Storage Wall

[jefm]

Festool Gang,
I need to make a wall-sized storage system. No style is required, just needs to be sturdy and dynamic. Be able to change things w/o taking the wall down. It's hard to run AutoCad, Sketchup, Solidworks and friends without a Windows PC, so I submit this drawing.
View attachment 1

The Wall is made of only two cuts of wood: verticals (plywood) and shelves (plywood or other).
A vertical that supports shelves becomes a shelf interface.
Verticals and shelf interfaces are screwed together. Therefore, shelf load will be supported by three vertical pieces of plywood. Ideally each vertical will attach to a piece of 2x4, which is screwed to a stud through drywall.

I don't have a Domino, but was wondering about one for this project. For instance:
Clamp two shelves together, Domino two mortises on the short side's seam, repeat on the other side, unclamp and the shelves now have open mortises.
Clamp a couple shelf interfaces together and Domino clear through them, at the width used above, and height whatever amount I want shelves at.
.... now the shelf interfaces accept a Domino tenon for the shelf's mortises to lock to. (Might have to cut tenons in half or etc)

Need to imagine a horizontal strut in the back, perhaps only on top and bottom, unless it's a big open shelfless section (lumber storage, etc)
Will use hardware to secure top shelf, which will only be holding lighting or lightweight items.
To get a nine foot tall shelf out of eight foot ply wood, I might stagger cut pieces. (Or just build it eight feet tall)

The 'ALC' in the pic stands for 'attached lid container', my preferred storage. They are under two feet deep. Ideally, the whole system is just deep enough to support ALC's.

I've screwgunned lots of basic shelves, frames, set pieces, bunkbeds, basic benches and desks together but this will be the biggest thing. Thanks for reading and I look forward to your input.

 

[nclemmons]

Welcome to the FOG - looks like a good project you are undertaking.

There have been a few examples here of members using a Domino for shelf 'pins' to support them.  They will certainly work for that.  Domino's tend to fit tightly in the mortise, so you might want to lightly sand them if you expect to be changing shelf adjustment much to ease insertion / removal over time.  I was not clear from your drawing if you are planning to domino at the edge with two shelves clamped to create a rebate to hold the shelf in place, or glue two shelves together to go for a thicker shelf. 

You might want to plan for a 'fixed' shelf toward the middle of the unit.  7-8' is a tall upright and if you get any bowing or an accidental bump of one of the uprights, I wouldn't want to see a shelf drop.  Certainly if you go with three uprights, that's 2.25 inches and if thats glued up, you won't get much flex.  But I still tend to like an intermediate shelf that might be fixed to ensure things stay in place.

Not sure you really need to go 3 uprights wide for the side of each unit.  Two would be sufficient if you want to save some money on materials.  The Domino has depth adjustment on it and you could easily use a set of 'index blocks' starting from the bottom and just index up the sides to give you a consistent depth and height for each plunge and shelf adjustment hole.

Are you planning to cover the front edges of the uprights or shelves?  It's not clear how much width you will have for the shelves, but you might get some bowing and want to consider a face frame piece across the front of the shelf that is perhaps 2" wide to provide more support and resist the bowing.  You could go with a face frame on the uprights as another way to 'finish' the piece but also remove the need to half-mortise the dominos in the shelf as a face frame would make the shelves captive to the back wall.

Finally, it sounds like those are 2' deep shelves, so you probably want to think about three dominos on each side to support the weight.  And if you don't go with any face frame, think about a cross pin or screw through the domino into the bottom of the shelf to reduce any chance of the shelf coming off the dominos when you are removing things from it.

Good luck and please share photos as you progress.

neil

 

[HarveyWildes]

Maybe consider a domino in the back center to support the shelf lengthwise?  I'm assuming your ALCs could get pretty heavy.  It's not clear what you might have in the back to support a shelf, but if you've got something, the extra support would be worth it.