nathalie veilleux

Bookcase Plans - Build it Strong and Solid

Bookcases seems easy to make but to be sure you do it right, take a look at some bookcase plans to get the right idea and to see some designs. You will be glad you did.

Using bookcase plans to build a bookcase may not be something some people think they need. It appears to be an easy project without the fuss of having to get plans and follow instructions. But let me tell you I imagined that plans were only for complicated projects but I quickly found out that I was wrong. And besides I knew better.

My wife asked me to make her a book case for her office in the basement. I had some spare wood at home that I saved from a carpentry job so I decided to use it to build her bookcase. The wall behind her desk seemed to be perfect to fit the bookcase from wall to wall.

The boards I used looked a little thin but I figured that putting some pieces across in brick style fashion would be enough to provide support.

I putted two boards on each side of the wall for sides and planned on installing five shelves. I made little supports for the shelves on each side of the wall. When I screwed the boards on the walls the drywall got loose so I had to go the the hardware store to get some little plastic supporters for put the screws in.

Then I installed wood pieces across to support the shelves but since I ran out of wood I did not put a board on the floor to support the bottom. Anyway the whole thing looked fine and my wife was happy with the bookcase wall unit I made.

The next day she began to install all her books in it and yes she has a lot of them. I asked her to store all the heaviest ones on the bottom shelf first to concentrate the weight on the bottom, which she did. But as she was putting more and more books the boards that were screwed on the wall on each side began to come back towards the center on the top.

Once all the books were there, the book case shelves were visibly going towards the center bending down! Some of the screws on the top of the boards on each side even started to come out of the wall a little bit.
My boards were too thin to support all that weight and the bottom of the bookcase had no support at all. It was just being supported the two walls.

I finally realised that the whole thing having about ten feet long, there was no way the shelves were going to stay straight. The worse of all is that I have a lot of bookcase plans in my woodworking plans kit and I did not even looked at them. How silly of me. My wife made fun of me, her so called carpenter husband.

I can leave it there for a while but needless to say I will have to redo it all over again but next time I think I will look at my bookcase plans.

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