In deciding what we wanted in our van, we knew storage was going to be very important, however with a folding bed, a large portion of one side wall becomes lost due to the bed having to fold up. So we decided a great way to add some good storage is to integrate some drawers into a center table that would sit beneath the bed when it was folded down (and provide support), but act as a table surface for everyday use when the bed is folded up. We made the table the same length as the bed supports (67 inches) by 18.5 inches wide. This width was a good compromise as we wanted to maximize the storage underneath the table, but keep enough space to freely walk through the back of the van.

There will be two sets of drawers coming out of the table. One set will open from the front half of the long side into the van, while the others will open out the back, and can only be accessed when the back doors are open. The thickness of the frame, plywood and drawer slides makes the drawers a bit smaller than the table width but that is a necessary evil. We opted to go with quality, and got nice hardwoods for the table surface and the drawer fronts.

- Five (5) 2" X 3" X 8' Long Spruce Studs ($2.59 Each at Home Depot)

- Kreg Pocket Hole Jig ($26.98 at Home Depot)

- One (1) 50 pack box of 2.5" Long Kreg Screws ($6.22 at Home Depot)

- Two (2) 4 Packs 90 Degree Angle Braces ($1.64 Each at Home Depot)

- Two (2) 4' X 4' X 1/4" Thick MDT Hardboard for Drawer Bottoms ($15.37 Each at Home Depot)

- Three (3) 8" Wide by 8' Long by 1/2" Thick Pre-finished Drawer Sides (US$21.50 each at Crosscut Lumber in Seattle)

- One (1) 9.5" Wide by 10' Long by 1/2" Thick Brazilian Cherry Hardwood (Jatoba) Board (US$64 at Crosscut Lumber in Seattle)

- One (1) 9.25" Wide by 14' Long by 3/4" Thick Sapele Hardwood Board (US$100 at Crosscut Lumber in Seattle)

- One (1) Bottle Lepage Wood Glue ($5.07 at Home Depot)

- Two (2) Pairs 32" Long Ryadon Drawer Slides ($34.99 Each at Gregg Distributors)

- Two (2) Pairs 14" Long Ryadon Drawer Slides ($15.99 Each at Gregg Distributors)

- Many Fasteners (Did not keep track of them all!)

- We also used Pieces of the Birch 5' X 5' Plywood from the Platform Bed for Parts of the Coffee Table

Total Material Cost: ​$185 Canadian + $230 US Dollars (Does not include tools purchased)

- Chop Saw (Borrowed from Neighbor in Edmonton)

- Jig Saw

- Drill with Bits and Screw Drives

- Router with Rounding Bit

- Palm Sander with Various Grit Sandpaper

- Eight (8) Each of C-Clamps and Pipe Clamps (Borrowed from my dad in WA)

- Kreg Pocket Hole Jig and Corresponding Screws

- Table Saw (Borrowed from Neighbor in Edmonton)

- Skil Saw (Borrowed from my Dad)

​- Straightedges

- Carpenters Square

​- Measuring Tape and Pen

Time Spent on the Job: Maybe 24 Hours? It was hard to gauge as we were jointly installing insulation, and a wall over a few weekends.

It is worth noting that this table will also act as one of the primary supports for the folding bed, and the hinges the platform will attach to are exactly 1.75 inches above the top of the frame (by design...see photo above right). This gives me 1.75 inches to work with for the combination of the table top thickness, and whatever we decide to use for supporting the 1/2" Baltic Birch plywood sheets (since they are definitely not strong enough to support us both just on their own). The extra 1 inch Ipe boards (very, very hard wood) my dad has from the new deck he built will work perfectly with the 3/4" Sapele hardwood I bought. The combined thickness of the table and bed frame is 1.75 inches..perfect! The plywood sheets will then sit atop the hinges, and fastened through them into the bed frame below. Extra care will be needed to keep the fasteners from jarring loose, and when the bed is folded down, there will need to be a perfectly flush fit against the table top. See Folding Bed Installation Part 2 for more details about the bed platform!....Coming soon when completed

Once all the thinking and planning was done to make sure everything will fit together nicely, I cut the 9.25" wide by 14 foot long Sapele board into three pieces using a Skil Saw with a straightedge guide. Two pieces that are 68.5 inches long and the third as a smaller 32 inch piece that will be the folding up table extension. Note that the Sapele board was already power planed on all sides when I bought it. This method will not work if the wood isn't power planed beforehand, as the seam will not be flush! With the help from my dad, I was able to glue the two 68.5 inch pieces together lengthwise to turn the 9.25 inch wide board into an 18.5 inch board. Many clamps were needed to hold the two pieces together as the glue dried. Once dry, I sanded the surface and tested the fit on top of the frame.

Over the course of a weekend in October, Elaine came up to Edmonton and we built the drawers that would fit inside the frame of the coffee table. In a nutshell, this was fun and challenging, but also a bit finicky, as it was quite difficult to get the drawers to all be perfectly level, square and flush with one another, and the table frame. With patience however, we managed to get it to look acceptable! I found this link which describes a good way to build drawers which helped quite a bit in determining the methodology we used, and gives a more detailed step-by-step guide as to what we did. I more or less copied the method described on the link, with a few things omitted that weren't applicable in our case.

First step was to screw half of each drawer slide onto the side of the cabinet frame. Where ever we decided to screw these into would dictate exactly how we would build the rest of the drawer, so even though there was lots of flexibility in this step, we had to make sure they were at least level, and spaced well enough to allow 2 drawers to fit. For the drawer in the back we simply located the slide just below the center of where the drawer would be. Since the plywood inside the frame is 1/2" thick, and the metal on the drawer slide is 1/8" thick, half inch screws worked perfectly to hold them in place. The slides have various oval shaped holes you can put your screw into, and then be able to slide it one way or another a small amount for final placement. Note each drawer slide is 2 inches shorter than the length of the drawers they are intended for to allow wiggle room.

With the drawer slides mounted to the inside of the drawer boxes, we measured the length of the sides for each drawer, and cut those using the pre-finished drawer side boards I found in Seattle. Working first on the back drawer, we cut the sides to our length of 32 inches, measured where exactly the top of the drawer would be relative to the drawer slide we just installed in the cabinet, then screwed the other half of each slide onto each side piece. This part had to be EXACTLY correct or the drawer would not fit correctly.

We then repeated the process for the two side drawers, which were instead wide and shorter rather than narrower and deeper.

To finish the drawers, we measured and cut the 9.25" wide Brazilian cherry board to match the length of each drawer front, plus some extra on each side to cover up the vertically oriented 2X3 studs making up the frame. The extra 1.25 inches of height will allow the drawer front to cover the horizontally oriented studs. We sanded each drawer front, and secured them to the front of the drawer box with 3/4" screws from the inside to allow no visible screw heads on the drawer face. Getting the face boards to fit perfectly with one another with the correct size gaps was tricky, and required a lot of fiddling around and a little bit of shimming. We then added a small shelf just 2 inches below the rear drawer to allow convenient storage for our long things such as ice axes, trekking poles and pickets (see bottom left photo below). This was done by simply cutting out another piece of our 1/4" hardboard, and two pieces of scrap 1/2" plywood for it to rest on. Lastly, we used seven 90 degree angle brackets and 1/2" screws to secure the table top, by screwing the brackets to the underside of the table and then into the studs from below, making sure to pilot each screw hole with a small drill bit to avoid any cracking in the table, since it is a hardwood (Sapele).

So, we still have the open space in the back of the coffee table below the rear drawer, but we had just enough left over Brazilian cherry to make a door to cover the lower storage compartment. We used two hinges mounted to the bed support to allow it to open to the right against the van back door. Unfortunately, the remaining piece wasn't quite long enough to cover the entire table frame or bed support but that'll have to work. We will install a device to hold it shut such as a magnet or tongue and groove lock later

When we are seated on the couch, we thought it would be nice to have a folding table extension that can be folded up when we need it and lowered when we don't. With the remaining sapele wood we had from the table top, we prepared a piece just the right length. I cut two triangle shaped pieces of cedar that also fold in and out sideways from the frame of the table. When extended out, these triangles will provide support for the table extension, which folds up/down and rests on the supports when out. See the photo below.

Our plans for finishing the coffee table will be to use the same pine tongue and groove wood panels we will use for the walls, to cover part of the non-drawer portion of the side that sits adjacent to the two drawers (which will be left partially open to house a couple nice coffee table books). We also applied a protective varnish to all the drawer fronts, table top and the wood panels. We still need to install drawer handles using some climbing holds Elaine found at the Calgary Climbing Center. Photos to come when this eventually gets completed.