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The coolest desk in Camp Bucca, Iraq!

While I was stationed at Camp Bucca Iraq, I came up with this desk arrangement. The beauty of this design is the swiveling laptop stand. This means that you can use the computer, with an external keyboard normally sitting at the desk. It even raises the screen to a better level. Then, at night, you can swing the laptop over the bed and use your laptop like a DVD player to watch movies or any digital media. This desk got better and better over time, and it truly was a great desk! I even finished my Master’s degree at this desk!

While it’s not the prettiest desk, the entire desk was made with items found in the metal scrap yard. (yes, all the wood was in there as well.) Talk about re-purposing! The desk top was from a broken desk that was thrown away.

I wish I would have thought to take pictures of it while I was building it, but I didn’t know about ‘ilbes back then!
Enjoy!

Note, I was inspired to post this (and other) slideshow as a result of Frosty865’s question. Here is a link to it…
http://www.instructables.com/answers/Does-anyone-know-a-good-site-for-DIY-for-deployed-/

And here is a link to my current blog as I’m deployed in Afghanistan.
http://www.megageek.com/blog/Mob2009afg.nsf

4 comments

Feb 5, 2012. 8:22 PM

finton says:

As you say, not the prettiest desk, but I absolutely love the 3-position swivel idea. Excellent! And great recycling. Kudos.

Jan 5, 2011. 9:22 AMvandal1138 says:

When were you in Bucca? I was there from 2007 to 2008. 15 months of fun...

Feb 19, 2010. 6:46 PMpmartinez says:

Great job! Brings back not so good memories.. I used MRE boxes to make a 5 drawer desk, served as a desk and cloth drawer.. By the way.. let me share with you what I did for "drinks", got a huge Listerine bottle (glass), drain that s...t, and filled it with good old southern whiskey, no one ever knew about it, even during inspections.

Good luck to you

Semper Fi
Pedro Martinez

Jan 22, 2010. 7:06 AMRanie-K says:

Nice! I used pallet "sides" (What do you Americans call these? Picture: http://www.pallegrossisten.no/images/img_prod03.jpg ) to make my "desk in Bosnia: I turned it upside down and hammered the "lips" flat onto the plywood, making it a wooden crate. Turned it onto it's end and put in a shelf. Voila! -Computer desk!

Used the same thing for my clothes: Pallet "sides" with shelves inside. I put two legs on it and had it perched over my foot end of the bed -secured it with some zip ties.