buy some for it.)

I made one bed a little longer put a 6 inch wide board across the head for a little head-table for reading lamp, books, glass of water, whatever.


If you're dead-set on painting it, I guess you might want to buy poplar for the banding material. I'd want something 6/4 (six quarter, or 1 1/2 inches) though I know from the ledger boards that 1 inch nominal (3/4 actual when planed) works fine.

Poplar is cheap among hardwoods and it's a great wood for paint-grade work. Available at the box stores too. Buy it 8 inches wide minimum, as that's what you'll need structurally for the long members.

Hope that helps you get more into wood.

---- edit:

I realize I didn't mention how I did the posts. Simply cut it to whatever height you want the bed - I think I went with 18 inches. Then fasten the ledger boards to it with the post sunk down a couple inches from the tops of the ledger boards. This is so the post doesn't interfere with the box spring or matress - in other words it should be at the same height or lower than the slats.