Building a Night Stand For My Daughter And I Have A Few Questions

[Javier D]

Thanks for taking the time to read this and possibly offer some advice. I am in the design stage for a night stand I am going to build for my 6 year old daughter. This is going to be my first furniture project and I have a few questions.

I will be adding a single drawer to the stand that uses wood runners for the drawer support. Will this work? What other options should I consider?

Based on the attached drawings can anyone see something that I am missing?

This is the first version so pocket screw placement has not been indicated and all dimensions have not been finalized. Wood will probably be 3/4 inch Birch plywood. All pieces will be glued as well as pocket screwed together. Finish will be light maple/amber with a gloss coating to match her dresser.

Any and all suggestions and comments are appreciated. 

[John Schaben]

Wood runners worked for several hundred years, don't know why they wouldn't work for you now. Wood on wood does have a tendency to wear though. I built a tool stand where I inlayed a strip of UHMW and bullnosed the bottoms of the drawer sides to use for drawer support. Even less expensive and just as effective would be to inlay strips of HPL (formica) for the drawer to slide on. I have also seen grooves put in the drawer supports and filled with dowels providing a rolling drawer support. Lots of ways to do this.

Good Luck.

[David Dean]

Well Javier I use wooden drawer slides on all my work and I also replace a lote metal one's and put wooden one's in there place.

[George Adair]

Hi Javier: I built a drawer cabinet using wood sliders and while I found it easier to put together the drawers very quickly became a bit of a pain. I used various methods to prevent the slides from wearing out and sticking without success. I don't know about others but I would recomend using a set of full extension drawer slides. I was thinking to that with any children they will probably at sometime try to lean on the drawer with it extended. a good sturdy drawer slider will support her full weight. The other thing I have done recently was to rabbit out the side of the dawer to allow the slider to sit partially inside the drawer side. Made for a nice tight fit drawer. Good luck on your project, I am sure your daughter will be very happy.

[Javier D]

Everyone, thank you very much for the feedback and input.

George, for some reason I never considered the idea of my daughter leaning on the drawer. Thanks for mentioning it. As I think more about it I can see my middle son leaning on it and breaking it as well. I think that would be stronger then the rabbit as well. It will also solve the problem of the drawer being pulled all the way out. 

She does not know I plan to make it for her. I had planned to put it in her room while she was in school. She will love it.

After the night stand I plan to tackle dressers for my two sons. They are rather...rambunctious so it may be a challenge. Maybe I will weld them dressers.

[Jens Jensen]

wood slides are great but I always use a paste wax an drawer and slide so there is less friction.

Start  building

[Jens Jensen]

If your daughter leans on dresser even full extensions will not allow it not to tip over unless you bolt it to floor

Javier D said:

Everyone, thank you very much for the feedback and input.

George, for some reason I never considered the idea of my daughter leaning on the drawer. Thanks for mentioning it. As I think more about it I can see my middle son leaning on it and breaking it as well. I think that would be stronger then the rabbit as well. It will also solve the problem of the drawer being pulled all the way out. 

She does not know I plan to make it for her. I had planned to put it in her room while she was in school. She will love it.

After the night stand I plan to tackle dressers for my two sons. They are rather...rambunctious so it may be a challenge. Maybe I will weld them dressers.

[David Dean]

50 drasser's later and my customs are still happy the trick is to make the draws a 1/16 smaller overall.

George Adair said:

Hi Javier: I built a drawer cabinet using wood sliders and while I found it easier to put together the drawers very quickly became a bit of a pain. I used various methods to prevent the slides from wearing out and sticking without success. I don't know about others but I would recomend using a set of full extension drawer slides. I was thinking to that with any children they will probably at sometime try to lean on the drawer with it extended. a good sturdy drawer slider will support her full weight. The other thing I have done recently was to rabbit out the side of the dawer to allow the slider to sit partially inside the drawer side. Made for a nice tight fit drawer. Good luck on your project, I am sure your daughter will be very happy.

[Ken Darga]

I made my HD workbench, that has 8 drawers---2 rows wide (over 4 ft) and 4 drawers high, ( each about 5'' deep)---all made of hardwood (drawer sides and drawer support frames.

  The drawer sides are 1/2'' thick and the runners/drawer guides are 3/4'' thick material.

I've lubed the drawer sides bottom edges and the frame slide surfaces, exposed to wear, using candle wax or parafin wax.

The drawers get lots of use---sliding action---opening and closing.

The bottom most drawers, store some heavy tools, metal parts, pipe fittings, and pipe wrenches.

The drawers are still in great shape, for being in use for nearly 40 years.

Pine/fir is a softer wood and will wear more rapidly, with the surfaces exposed to the rubbing action---

therefore, hardwood (maple or oak) is be better.

  For wood frames, make the drawers 1/8'' narrower than the frame opening---allowing 1/16'' clearance on each side.  This minimizes side-to-side play.  The drawers and frames need to be ''square''.

  Most metal drawer tracks and guides, on today's market, would not hold-up to HD use.

Metal tracks are okay for light to medium duty use, and for storing light loads---even though the manufacturer states they're load capacity is 100lb per slide set.

The rating is based on an evenly distributed ''static loading''.

  Roller guide type metal tracks move more freely---less friction with a rolling motion vs a sliding and rubbing action.

  Full-extension drawer slides are much more money, and not worth it over a 3/4 extension, for many simple projects.

  For a simple night stand---that won't have the drawer loaded with rocks---keep it simple and use wood slides or some inexpensive slides, such as ''Blum''---they offer some good slides, starting at around $5.

Blum slides---

http://www.rockler.com/product.cfm?page=1507

 

 Classic wood center mount drawer slides are very nice for night stand drawers.

These can be purchased in approx 24" lengths and cut-down---

OR, make your own, using a 14 degree dovetail bit in a router table.  (make from maple or oak).

  

[James L. Barrentine]

A little bee;s wax on the slides and they will work great, the only other thing I see You could add would be a cleat to stop the drawer from falling out.

[Javier D]

WOW! Thanks for the additional information. Now I am tossed between the wood slides or the hardware slides. The cleat was something I had noticed I should add and I was definitely going to attach it to a stud to keep it from falling over.

I will definitely post pictures of the piece once I get started in it. Right now my work space is being taken up be stuff from the garage. My wife has told me I will be drywalling the walls and ceiling in May. 

Javier