Railway sleeper benches

[amanzi]

Hi

I am thinking about building two simple new oak (not reclaimed ) railway sleeper benches.

I was planning to keep the design pretty simple . One sleeper with two legs attached to create a bench.

I was wondering if anybody had any ideas about how to attach, screw together the main oak sleeper to the two legs.

Somebody has said the negative to this design, is that the bench would easily topple over ?

Please see image for example.

Untitled

• amanzi
• 30 Apr 2015
• 1

 

[garethpa]

you will probably find that the legs in the photo are sunk into the ground - possibly set in postcrete.

The tops could be fixed to the legs using angle brackets from underneath, or for a more professional and invisible finish could be fixed using dowels - look up dowel joints on google.

 

[mattice]

Made some identical, set mine in postcrete 1/3 deep, countersunk some timberlok screws from top of seat into the post, cut some end grain wedges, banged then into the holes and sanded off. Very neat.

Use stainless timberloks if using oak sleepers.

 

[gregers]

or do a basic mortice joint and some poly glue.

 

[MR M - DT]

I like to use turbo screws (basically hex head coach screws)

You can counterbore them and cap them with dowel to hide them.

Dowels work well too.

If you don't want to concrete them in, you'll need a wide Base plate if you are using on grass .

 

[Harry0075]

These look great. Certainly something I'll be trying to do in future, it's on my list!