How to Make a Simple Lumber rack

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I started out by cutting all of the lumber pieces on my miter saw. You’ll need 5x 40-½” long boards of 2x4, you also need 10x 12” long and 5x 8” long boards, both are also 2x4. You also need some 1x4 boards: 20x 15-½” long and 10x 11-½” long. In total you need 4 8’ long boards of 2x4 and 5 boards of 1x4 also 8’long.

After cutting the boards I drilled 3/8” diameter holes half way through the longest 2x4s. The holes are spaced 4” apart, the first hole is 5” from the end, and after the fourth hole instead of a gap of 4” measure the fifth hole 5-½” from the fourth hole.

After I drilled the bigger holes I made pilot holes all the way
through the 2x4, I also counter sank the holes from the backside so I don’t need to worry about the material mushrooming from the backside.

I assembled the horizontal supports with 2” long woodscrews and wood glue. I don’t really know what the proper name for the support is so I’ll be calling them branches from now on. I don’t know if the wood glue will help because the 1x4s I used were rough sawn but the glue definitely won’t hurt. After you are done attaching the 1x4s to the 2x4s you should have 5 shorter and 10 longer branches.

Next step for me was to install the long 2x4s to the walls, you need to space the 2x4s according to the spacing of the studs in your wall. I made the bigger holes on the 2x4s because I wanted my 6” screws to have enough penetration to the wall studs. I used a level to make sure the 2x4s were straight. I referenced the 2x4s from a 1x4 running around my shop but you can use a level.

I then started to install the branches, I used 4 screws per joint. I didn’t add any wood glue in the joints but you surely could. I attached the branches with a help of a level to make sure the surfaces were parallel to each other. You could also install the branches to the longer 2x4s prior to installing them into the wall.

After all of the branches were installed I attached a 15” wide piece of ½” plywood to the underside of the bottom branch so I have place to store any shorter off cuts.