Introduction: Homemade Hollow Core Door to Stand Up Desk

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About: Do you really care?

Not going into a lot of detail here, just showing a few steps of the project, you should get an idea of what to do from there....

Items used in this project:

Hollow core door
Balusters
1X4 lumber
liquid nails
base board molding
laminate flooring
screws
drill
saw
framing clamps
AWETHUM dog
other stuff I'm forgetting

Step 1: The Basic Frame

Find a hollow core door size that fits your needs.  I then made a simple 1X4 frame so that 2 sides of the door would over hang 3 inches since this is going in a corner.  AWETHUM dog is being AWETHUM.

Step 2: Balusters for Legs

I purchased 3 balusters to make a leg.  I clamped them together as shown and then ran a total of 3 screws each though the left and right ones into the rear baluster, but not where the 1X4 would be.  After I screwed the 3 balusters together, I cut the round ends off seen in the photo here so I had a flat surface.

Step 3:

The screws that keep the 3 balusters together are not seen from the outside when viewing the desk as shown here.  I then ran screws though the 1X4 into the balusters to secure into place.

Step 4:

I had to cut the narrow ends down a little to get the correct height I wanted for my stand up desk.  But just bunch them together and then shoved a rubber cap over the end.

Step 5:

Once I had the frame made and the leg screwed into place, I flipped it over and screwed it to the wall, going into studs.  I then put Liquid nails on the top side of the 1X4 frame and placed the door on top with weight on it and let sit for a few hours to dry.

I had some laminate flooring left over so I put that on top of the hollow core door which I would recommend since the hollow core doors are waffer thin.  I cut the laminate flooring down to size for a flush fit on the door and used a little bit of Liquid Nails to secure.  I then cut some basic base board molding to size, put Liquid Nails on the edges of the door, pushed the base board molding onto it and used a braid nailer to secure. Added a bit of base board along the wall as well to finish out.

I had to go back and touch up a little bit of the paint work, no big deal.

Step 6:

The 3 balusters for a leg has been very sturdy and gave me the length I needed to make a stand up desk.  Also being mounted to several wall studs helps as well. 

The laminate surface his a bit of a fine texture about it, but doesn't cause me any problems when writing on a single sheet of paper directly on it.  If I were to write directly on the hollow core door, it would write groves into it. 

The hardest part of this whole project was figuring out how make a long leg to get the height needed for a stand up desk.  I didn't want just a 2X4 or something there.  Balusters was a good fit for my needs.