How easy is it to make a wardrobe?

puddy

or difficult?

I want to put some hanging storage under the stairs. I dont want to box in all of the undestairs as there is a small window there which gives light to the utility room behind.

the area that I want to put a wardrobe in is about 1.6m tall by 70cm wide by about 60cm deep but part of that depth is taken up by about 10cm of electric meter and consumer unit which wil need its own little cupboard and door.

I have tried and failed to find a wardrobe that fits the space, so now think the best way forward is to build one ourselves.

It will need to have a first little cupboard with a door for the meter and stuff. then over the top of this I will put the wardrobe so that when we want to get to the meter, we open the wardrobe door, then push the coats aside then open the meter door.

Does this sound feasible and what do we need to know? What sort of wood do we need? It will be painted white gloss in the end.
on the right hand side as you look at it, it will be against the wall, the back will be against a wall, do we put little bits of wood on the walls to secure it?
Can we do it all just with saw or do we need some complicated equipment??

wallbash

An interesting 'first' time diy project.
Will probably get different ideas , but here is how I would approach it.

Source the wardrobe door , it will be the one thing you will see from the hall,
it needs to look good . Its Short . Would be better to find , rather than have to cut down. Then all your sizes are based on the door.

I'm a big fan of CLS ( its a planned , straight wood, with few knots and cheap)

Construct frame , keep joints really simple, half lap is fine,

do we put little bits of wood on the walls

Wood is cheap , would put one long piece , rather than a number of blocks.

Can we do it all just with saw or do

Basic tool kit would be a help.

Saw/ electric drill / spirit level /tape /pencil/hammer
rawpulgs/ screws would be the absolute minimum


I would turn up with workmate /electric saw ( and a boot full , just in case :rolleyes:)

Perhaps a diagram might help us?

WestonDave

The hardest part is going to be designing it - building it is basically a question of cutting the bits to size and screwing them together.

The simplest way forward is to get some conti board and some plastic corner screw blocks and use those to make your basic rectangle. Add some shelves in to break it up and also to add structural strength, and then put a hardboard back on with a section cut out for the meter to protrude through.

However as I said its all in the design - going for 70cm wide is going to leave you needing an odd width for doors (and the back but that will largely be hidden and you can cut it to size without leaving a visible edge). 60cm is a standard wood size as is 30cm so if you narrowed it a bit you could either have one 60cm wide door, or two 30cm wide doors. I'm sure it is possible to hand cut and then sort out the edges of a piece of wood to make it 70cm (more likely two 35cm pieces) but I wouldn't volunteer to try without a table saw as you inevitably will not cut it perfectly straight by hand. The other thing about going down to 60cm is that it gets you into range where you might be able to buy doors from DIY stores like B&Q or maybe IKEA (also worth looking at the kitchen doors - we have a boiler cupboard with a gloss white B&Q kitchen door on it!).

I would fix it to battens on the wall for stability.

ormus

i would try and locate a wardrobe (free or cheap) that could be modified to fit.
much easier if your carpentry skills are limited.

puddy

right, i have measured properly and found a door at 'doors sincerely'.

i can fit the doors for the 175cm high by 596 wide door, so this will need to be the size of my cabinet. the depth is actually about 70 altogether

we have a saw, electric drill, hammer, screws etc, but we dont have a workmate

puddy

sorry to be dim, what is CLS and what is Lap?

the battens, are these the bits of wood that i was talking about that fix onto the wall? you then put the flat bits for the roof and the side onto the battens?? i can see it in my head i think

ormus

a workmate is almost essential for any chippy work. they only cost about ten quid from the discount places.

good luck.

ormus

http://www.diyinfo.org/wiki/What_Are_Angle_Or_Cross_Timber_Joints

some basic woodworking info.

WestonDave

Yep sorry - battens = bits of wood on the wall.

wallbash

I'm a big fan of CLS ( its a planned , straight wood, with few knots and cheap)

Its the wood /timber Canadian Lumber ( I think ormus told me size)
but if you ask for stock same thing

puddy

ormus wrote: »

http://www.diyinfo.org/wiki/What_Are_Angle_Or_Cross_Timber_Joints

some basic woodworking info.

good god, i wasnt even thinking about anything as intricate as that.... my plan was to put a piece of wood on the wall, say for the roof bit, i would put a bit of wood screwed to the wall, then put the roof on by screwing the roof down from above into the bits of wood i had put on the wall?? is that a possibility as it would save us from having to learn how to cut joints out of wood? so the 'batten's would provide a support for the wood on the wall, then i would put 'battens' on each corner of the sheets of wood providing the walls and sides of the wardrobe to hold it all together, would this work??