Egg crate storage unit

[bmuir]

I am planning on building a storage unit from ¾-inch birch plywood that will hold standard 11x12x15 cardboard legal/letter boxes. Unit will hold 18 boxes. Size of the unit is about 40.25” w x 70” h x 15-1/2” d.

There would be four vertical supports and six horizontal shelves. My plan is to “egg crate” the center two verticals and all the shelves together with the ends of the six shelves glued and nailed into dadoes in the vertical pieces on each end. A full 1/4” back will be nailed to the back to prevent racking and the unit would be screwed to the back wall to prevent it from falling over. The boxes would weigh no more than 50 pounds each (my guess).

Will this work? Is the egg crate enough or should I put glue and nail ¼-round supports below each intersection on each side of each egg crate joint? Any other ideas for this project?

Thanks,

Bill

[crokett]

So you will have 3 rows of 6 boxes? What I would do is cut 4 70" pieces (2 sides and 2 dividers) and 2 40" pieces (top and bottom) then as many dividers as you need. Dado the sides, top and bottom of the unit to accept your dividers. Dado the 2 long dividers to accept the short ones and glue all together. I would rabbett the rear to accept the ply. It looks much more finished and actually is a bit stffer. With those dados and the ply back, it will be plenty strong enough.

Where ever you plan to screw through the backing into the wall, run screws through the backing into the back edge of the shelves. I've seen a unit separate from the backing.