Mother's $10-per-square-foot Earth Sheltered House: Part V
(Page 2 of 3)
January/February 1985
By the Mother Earth News editors
A close look at the unit reveals its multipurpose, space-saving nature. In addition to providing two 34" X 76" sleeping areas, it also furnishes a pair of bookcases at the upper bunk, another pair at the lower bunk, and a set of bulletin boards between. And that's not all: At one end (or at both ends, if the room is large enough) an 18-1/2" X 37-1/2" bookcase door folds down to become a convenient study desk.
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James McGinnis (who did most of the actual assembly) started by building the corner uprights. To gain these 11"-wide stanchions, he merely butt-glued pairs of 5-1/2" X 76" boards together. The bunks' side rails are sandwiched between those uprights and oak inserts set both at the ends of the bookshelves and at the bottom legs. The rails rest on block spacers glued between the boards, these supports being notched to accept the ends of those long horizontal planks. Two 1-1/2" X 2" X 76" ledges fastened to the inside lower edges of each pair of rails with glue and No. 10 X 2-1/2" wood screws support 3/4" X 34-1/2" X 76-1/2" plywood mattress foundations. (To make it easier to assemble the unit, the upper side rails are 4" shorter than the 92-1/2" lower spans.)
James chose to use dovetail joints to keep the junctions of the shelves and uprights uncomplicated but structurally sound. The uppermost and lowest shelf joints are blind to the bed face, while the two center shelf connections are blind to the desk. Actually, making the dovetails isn't as complicated as it may sound, since the router table—fitted with the proper cutter and a fence—forms the tenon pan, while the mortises are similarly cut with a hand router and a dado blade.
Straight mortise and tenon joints can be used with equal success where strength isn't a major consideration. As examples, the top of each bookcase utilizes such a joint in a blind configuration, whereas the face-molding corner ones, including those of the cover panels and the fold-down desk frame, feature an open design.
The cover panels, by the way, typify our straightforward approach. The inside edges of the 3/4" X 1-3/4" frames are merely grooved with a dado blade, and inexpensive 1/4" lauan plywood inserts fit into the slots. Rather than cover the exposed sheets with fine wood, we simply used wallpaper paste to secure natural burlap to the faces. The panels are nailed to the bookshelf, and the countersunk heads are hidden with filler. To allow the desk surface to open, concealed cabinet hinges join the frame's lower rail to the top of the panel beneath it, and two chains hold it at the proper level. A magnetic latch keeps the top shut when it's not in use.
