Basement storage shelves
Back story
Our old house is really neat, but there is little to no storage. In fact, the whole basement is open, no walls or anything, and we just have plastic bins laying everywhere, somewhat piled up, not really organized, or anything. There’s no way I could leave it like this.
For this project, I used:
Tools
Materials
| Qty | Material |
|---|---|
| 1 | Plywood – 1/2″ – 4 x 8 (D Grade) |
| 9 | 2 x 4 – 8-foot |
How I went about it
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Create the frame
I started with 2 pieces of 2×4, full length and added a piece of 21″ on each end to create each shelf. I added another piece of 21-inch long 2×4 on the inside, right in the middle. This added both support and somewhere to screw in my plywood some more. With the thickness of the full-length 2×4’s I now have a full 24″ surface which I covered with plywood. I repeated this a second time for the top shelf.
Considering the height of my basement, as well as mine and that of my girlfriend, a 60-inch tall structure was the maximum I could have if I wanted to use the top of the shelves. This means my 4 legs are 60 inches tall.
-
Add shelves
I screwed bottom shelf first. I made sure to have 24″ of clearance which gave me the necessary space to slide some bins under. Considering I built it alone, I used some bins to rest the top shelf on one end while I screwed on the top into place on the other end. I then brought it all up and screwed the second end.
Key takeaway
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Gotta learn joinery
This type of structure is a nice, easy build and is a lot of fun to do, especially when you really need it. I’ve built two of these, and if I were to build another, I think I would consider using some kind of support to hold my 2×4’s into place. This being said, any sort of joinery would probably have helped, but I am still just starting out in woodworking so this is as good as it’s going to get right now. This being said, I am quite proud of it.
* A difficulty level of 6 / 10 is really just because I did the work alone. To be fair, this is probably more a 2 or 3 / 10, or less, if there’s any challenge at all. For my current level, I think this is a fair assessment.
