Bed Frame to Porch Swing for Dummies

Bed frame to porch swing

The intersection of "upcycling" and the website Pinterest.com seems to have been responsible for an awful lot of dumbassery in the world of (alleged) DIY freelancing. Someone saw a photo on Pinterest of, say, an old bed frame repurposed into a porch swing and thought, "How cute! I wanna do that!" Instead of finding the original of the photo, said person just googled "How to Make an Old Bed Frame Into a Porch Swing." An eHow.com scraper 'bot grabbed the search terms to create a "title"; and Kimberly Dyke thought to herself, "Gee: I can write that." Unfortunately she couldn't, as her HomeSteady.com post clearly proved.

The key to the upcycling job shown in the photo is that a woodworker recycles the headboard and footboard, but everything else is unrelated to the original frame. That includes arms and a seat that – instead of using the full-length bed rails – is only about as deep as a chair. Dyke clearly did not understand the question, and made things even worse by attempting to use instructions for hanging a daybed. What an idiot.

Here's what Dyke thought would constitute converting a bed frame to a porch swing:

1. Sand everything
2. Add slats made of 2-by-4s
3. Cut a piece of plywood to the "dimensions of your bed frame to form the support bottom [sic] of the swing."
4. Add two "lag eye bolts" to each corner of the frame
5. Suspend the frame, with chain, from four "lag eye bolts." Oh, well, at least she says to "tighten" the eye bolts into the "ceiling joists."
6. "Lay the mattress on the bed frame and cover with bedding and pillows."

Never mind that her construct would weigh well over a hundred pounds even if it's just a twin bed; never mind that the notion of putting a mattress and bedding on a porch swing is utterly ridiculous. In the final analysis, that's not a "porch swing," that's a bed. 

We haven't tried this, mind you, but based on the photo shown we suggest the following changes to Kimberly's plans:

1. Start with a twin bed frame with "colonial" posts.
2. Cut the legs from the headboard just below the rails
3. Cut supports from the rails to make the ends of a seat about 17 to 20 inches deep, and assemble a frame with corner braces and pocket screws. 
4. Add 1-by-3 or 1-by-4 boards to form the seat.
5. Add arms of 1-by lumber that rest on the footboard posts and attach to the headboard posts. You may also need to reshape the footboard to create a smooth front edge and a reasonable height for the arms (about 12 to 15 inches above the seat).

This will still be heavy, but it will actually be a porch swing instead of the bed hanging outdoors that anyone following the "plans" our Dumbass of the Day drew up would be creating. Sheesh: what a yutz!

DDIY - FURNITURE