A Loft Bed for the Dummy Carpenter

loft bed

One of the hallmarks of the eHow.com brand was the editorial staff's insistence that every last piece of lumber must be identified by a noun, and – for some unknown reason – whoever was in charge didn't care for the word "board." That's why almost any carpentry or woodworking directions at the site (and now at HomeSteady.com, Hunker.com, or OurPastimes.com) are peppered with beams, planks, and posts. Calling a 2-by-4 a 2-by-4 wasn't enough, it had to be a "2-by-4 beam." Never mind that beams tend to be beefier... That was not, however, the sole problem of carpentry plans at the site, as is amply illustrated by Beverlee Brick and her Hunker.com article, "How to Build a Queen-Size Loft Bed."

Brick's been here before a couple of times, including another attempt to build a bed frame. This time out, she managed to allow for the dimension of lumber in her "plans," although you'll have to find the original at eHow¹ to find her cutting list, which was omitted when the content was ported to Hunker [it's back now]. As usual, she cited her father-in-law, a "furniture hobbyist," as a reference.

Beverlee's unfamiliarity with her subject is manifest in the 700 or so words she pounded out, which included 22 repetitions of "plank" and 15 of "beam," although not one use of "board." We submit that a woodworker or carpenter would not:

• ...include such amorphous instructions as, "Sand one face of the plywood. You can sand the rest of the lumber if you like..."
• Drill holes in two boards before they're assembled instead of clamping them and drilling the hole through both at one time.
• Tell her readers to "Connect the beams with two screws at each joint, screwing through the side of the longer beam into the end of the shorter beam" without mentioning pilot holes.
• Confuse perpendicular and parallel: "Lay the plywood sheets on top of the rectangle so they cover the frame entirely. The long sides of the sheets should run perpendicular to the long sides of the frame."
• Tell her readers to "Set one post in one corner of the frame, on the side with the beams exposed," which is at best ambiguous and at worst makes no sense. 

Although there's more of the same kid of crap throughout, a competent (and patient) carpenter could probably manage to build the advertised queen-size loft bed frame. It would, however, have problems:

• According to Brick, a loft bed "can free up almost 35 square feet of floor space." This plan, however, won't; since the frame has 1-by-12s across all four sides, leaving an "entrance" 49 inches or so high with a tripping hazard. Perhaps some cross-braces on the ends would have been more... efficient? Or at least leave the front side open (see image above).
• Why on earth would you need 6-by-6 corner posts? 
• Papa-in-law is a "furniture hobbyist," but nowhere is any mention made of furniture-grade lumber (or finishing). That's gonna look like... crap.

Like we said, competent carpenters could probably build a frame from the plans our Dumbass of the Day pounded out... but would they want to? Probably not.

¹ Use the Wayback machine at archive.org; the original URL was ehow.com/how_6159217_build-queen-size-loft-bed.html

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