Need some wood help on making my homemade platform

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  • 97mustang82
    Speed Bag Trainee
    • Aug 2007
    • 21

    Need some wood help on making my homemade platform

    First of I would like to day that I have never worked on wood before, I'm more of a auto mechanical person. Some of these questions may sound basic in the wood world, but I'm very new to this. Also, I apologize for the long post.

    So I went to home depot yesterday and got a long single piece 2x4 foot of birch plywood cut in half to make two 24" pieces of wood at 3/4" thick each. I'm going to glue the wood together to make a 1.5" thick board. I'm not going to cut it round, if anything I'm going to make it an octagon which wouldn't be as hard to do as I'll only have to cut straight lines. I bought a cheap sand block to sand down the rebound side of the wood and sanded it down just a tad and got it real smooth. The set up is going to be held by a pair of cheap everlast platform brackets from their $50 kit. I bought the everlast platform used for $10 on craigslist. AThe brackets are going on a 30x27 plywood which I will the nail onto 2 wood posts in my garage. Now here are some I have so you know what I'm working with following some questions...









    It's just a mock up and it's not glued or nailed yet.






    Heres a pic I took sideways to see what it would probably look like.





    QUESTIONS
    1. What type of glue should I use? I bought the cheapest wood glue they had, Elmers carpenter glue (in pics). Should I just keep this and use it or return it and get some other type glue?

    2. Nails. The guy at the store said it would be good to nail the 2 boards together along with the glue to be safe. Is this nessecary? I figure just nail the outside together.

    3. Extra wood. Should I get one more piece of plywood to make my board even more thicker, 2.25"? I know I'm going to use sand on the top anyways, so will this even benifit me, or would it just be for a thicker look.

    4. Placement. How whould I place the brackets to the wood? Should I go by the holes in the everlast platform. Place the platform on the plywood and use a pencil to make a mare through the holes, or should place them wider since I can do that with a square board.

    5. Finish. What type of finish should I use? I bought this polyurethane spray can (in pics). Is this good enough? This setup will be in my garage so I want the wood to be real strong to the elements. It's a crappy old outdoor garage which has bugs and creepy crawlers. In the winter it gets real cold and rainy in the spring. Also the platform and brackets will be nailed to a piece of 30x27 plywood I bought that will then be nailed in front of the garage window which only has a screen open to the outside.
    Last edited by 97mustang82; 09-03-2007, 12:03 AM.
  • Jonzel
    Speed Bag Trainee
    • May 2007
    • 19

    #2
    IN MY OPINION you should:

    -use screws to hold the two boards together as nails will not pull the wood together tightly, but make sure your screws aren't too big so that they don't come out the other end.

    - your glue is fine but cover the ENTIRE surface of BOTH pieces of wood and use several screws to hold the wood together and let it dry over night. If you don't have a drill and don't want to buy one, then I would glue it and then lay it flat on a flat hard surface and pile as much weight as you can on top of it to "clamp" the two pieces together and let it dry overnight with the weights on top and don't worry about using nails.

    -I'm assuming that your attaching your platform to a piece of plywood because your studs are too far apart to attach it to them. I recommend that you attach ur platform to 2x4's rather than to plywood, so you should attach two vertical 2x4's to your horizontal studs and attach the platform to the two vertical 2x4's.

    -I dont recommend that you use nails for anything on this project, they'll probably vibrate right out, but then again screws may break, but I recommend screws.

    -As for how far apart your brackets are, they look good in the picture. Use screws.

    -I've never used spray on polyurethane, but I would just spray the entire wood surface after you glue it.

    -you may even want to widen the holes in the bracket where you will be attaching the platform to the wall and use lag bolts (lag bolt are basically really thick screws)

    -Chris M will probably have some good advice for you.

    -good luck

    Comment

    • Speedbag
      Author of the Speed Bag Bible, founder of speedbagcentral.com

      • Feb 2006
      • 7109

      #3
      Originally posted by 97mustang82 View Post
      First of I would like to day that I have never worked on wood before, I'm more of a auto mechanical person. Some of these questions may sound basic in the wood world, but I'm very new to this. Also, I apologize for the long post.

      So I went to home depot yesterday and got a long single piece 2x4 foot of birch plywood cut in half to make two 24" pieces of wood at 3/4" thick each. I'm going to glue the wood together to make a 1.5" thick board. I'm not going to cut it round, if anything I'm going to make it an octagon which wouldn't be as hard to do as I'll only have to cut straight lines. I bought a cheap sand block to sand down the rebound side of the wood and sanded it down just a tad and got it real smooth. The set up is going to be held by a pair of cheap everlast platform brackets from their $50 kit. I bought the everlast platform used for $10 on craigslist. AThe brackets are going on a 30x27 plywood which I will the nail onto 2 wood posts in my garage. Now here are some I have so you know what I'm working with following some questions...






      It's just a mock up and it's not glued or nailed yet.




      1. What type of glue should I use? I bought the cheapest wood glue they had, Elmers carpenter glue (in pics). Should I just keep this and use it or return it and get some other type glue?

      2. Nails. The guy at the store said it would be good to nail the 2 boards together along with the glue to be safe. Is this nessecary? I figure just nail the outside together.

      3. Extra wood. Should I get one more piece of plywood to make my board even more thicker, 2.25"? I know I'm going to use sand on the top anyways, so will this even benifit me, or would it just be for a thicker look.

      4. Placement. How whould I place the brackets to the wood? Should I go by the holes in the everlast platform. Place the platform on the plywood and use a pencil to make a mare through the holes, or should place them wider since I can do that with a square board.

      5. Finish. What type of finish should I use? I bought this polyurethane spray can (in pics). Is this good enough? This setup will be in my garage so I want the wood to be real strong to the elements. It's a crappy old outdoor garage which has bugs and creepy crawlers. In the winter it gets real cold and rainy in the spring. Also the platform and brackets will be nailed to a piece of 30x27 plywood I bought that will then be nailed in front of the garage window which only has a screen open to the outside.

      Man, looks like you got yourself a serious speed bag project. I absolutely agree with Jonzel on Q1. Never use nails in a speed bag project, anywere. He suggested screws in the board, I would suggest bolting the rebound boards together, with flat bottom elevator bolts. You are going to need at least four long ones to go through your two board and hanging brackets. You could also put a few for stability either outside your rebound area or inside the area by the swivel (which will also need either 1/4 cap bolts or smaller width #10 or #8 depending on the swivel. get washers and nuts to fit also. I like wingnuts for easy adjustment.

      I see two tricky parts: First, your wall and stud widths. You really want the vertical wall brackets on studs. Attaching these to the plywood only will probably not offer the stability. It looks like your stud width is 27? Actually, you Could put your vertical brackets on these, but it would be a pretty wide area between the mounts. Most wall mounts are made for 16inch stud centers, and the rebound board is pre-drilled to fit the brackets, but since you have to drill all your own rebound board holes, you can figure out where they need to be. THAT is you second problem. lining up your board holes with your board brackets. This is rocket science, and if no rocket scientist ( or Chris M. ) is available to figure this, I would lay the rebound board out by the studs and see where they meet. At that junction, I would mark the board and draws lines on it with a square to get a straight line. these are the lines your board bracket will lay on. Then I would fasten the vertical mounts and hanging brackets together (to be sure everything lines up) and mark the holes in the board brackets over the straight lines I drew. (..and hope they line up. )

      Good luck with your project, and we all look foreward to seeing and hearing the finished product.
      Speed Bag

      Put a little Rhythm in YOUR workout!
      *attendee: Every SB gathering so far!
      The Quest Continues...
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      Comment

      • 97mustang82
        Speed Bag Trainee
        • Aug 2007
        • 21

        #4
        Originally posted by Jonzel View Post
        IN MY OPINION you should:

        -use screws to hold the two boards together as nails will not pull the wood together tightly, but make sure your screws aren't too big so that they don't come out the other end.

        - your glue is fine but cover the ENTIRE surface of BOTH pieces of wood and use several screws to hold the wood together and let it dry over night. If you don't have a drill and don't want to buy one, then I would glue it and then lay it flat on a flat hard surface and pile as much weight as you can on top of it to "clamp" the two pieces together and let it dry overnight with the weights on top and don't worry about using nails.

        -I'm assuming that your attaching your platform to a piece of plywood because your studs are too far apart to attach it to them. I recommend that you attach ur platform to 2x4's rather than to plywood, so you should attach two vertical 2x4's to your horizontal studs and attach the platform to the two vertical 2x4's.

        -I dont recommend that you use nails for anything on this project, they'll probably vibrate right out, but then again screws may break, but I recommend screws.

        -As for how far apart your brackets are, they look good in the picture. Use screws.

        -I've never used spray on polyurethane, but I would just spray the entire wood surface after you glue it.

        -you may even want to widen the holes in the bracket where you will be attaching the platform to the wall and use lag bolts (lag bolt are basically really thick screws)

        -Chris M will probably have some good advice for you.

        -good luck
        Hey, thanks for the advice. Few questions tho. You said attach my platform to 2x4? Do you mean 2x4 inch wood attached vertically to the brackets? Wouldn't that make the platform vibrate more than one solid piece of wood since the large 30x27 is much more stable laying flat across the whole wall?

        I think the holes that came on the brackets should do fine because a few people here have done the same thing and I don't think they had to drill out bigger holes. I think they may have just used a large washer or bolt with a built in washer. But if the unit vibrates or gets loose, thats what I'll keep an eye out for. Heres Chris M's set up. This is exactly where I got the idea from. I was ready through some posts one day and came across his set up and thought using the everlast brackets was a cool and simple idea. Thanks Chris. Of course my plywood is no match for his rosewood tho.





        I think your right about the nails on the plywood. I think I'm going to buy some thin screws and just put 1 on each edge. There will already be 4 screws holding the wood together that go through the brackets so these 4 screws is just a safety thing so the outer edges won't come apart over time. Chris posted something on here about using liquid screws. What that? Heres his set up. The century brackets look awsome. Looks real stable.







        As for the glue, the guy at home depot told me to make sure I don't saturate the board by covering the whole thing in glue. He said to just go around the edge with one line and then make an "X" pattern accross the board and then a small circle in between the triangles created by the "X" pattern. He said if I saturate the board, the glue will just all ozz out the edge and might leave the boards uneven with glue much thicker on some parts.

        Well, thanks for the reply. I'm going to dive into some of it today. I'll keep you posted on how it goes.

        Comment

        • Chris M
          Speed Bag Guru
          • Mar 2006
          • 750

          #5
          Yes, I did mount directly to the wall but the pictures above were into brick. That wall was in my old house and it had about 1 inch of plaster over solid brick. Knowing what I know now, if I had to do it over, I would have mounting two 2x4's to the wall and mounted the frame to it, only because it would have made it much, much easier in hindsight.

          On to your questions:

          QUESTIONS
          1. What type of glue should I use? I bought the cheapest wood glue they had, Elmers carpenter glue (in pics). Should I just keep this and use it or return it and get some other type glue? What you bought is just fine. You dont need any screws or anything. Cover both facing sides of wood liberally with your Elmer's wood glue and screw them together every six inches or so. You should have some glue squeezing out as you screw the pieces together. For best results, drill some holes and use nuts and bolts with washers to clamp them down tight. Don't go too tight because if you clamp too hard, you'll starve the joint of glue and it will not be strong. Go slowly because screwing and gluing two pieces of wood together like that is hard because the glue is very slippery and they'll slide like crazy. After you have two screws in, the boards won't move. You can remove the screws after about 4 or 5 hours but don't use the board or cut until they dry overnight or about 12 hours. Unless you're going to use this drum outdoors, you chose very good wood glue.

          2. Nails. The guy at the store said it would be good to nail the 2 boards together along with the glue to be safe. Is this nessecary? I figure just nail the outside together. Don't use any nails, as has been said before, only use the proper screws (i.e., wood screws into wood, masonry screws into bricks or concrete, etc.

          3. Extra wood. Should I get one more piece of plywood to make my board even more thicker, 2.25"? I know I'm going to use sand on the top anyways, so will this even benifit me, or would it just be for a thicker look. I think you'll be fine with 1.5", but it's your preference. You likely won't ever notice the difference between 1.5" and 2.25".

          4. Placement. How whould I place the brackets to the wood? Should I go by the holes in the everlast platform. Place the platform on the plywood and use a pencil to make a mare through the holes, or should place them wider since I can do that with a square board. Just make sure the brackets are spaced exactly like the holes in the Everlast drum so your spacing is correct for lining up with the studs in your wall if you're going into a wood frame wall. If you're going to use the 2x4's behind the platform as has been recommended,or if you're installing into a masonry wall like brick, it's not important.

          5. Finish. What type of finish should I use? I bought this polyurethane spray can (in pics). Is this good enough? This setup will be in my garage so I want the wood to be real strong to the elements. It's a crappy old outdoor garage which has bugs and creepy crawlers. In the winter it gets real cold and rainy in the spring. Also the platform and brackets will be nailed to a piece of 30x27 plywood I bought that will then be nailed in front of the garage window which only has a screen open to the outside. Poly is perfect, just put at least 3 coats on it. Just go over it with 150 grit sandpaper after each coat and 225 or so for the last coat. You jut want to remove the nibs and dust in the poly when sanding, but this is purely for aesthetic reasons, it won't affect the function of the bag.

          Comment

          • 97mustang82
            Speed Bag Trainee
            • Aug 2007
            • 21

            #6
            Thanks guys. You've all been real helpful. I really appreciate you taking the time out on good old labor day to help me out. I'll keep you guys posted on whats what. Thanks for the advice and have a good labor day

            Comment

            • Chris M
              Speed Bag Guru
              • Mar 2006
              • 750

              #7
              Once that wood glue dries, it won't come apart, trust me. The joint will be stronger than the wood itself. If you want to test out what I'm telling you, take the scraps that you've cut off but are still glued together and put a chisel on the joint and whack it with a hammer. The boards should separate at the wood and glue joint will still be intact! It's good stuff as long as you don't squeeze too much out while clamping it.

              Oh, and by the way, when you put the glue on the boards, take an old paint brush or rag and cover every square inch of the both boards with glue, just like you were painting, but you're doing it with glue. After you clamp, clean up the squeezed out glue and wipe it clean with a wet cloth. Water won't affect the joint and clean up any glue spots on the wood. This is important because anywhere the glue residue dries, the board will be white or a yellowish white and stain won't stick to it. That's really the only advantage that the other glues have over the cheap Elmer's wood glue, (other than some are also waterproof) they are stainable and if there's any residue, the stain or poly won't be a different color.
              Last edited by Chris M; 09-03-2007, 08:32 PM.

              Comment

              • metaldad
                Speed Bag Guru
                • Apr 2007
                • 1514

                #8
                Sounds like everyone hooked you up with some pretty good advice. My only input is I swear by Gorilla Glue! If the Elmer's works for you, then stick with it. I personally prefer Gorilla Glue.
                Last edited by metaldad; 09-04-2007, 03:50 PM.
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                Comment

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