Thanks for purchasing one (or more) of our kitset VEG Beds! These assembly instructions are designed to make it easy for you to assemble your new VEG Bed/s so you can get on with growing delicious vegies at home.
First, look at the image to the right and then scroll down to get a feel for what the finished bed will look like, and what we mean by side sleepers, end sleepers, posts, vertical braces, and horizontal braces.
You should then take a look at the youtube movie before heading outside with these instructions and the template. Basic woodwork tips for making the required joins can be seen here.
Ingredients
Supplied to you
- These instructions
- All timber required for your bed (made up of 40mmx200mm sleeper lengths, four 90mmx90mm posts per bed, and 40mmx140mm seat lengths if you ordered a bench seat)
- Enough 75mm bugle-head batten screws to assemble your bed (which we will have given you)
Supplied by you
- A 5mm hex bit (available from us at purchase for $2.50)
- A 5 or 5.5mm drill bit (available from us at purchase for $2.50)
- A hand-held drill (cordless better but not essential) for the drill bit
- Ideally another drill or even better impact driver for the 5mm hex bit (you can use the same drill but it takes a bit longer to swap from the drill bit to the hex bit and back but hey, what’s the hurry?)
- A level surface like a path, deck or driveway to assemble the beds on within easy carrying distance from the final bed location (note a large bed will be heavy so either build it close to where it is going or have a few strapping persons at hand)
- A few hours of time & ideally a friend or two, and optionally a bottle of champagne to celebrate finishing
Preparations
Assembly Step 1 – Assemble Top Rectangle of Sleepers
Choose some nice looking sleepers (being rough sawn some will be slightly more rough sawn than others) for the top of the bed. Lay these (four) sleepers out on a level surface in the shape of the bed.
Next, taking two 75mm batten screws, line any of the corners up as per the diagram below so where the two sleepers join at the top and on the side is perfectly flush. Holding them flush, take the drill and drill through the two end-most pilot holes in the side sleeper (yup, we drilled these holes for you) into the end sleeper, then take two batten screws and attach the side sleeper to the end sleeper. You now have an L-shape of two joined sleepers.
Repeat the process at the other end of the side sleeper to form a U. Now add the final end sleeper to form a rectangle.
That’s it, Step One is behind you.
Assembly Step 2 – Add posts
You might want to check the movie again, but Step Two is to lift one of the corners of your new rectangle up (this assumes your bed is at least two sleepers high) and either have a friend hold it up or rest it on a sturdy chock of some kind (we often use a milk crate or similar). You then take a corner post and hold it snug in place on the inside of the corner with its top flush against the top of the sleepers and its side flush against the sides of the sleepers.
Now take the drill and drill through one of the empty holes in either the long side sleeper or short end sleeper into the post and (holding the post snug all the while) put a batten screw through the sleeper into the post. You can now let go and put the remaining two screws into the post.
Now move around to the next corner and so on until you have a kind of table – a rectangle of sleepers with a post sticking down at each corner. This is the hard bit done. The rest is easy.
Assembly Step Three – Add Remaining Sleepers
NOTE: Complete step three on your level surface only if you are confident about shifting the whole bed to its final location. Otherwise shift it now before it gets any heavier, and only then proceed with Step Three.
Your next task is to slot the remaining sleepers into position underneath the top ones and once getting them flush at each end, lifting them firmly upwards before drilling through their remaining holes into the posts and in the case of the side sleepers into the end sleepers. If your bed is two or more sleepers high, a trick we use for lifting the sleeper up into position is to put a batten screw in underneath the sleeper (between the ground and sleeper) temporarily. This is only appropriate on a surface you don’t mind scratching. You can also use something like a spade or mattock as a lever.
Start with the two end sleepers then move on to the side sleepers.
At this stage your VEG Bed will look complete, and only needs the internal bracing to finish it off!
Assembly Step Four – Add Bracing
Take one of the two vertical braces and put on the inside middle of the bed 5cm from the top and bottom. Drill pilot holes then attach to the inside of the bed using 75mm batten screws (screw positions shown in diagram below). Repeat for the remaining vertical brace.
Then take the horizontal brace (same length as the end sleepers) and fit these across the bed from vertical brace to vertical brace as shown in the plan and movie. It is easiest to put the horizontal brace in diagonally then tap it snugly into position.
Drill pilot holes as indicated below and attach the horizontal brace to the vertical brace, and…
…your bed is done! Well, unless you ordered a bench seat that is, in which case to finish you need to attach the four supplied seat lengths as follows…
Assembly Step Five – Add Bench Seat
…and now you, too, are done!
Thanks for gardening with VEG.
Ps. We’d love your feedback on how helpful (or not) these instructions were. Contact us here.
