Japanese style cherry platform bed

[Anna S]

I just joined, and had a lot of fun building this last fall.  It’s a Japanese style cherry platform bed, inspired by some pictures I found on pinterest.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/popdan/6954242139/in/pool-make/

I really like the joint, especially because it comes apart- no glue involved…

 

There’s a model of the joint (MDF and scrap) below…

I started with the legs and had to route out grooves in the center of each side, progressively advancing the depth of the router bit.  The last piece- basically the center of the tic-tac-toe board I chiseled/drilled out.  Then I squared up the holes with the mortiser.

The rails where curly cherry and just needed slots cut into them so they’d together like the little pieces of cardboard that separate the bottles of beer in a 6-pack.  I did that with a handheld router and a jig that kept it straight and only let me advance it so far.  I square the slots of with chisels.

The rails the fit into the legs and a kept adjusting the depth of the grooves on the rails so they ended up sitting just below the prongs of the rails.

Then I cut the corners off the ends of the rails to make it look less boxy.

I added and inner rail on each of the main bed rails to hold the slats- just screwed in place, probably way more screws than necessary.  I wasn’t excited about cutting slats, so I just used an ikea bed slat base. 

http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/categories/departments/bedroom/24827/

The inner rail holds this base in place.

I also made 2 false legs to support the frame in the middle. 

The whole thing was sanded down to 800 grit, and then finished with a single coat of Odies Oxy Oil.  http://www.odiesoil.com  

This stuff was great.  I put gloves on, and then rubbed in in by hand.  It’s the consistency of honey, and goes on smooth.  It darkened the cherry a little and really made the grain shine.  Since it’s an oil/wax combo there are no drips or fingerprints to worry about.  I probably put it on a little too thick initially, which meant I wasted a lot in whipping it off with a rag after 45min- an hour.  After another day or so, I buffed it again and it looked great.  That beats the heck out of sanding out drips and starting over when I’ve used poly based finishes before.  The project before this had at least 7-8 coats of finish before I was happy, and this looked great with one. 

So far, I haven’t decided on a headboard, but if I find the prefect piece of figured cherry that’s long enough, I’ll probably go with that. 

 

Fanciest dog bed ever… 

[Coop]

Really cool project Anna and some pretty fine woodworking skills. The ONLY thing I question are the rails extending out past the legs as far as they do. Have you had any problem with bumping your shins on these? 

[wtnhighlander]

I like the design! How well is that joint holding up under regular use? Racking of the rail to leg joints is always an issue on a bed frame.

[Chet]

The cherry looks like it had some real nice grain to it.  Very interesting design but I no with my skill id be wacking my shin all the time.

[Coop]

And a dog with an iPhone that matches the sheets? 

[Isaac]

1 hour ago, K Cooper said:

Really cool project Anna and some pretty fine woodworking skills. The ONLY thing I question are the rails extending out past the legs as far as they do. Have you had any problem with bumping your shins on these? 

Was about to ask the same question. Great work!

I actually built a crude, 9 legged version of this sort of bed when I was in college out of construction lumber, worked quite well, but wasn't classy like yours. Still, these jigsaw puzzles are always fun.

[Anna S]

4 hours ago, K Cooper said:

Really cool project Anna and some pretty fine woodworking skills. The ONLY thing I question are the rails extending out past the legs as far as they do. Have you had any problem with bumping your shins on these? 

ran into it one time which was painful, but I learn fast, no problem since.  You can also make them much shorter.  There's no structural reason they need to stick out, I just liked it.

 

4 hours ago, wtnhighlander said:

I like the design! How well is that joint holding up under regular use? Racking of the rail to leg joints is always an issue on a bed frame.

The joint is rock solid because it's about 4 inches deep.    I was expecting some movement, and nothing moves.   The entire rails are actually resting on the flat bottom of the grove I cut out on the router so it's really stable.  There's no hardware that holds the rails to the legs.  When I was setting it up, I did run into problems with the rails bowing out  and allowing the slats to fall through the middle.  I was going to fix that with some pegs that would secure the rail to the slats, and I'm still planning to.  Once I put the mattress on it though, it's a foam mattress and it basically secured the slats from moving in any direction.  Hasn't been a problem since.

 

3 hours ago, Isaac Gaetz said:

Was about to ask the same question. Great work!

I actually built a crude, 9 legged version of this sort of bed when I was in college out of construction lumber, worked quite well, but wasn't classy like yours. Still, these jigsaw puzzles are always fun.

Agreed, I like the when the wood just fits together.  Since these didn't get glued together like a mortise/tenon, it was also a lot more forgiving putting it together.

3 hours ago, K Cooper said:

And a dog with an iPhone that matches the sheets? 

Still haven't been able to teach him to use it though