Best material for fitted bookshelves

[JohnS2]

I want to make fitted bookshelves for our dining room, fitted round the piano, fireplace, window etc. I've got the design worked out: 1" thick verticals fixed to wall, 3/4" adjustable shelves, quite a few with curves to assist the fitting to the shape of the room, and routed fluted profiles on the front edge of both uprights and shelves. Finish white to contrast with dark green walls. There will be about 15 uprights of varying lengths and pushing 40 shelves.

I'm reasonably competent with circular saw and router so have no qualms at cutting all the pieces but I know my limitations when it comes to finishing and painting. I had thought of MDF but I'm balking at the work required to get a decent finish on all those pieces particularly the routed edges. I guess the alternative is pine laminated board but is that any easier to get a half-decent finish? I'm not after mirror-finish gloss, just the minimum quality to look decent. Any suggestions, alternatives, shortcuts welcome, or can I just pay someone to paint them all after I've cut them?

 

[big-all]

heeelllooo and welcome JohnS2

need to know the span you are after the depth off shelves and loads before choosing materials
shelves should be same size or bigger than the uprights from the strength point off veiw
18mm mdf shelves for books will need supporting every 600mm or so

 

[JohnS2]

Spans will vary from 80 cm to 40 cm. I have the luxury of knowing what books we need to accomodate and designing accordingly - lighter books on the longer spans over the fireplace where long spans will look better, short spans over the piano to fit all the piano music. Without being arrogant, I'm reasonably confident about the structural side - I've spent a fair bit of my life building scenery on stages and the like and have a fair sense for structural properties of wood. But precisely because my experience is stages (and treehouses and trailers and other odds and ends) it's achieving the quality finishes that worry me - hence the concern that if I do it from MDF I'll be spending the rest of my life priming and sanding.

Thanks

John

 

[Deluks]

Mdf has to be the easiest of sheet materials to work with. If you have a circ saw and router then you are good to go.

You can get a better quality grade of mdf from timber/sheet goods suppliers.

example

Just use the right products when painting; a proper mdf primer and then most wood paint will take and stick. Use v fine paper between coats, there are plenty of painting mdf threads here, do a search.

You could take them to a local manufacturer for spraying or lacquer if you'd rather pay someone to do it.

How are you intending to support/adjust the shelves?

 

[JohnS2]

I plan to fit bookcase strips to the verticals, routed in to give flush finish. The shorter shelves will then just sit on those, for the longer shelves I will fit a batten to the underneath of the rear edge for extra support. In three of the four corners of the room (the door is in the fourth corner) the verticals will be floor-to-ceiling. Along the lengths of the wall, the verticals will all start at the same ceiling height at the top but will come down to varying extents - the long wall with the fireplace, for instance, will have the full height for the outer 50 cm, then just two shelves for the next third in from each side, then just one shelf over the middle to give a profile over the fireplace. Verticals to have curve at bottom below the bottom shelf partly to get them shallow enough to be fixed to the wall by a coach screw, plus a custom-made brass bracket at top.

I've been planning it mentally for years, now the reality is getting close I'm daunted by the sheer scale of it - not the cutting and routing, which I enjoy, but the finishing, which I do not and am not very good at.

 

[big-all]

i am assuming your going for a fixed back !!
you cannot have fully movable shelves you need a fixed shelve top middle and bottom minimum on a 2.440 height without a back

put a 1-1.2 degree angle on the bottom to lean the shelves back against the wall
but of course a fixing ever 3 or so foot wont hurt

plan to make your units in a maximum 4x6ftor simmilar [3x8 2x12] as anything bigger will be umanagable

providing your shelves are 8" deep and you lean the unit back you won need fixings to the wall unless your floor bounces



if you want to go floor to ceiling then deffinatly make in 2 parts with 1" clearence or leave at least 4 inches clearence for 1 part unit

http://www.woodbin.com/calcs/sagulator.htm

 

[JohnS2]

No back at all! Verticals screwed directly to wall. That should fix them at constant separations and at right angles to the wall, which I assume are main reasons for fixed shelves. The longer verticals where the shelves are full height will need fixing to the wall at intermediate points as well. That could be simple angle bracket but I was toying with concealed fixing - a stud screwed into the wall matching a stopped clearance hole drilled into the thickness of the vertical. As long as the fixings at the top and bottom hold the vertical onto the wall the intermediate supports just need to stop twisting and buckling.

Thanks for the tip about angling the shelves.

 

[big-all]

the trouble with battons is you finnish up with dead space or leaning books

if i make full height shelves the are usualy 2 parts 2/5th base unit around 10 inches deep
top 3/5ths 6 inches deep

you need different depths otherwise your big books overhang to much or you little books need to be 2 deep or recessesd way back