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Free Loft Bed PlanAll the measurements in this Free Loft Bed Plan are taken from an existing bed that has lasted over 10 years and is still as strong and sturdy as the day it was made.
This loft bed was made and assembled in less time than it took us to prepare the step-by-step photos and detailed illustrations all with descriptions in this series of articles.
This is a plan for a wooden bed frame which is ideal for mounting in spaces where access may be limited - like lofts and basements and any bedroom which may have narrow entry doorways.
Once you understand the basic principles of this EASY free loft bed plan you will be able to adapt this plan to fit any mattress.
Here is an illustration of the overall look of this free loft bed plan showing how the pieces come together.
The sides form a nice 6cms lip above the bed boards to firmly hold the mattressess snugly in place.
The overall size of this full loft bed is 1.80m wide (5 ft 11 inches) and 1.84 meters (6ft and 1/2 inch) long.
You can changing the lengths of the header and footer and the sides of the frame to adapt this plan to fit any size of mattress that you want to use.
In this illustration you can see how the header and footer of the frame are constructed.
You can also see in the illustration how the legs were cut into - half way deep and down 10 cms - this gave a good base for the cross wood to sit on and enough to firmly screw the legs into position on the inside of the frame.
Our bed is quite low with fairly short legs - this also makes it more stable and ideal for this free loft bed plan - where cieling height may be an issue.
Our loft bed legs extend 22 cms (8 3/4 inches) below the frame. the overall height of this bed is 22cms + 16cms = 38cms + the additional height of the excess mattress which sits above the frame.
The center beam fits into supports at each end - top and bottom of the bed. It acts as mid-way support for the bed boards and also braces the whole of the bed frame for added stability, strength and durability.
As you can see in the illustration - the support is a really basic design which is screwed onto the inside of the header and footer parts of the frame.
We cut away a square of 4.5cms x 4.5 cms from the center of this piece of wood - just enough so that the beam (which is 4.5 wide) could sit well in position.
This illustration shows the measurements and assembly of the different components that make up the two sides of the base.
The Sides are made up of two pieces of pine measuring 1 meter 84 inches with a drop of 16 cms. You will see a batten placed 8cms down on the inside.
The batten - or long piece of wood we used on both inner sides was 1 meter 74 cms long with only a 3 1/2 cms drop and was 3 cms deep.
We placed the battens 5cms in from the end on both ends to give ample space for the hardware and give easy visibility when connecting the corners.
As you can see there is still 8cms of height above the batten - if you subtract the 2cms thickness of the bed boards that will leave you with a very reasonable 6cms lip to hold the mattress or mattresses in place.
Unlike the hardware on the top and bottom which were placed 5cm in from each end THIS time the hardware is placed so that the downwardly facing hooks sit flush with the edge of each piece of wood.
As the recieving end of the hardware protrudes slightly the base sides hook in to make a firm fit. (We did play around with the positioning of our hardware to get an exact fit and this is what worked for us!)
Free Loft Bed Plan - Center Support Beam
We started off with a good solid piece of lumber that was 1.84 meters long with a drop of 8 cms and 4.5 cms thick.
This important piece of the bed base is not at all visible when the bed is finished and made up - so we simply shaped the ends to match the cut we had made in the recieving support - so that both ends fit firmly in place.
Free Loft Bed Plan - Bed Boards
Here are the final measurements for this loft bed plan - we started off with 10 pieces of lumber which were all exactly 2cm thick and measuring 1.78 meters long and 16.5 meters wide.
We selected two pieces for the first and last board (i.e. top and bottom) these needed to be worked on to get an exactly smooth fit.
First we cut out a square notch in two corners of 2cms x 2 cms to allow space for the hardware. Next we roughly cut away a section just bigger than the size of the legs.
As you can see in the illustration - both of these cuts for the legs started 14cms in from the ends and were 4cms deep and 8cms long.
The remaining 8 boards which were laid equally spaced out did not require any adjustments - they just need to be all EXACTLY the same length.
If your finished bed starts to creak - this means that one of the bed boards is sitting slightly over the over and just needs to be moved back into position and secured.
We put one short nail or tack in at the end of each board to attach it to the batten - just to make sure that they don't move around over time.
Now you are all set to enjoy the results of your Free Loft Bed Plan
Photos Speak a Thousand Words
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Last Modified: February, 2006
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