The missus gave me an ultimatum since we had books crawling all over the living room because my room’s bookcases are all full. I checked prices online for real book cases made out of wood and not particle board and I almost had a heart attack when they were asking +$200 as starting price.
Six feet tall, six 3-foot by 12″ long shelves and I reckon I can get creative and put more books on top. On average, every shelf is capable of taking on 32 paperbacks, so if I shove real hard, I can manage to squeeze 200 books in there. But it is sized vertically to take the average hardcover with an inch to spare on top.
Tools I already had so it was just wood and screws for a total of just under $90. OK, add $10, I just remembered I bought stain too to match the “decor.” (Nope, the $90 includes the stain, I just checked the list)
And the best part? The missus approves!
PS:
Just to show the bookcase under load. This is the first one I made years ago doing service in my room right now.
Bottom shelf has two boxes of lead ingots on the left and shotgun shells on the right. The shelf above is just bullets on the left and mostly primer everywhere else. Above that is books and assorted little stuff I can’t find a palce to put.
Nice, are those 1×12’s? I’m getting ready to build some myself, was debating between 10″ or 12″ shelves
The verticals are 1x10s and the shelves are 1x12s. I like the look and the extra space it gives.
I routed a dado to support the shelves but still secured them with screws for more structural integrity. Zero glue which means they can be dismantled and reassembled as needed if we ever move.
The bottom piece is just a 1×4 covering the raised bottom in case of a pipe burst or anything and we have water on the floor..
2 words:
Milk Crates. 🙂
One word: Married
Yeah… a few months back, I looked at bookcase prices. Anything at a halfway sane price, the load rating per shelf was laughable, and the picture showed it being used as a knickknack shelf – put actual books on it, and it would collapse.
I’m thinking of buying a bunch of industrial-style shelving (steel frame, thick particle-board shelves) to put in the (dry) basement so I can unpack my library from the moving boxes. A modest selection of books, at any given time, could inhabit a presentable-looking bookcase in the living space.
(Going in-person shopping for usable lumber to build bookcases is not currently an option, owing to the family situation.)
Particle board is a structural disaster. I have some industrial shelving like you describe; the only reason it holds anything is that the strength comes from angle iron that serves as the edges of the shelves.
Nice piece of work, Miguel. Do you have a table saw or mitre saw to do the dado work? All I have is a handheld circular saw, that seems problematic. I badly need a boatload of shelves for my radio room — books, magazines, parts, some ammo if I can find more…
Buy yourself a set of feet for that thing. If you put it on a hard surface it will save you from what the misses says to you if you scratch up her floor. And it will let you move it if need be. Plus it means that there are fewer contact points so less likely to wobble.
I’ve made some shelves kind of like that. Painted white and using beadboard as a backer they’ve held up pretty well.
Without a backer you risk the entire thing collapsing if it’s fully loaded and you bump it sideways just right.
Yes, this.
If needed, the wall will be the backer. A couple of well place “L” brackets secured against the studs will be more than enough to withstand a bump (tackle in this case).
It looks like the Ammo shelves at my local gun store.
Now that you mention it, this is the first bookcase I made that way. Bullets on top, lead ingots on the bottom left and, of course, ammo!
Right handy there, good on ya!
Ever the readers dilemma
I was gonna advise cross-bracing, but seein as how well the original is standing under load, no need.
I’ve probably been in the Land Of Shaking Ground and Fake People too long….
Ammo and books, I approve !
I took a different tack: chrome wire rack shelving from the restaurant supply house. My shelves happen to be 14″X60″ but depths from 14″ to 24″ and lengths from 24″ to 72″ are available, and corner post choices are 63″, 72″ and 86″ (I went with 86″). Shelf spacing is adjustable in 1″ increments, and, yes, you do have to add something solid on the shelf to support small books – I chose 13.5″ X 58″ strips of 1/4″ luan underlayment because it’s cheap and easy to cut (if you’re putting “something other than books” on the lower shelves, the wire shelves themselves are entirely adequate). I spaced 3 shelves apart at 12″, the rest are 10″ (haven’t counted the number of books it holds, but it’s a LOT). The wire spacing allows insertion of two 1X4s vertically at each end of the shelves, through the end spaces of all the shelves top-to-bottom to keep books from falling off the ends, hold it in place with a few wood screws and washers through the “truss design” at each end of the shelf, I did screws at bottom, middle and top and it works fine. If books don’t fill the entire shelf length (1X4s-to-1X4s) you’ll need bookends of some sort. (Pro Tip: unless you have 16 ft ceilings, insert the 1X4s before you stand it up…..) Not cheap – 4 posts and 8 chrome shelves was $240 (shorter shelves are cheaper), but rated load capacity is 600 lbs per shelf, and once assembled it’s a damn rigid structure that’s still easy for 2 people to move. I cut a pair of 17″ lengths of 2X4 and used a Forstner bit to put 1.5″ X 1/2″ deep “leg holes” in the 2X4s to make “support feet” to prevent the 1″ diameter posts from digging into the carpet.
Assembly is a PITA, best achieved with a second set of hands, but once the first two bottom shelves are in place it gets pretty easy for just one pair of hands.
If you’re inventive, you can use 6 posts to support double sets of shelves, or 8 posts to support triple sets of shelves, just stagger the spacing and the “end shelf units” can be any length shelf (it does make them really hard to move though if you ever want to move them). Or, put 2 complete shelving units together and Akro-Mills steel flat “S” hooks are available at Amazon (or from companies that make the wire rack shelving) to hang shelves between the shelves on the 4-post units.
I like those wire rack shelves, I have a couple too. Surplus from the office in my case; buying them would definitely hurt. There are actually dozens of choices in commercial shelving. Wire racks are one of them, and pricier than many others. A scan through an industrial supply catalog will show you lots of options, some light duty ones, some strong enough to hold your collection of V8 engine blocks or spare ammo for your howitzer.
Nice looking shelves! Excellent anti tip choice on the base with lead ingots and shotshells lol
I may end up adding a couple of lead ingots to the new one just in case. 😀
I’d second the backer. I used 1/8″ birch plywood on the last one I built. It also had angle aluminum on the sides of the shelves.
I should post a pick. The wife has it piled heavy with books and it’s still straight as an arrow.