The Ultimate Magnetic Pegboard!

by Yonatan24

65K48841

Intro: The Ultimate Magnetic Pegboard!

This my new Magnetic Pegboard over my projects table, it is where I do most of my Soldering, Hot Gluing, Dismantling, And sadly, Also my School Home-Work.

It's funny to say that this project costed me about $2 in parts because I had almost everything that was needed, but if I had to buy everything I can estimate it would have costed $100+

Maybe It looks small in the picture but it's more than 2 meters long (~2 yards)

That's more than 2,000,000,000,000 pico-meters! ;)

STEP 1: Why?

I had a toolbox but I got tired of it because it takes too long to find the tool you need, The small tools always fall to the bottom of the box, which means you have to dump the whole toolbox on the floor just to find the tiny screwdriver you were looking for.

I won't even start about how dirty and dusty they get...

For Short: You don't know how annoying toolboxes are until you try something else...

So I built this Standing Pegboard which was okay, But wasn't big enough, Tools kept falling off, And It was uncomfortable on my table because it was double sided. I had this pegboard for a couple months until a weird idea came to my head... A MAGNETIC PEGBOARD!

If I wasn't a even little pessimistic and learned to live with what I had, I wouldn't have thought of improving what I have...

Also If you noticed, I mentioned all of the things I didn't like about the standing pegboard, This helped me to improve the Magnetic Pegboard!

Okay enough talk, Lets get to work!

STEP 2: Planning, Planning, Planning, and More Planning

Weeks of Planning, Trying, Adjusting, And Failing, With my new wooden boards** until I was done.

What you need to make this isn't expensive tools, Huge walls, Or just to be a genius. What you need is:

1. TIME

2. Food to keep you from getting bored in my case pretzels work fine ;)

** High Quality sandwich boards, They look new (except for some small scratches that covered up by the tools) and were found for free while dumpster diving!

STEP 3: Tools and Materials

What I Used:

A Hot Glue Gun*** (You can use other kinds of adhesives such as: Silicone, Sugru, Epoxy, Double Sided Tape And More...)

A Pencil (for marking where to glue the magnet)

Any Kind Of Wooden Board

The Tools You Want To Hang

A Sharp Utility Knife (Optional)

Magnets From eBay (I had most of the Magnets from Speakers I took apart for free, But I did need a couple )

And If you're not interested in spending a lot of money on magnets like me (there really is no reason to...), The links below could probably be helpful:

Where To Find Free Magnets

How To Salvage A Magnet From A Speaker

*** Hot Glue usually isn't recommended for gluing metal or magnets but It was the best option for me:

Hardens quickly

I already had it

Strong enough (If it isn't it helps to scratch the surface of the wood and the magnet with a knife or a file)

Really cheap (I used 1 1/2 sticks for all of the boards combined, That is about $0.75 of glue!

STEP 4: How It's Done

This Instructable Isn't a "How-To" on everything I glued because it would be probably about 100 steps, It isn't very hard to glue a magnet to a wooden board and make it fit your own needs, I am just showing what I did and giving some tips.


This is how I did it:

1. Put the tool on the *magnet*, And find a place where the tool doesn't interfere with another tool, and is easy to reach

2. Take off the tool from the magnet, so only the magnet stays where you want it to be

3. Mark the outline of the magnet*** with a pencil on the board

4. Place the tool on the magnet again and make sure it's in a good place (similar so step #1)

5. Scratch the the back part of the magnet and inside of the OOTMOTB***, to increase the adhesion (optional)

6. Fill the OOTMOTB*** with Hot Glue (or with any other glue of your choice...) and quickly place the magnet on the glue and apply pressure, while still making sure that the magnet stays in place.

7. If you choose a smaller magnet, It will take the glue more time to harden...

*I chose the right magnet by making sure it is strong enough to too hold the tool when I shake it gently, But also not too strong so I will be hard to take it off.*

***"Outline Of The Magnet On The Board" will be marked as OOTMOTB***

STEP 5: More Explanations

There are notes on most of the pictures, explaining what each tool is, But I wasn't able to have notes on all tools.

Retractable Solder Fume Extractor

24 LED Light

2X Helping Hands

The second picture shows how the pegboard looks without any tools, How messy the table is without a pegboard...

STEP 6: How the Small Screwdrivers Are Connected

I used the magnets I bought on eBay to make a magnetic strip to hold the screwdrivers, This way is cheaper, And I can decide exactly how big I want the strip to be.

STEP 7: Utility Knife Connection

Both of these utility knives do not have metal connections so I had to glue small magnets on to them.

I added 2 magnets to the big green knife because it weighed more, and I had to put it upside-down because the knife comes out automatically when it is turned upside-down.

STEP 8: Addition to the Caliper

I added some shrink tube onto the magnet that holds the caliper to prevent scratches, only to find out later that this caliper is over 40 years old and is probably the hardest to scratch metal tool in my house.

STEP 9: No Magnets for the LED Light :(

I attached the 24 LED Spotlight For Soldering metal base to the wood with 2 screws that were a little smaller that the holes (There was only one so I had to drill the other one with a Dremel) of the base so I would still be able to remove it easily

STEP 10: Space Saving Way of Attaching Pliers

If you look closely you can see I broke my snips (small wire cutters) But that hopefully that isn't really noticeable in the picture ***oops***

STEP 11: I Also Have a Set of Star Screws in a Plastic Box That Isn't Magnetic...

The box is held with one hook on each side of the handle which makes it very easy to remove it when I need to.

STEP 12: How I Mounted the File

I used 3 small flat magnets to hold this file on the pegboard, Nothing really special...

STEP 13: The Hardest One to Mount: the Saw

The problem with mounting this saw is that the metal handle of the saw is probably made of aluminum so it isn't magnetic.

I had to hot glue a magnet to the handle, and then put 2 magnets (picture 2) so they would be farther from the board, because the magnet that held the top of the saw was bigger.

And yes, the saw still works as good as new!

STEP 14: Mounting the Two Big Screwdrivers

I have two big flat screwdrivers that I use mostly for salvaging magnets from speakers, And prying big electronic devices open

They are pretty heavy so I used a hard-drive magnet to hold them, since none of the other magnets I had were strong and big enough to hold both of the screwdrivers.

STEP 15: How All of the Other Big Screwdrivers Are Mounted

I had to use a couple small magnets because I didn't have enough big magnets for all of the screwdrivers (I had enough big magnets but they were really strong, So I felt It was kind of a waste...), But I will replace them when I have enough big magnets.

STEP 16: Mounting the Pocket Knife

I wasn't able to use a magnet so instead I used two 90 degree screw-hooks That were screwed close to each other so It would be possible to slide in the pocket-knife case, as seen in picture 3.

STEP 17: Thank You for Watching!

I hope you enjoyed my Instructable, If you wan't to see more projects like this, Don't forget to visit my Instructables page and subscribe for future projects!

If you find a that I made a mistake please point it out so I can fix it

I'd also really appreciate it if you vote for me in the contests I've entered :)

If you build a Magnetic Pegboard that is similar to what I built, Please post a picture in the comments to show everyone!

40 Comments

Samiam2104 2 years ago

I want make a stainless steel pegboard backsplash. I already have the pegboard. (I wanted it so I can hang my baking tools and magnetized measuring cups, spoons, and spices from it) yeah I have I thing for tools, always have and baking, only makes sense to me. Annyyyhow…my questing is I’m worried about spacing behind the pegboard. Should I water proof it? If so how? Should I am more worried about the bacterial, sanitizing aspects I suppose. Worried I won’t be able to see the gap and where moisture goes to dry vs where tile normally would be.

Yonatan24 2 years ago

In these situations, you need to have it completely sealed or open so any water can evaporate. I would leave it open and mount it with a hinge so it can swing open and you can clean behind it. Interesting idea, I'd be interesting in seeing a picture once you get to making it.

katou 7 years ago

Word to the wise, magnetic files are very bad. Files cut metal, usually steel. Bits of steel get stuck in file teeth. Magnetic files fill up faster and are harder to clean. I used a magnetic knife rack to store my little ones. Bad, bad idea. I fixed it by replacing them as they died.

supernoodle2014 7 years ago

Good Job. Lol on the broken wire snips because i noticed it before i read the text on it.

bradleycooper 8 years ago

Good work. I've got a suggestion on how to improve it a bit.

Instead of gluing the magnets to the boards you can insert them in the back.

Just make a socket in the back of the board and insert the magnets. Then get a piece of sheet metal and cover the face of the boards so that it will get magnetized by the magnets and there you have it. The whole surface of the board is magnetic and you can stick whatever you like on it.

HLightning11 8 years ago

or somehow have a peice of plywood or cardboard over it, thin enough so the tools still stick. at ikea, once I got some magnetic strips you just mount on the wall they are about 1-2 inches tall and about a yard long(from memory, got ridof them a while ago)

HLightning11 8 years ago

but if you make outlines on the metal, it could look really nice and you can remember where each tool goes... maybe paint the matal one color and paint silouettes of the tools if you have time, want it to look really nice and if you do decide to do so.

Yonatan24 8 years ago

This Instructable was written a pretty long time ago, But I think I mentioned it:

It took me an incredible amount of hours to make it- To the point where you can wake me up in the middle of the night, And I'll recite to you by heart where every tool goes :)

Seriously, I'm not exaggerating!

Yonatan24 8 years ago

I'm not sure it'll be strong enough.

I would have loved to use magnetic strips, But I wanted to make it for free with stuff I had laying around :)

Yonatan24 8 years ago

I thought of that but the problem is that the whole board won't get magnetized...

If I remember correctly Instructables member "Islam safir" made something like that

bradleycooper 8 years ago

Depending on the strength of the magnets you're using the magnetization of the board would vary so you're gonna have to tinker with how far apart the magnets are spaced from each other.
Could you link to the project you've mentioned by Islam Safir?

Yonatan24 8 years ago

I'm on mobile so I'm not sure if I can link it but you can search in the Instructables search search bar "Islam safir magnetic pegboard, It should show up

Verda 8 years ago

All very good ideas. Each one just has to evaluate what tools they want at hand and plan carefully. Thanks for helping with these ideas.

LihasH 8 years ago

What table is that? Is it from Ikea? I am looking for a similar setup in the back of my garage

Yonatan24 8 years ago

Nope, My table isn't from IKEA, But if you're planning on doing "workshop stuff" with your table, Don't buy a table like this. My table gets scratched very easily so I put those wooden boards on it...

Tonic Cat 8 years ago

Very nice, useful and an attractive result.

Yonatan24 8 years ago

Thank you, I have another one coming soon (because I have more new tools)

grayl 8 years ago

Do you ever have a problem with the tools becoming magnetized and subsequently transferring the magnetism to the parts themselves (screws for example)? Some parts of a component, if magnetized, will render the component inoperable.

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