My son is starting his first year of college next week and he and hisroommate have discovered the joys of Craig's List. They just HAD tohave a TV but neither set of parents were willing to buy them the $400flat screen they were lobbying for, so they went scrounging.Now, I love the fact that they decided to go this way and they foundexactly what they wanted: an old, 32-inch, flat-screen tube TV. Don'task me how the heck they are going to fit it into their dorm room atschool and I don't care if one of them has to sleep on the floor.But I am going to try to slap together a quick stand for it and hereis the rub: it is 32" wide (because the speakers are on either side)and 23" deep and has to weigh well over 150 pounds. They don't havemuch room, obviously, and the stands we see in the stores either donot support the sheer wight of this monster or they are way too wide.So I was thinking about slapping one together myself using 2x4s andeither 3/4" MDF or plywood. Needless to say, I want this thing to beas cheap as possible! I was thinking about gluing two 18" 2x4stogether to make an ELL for each of four legs and then lay a piece of3/4" plywood or MDF on top. Maybe use a 1" board to connect all fourlegs together at the top and then another set of 1" boards halfwaydown to put a shelf in plus it should help it stay together.Does this sound like a plan? Of course, I originally thought of acouple 2x12s and some 12" concrete blocks but the moms puked. Ain'tnothing going to be cheaper than that!busbus

Actually, I think it may even be cheaper to use a couple 2x12s for thetop and find a piece of thin ply I have laying around to make a shelf.

How much weight can a 3/4" of MDF support?

Aug 13, 2010 25 Replies

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Puckdropper 15 years ago

busbus wrote in news:860f61b8-b0ad-45f9-b3ed- snipped-for-privacy@x21g2000yqa.googlegroups.com:

Sit on it. Does it deflect badly?

My school issued us 2 drawer dressers that we'd often stack and put our TVs on. One of them would fit your need perfectly.

All you need is a simple 1x4 frame to support a piece of 3/4" plywood. Use 2x4s ripped in half for legs, and call it done. (A few braces on the legs would be a good thing, though.) At 2'x4', that's the basis for a N- trak module. It'll handle the TV easily. (Beware 1/2" plywood. I had some that sagged so easily I had to have supports every 8 inches.)

Puckdropper

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Lobby Dosser 15 years ago

The OP is talking about a Tube TV of 150+ Pounds.

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Lobby Dosser 15 years ago

How about a triangular stand? Make the 'corner' point square. These big old TVs like some support at the back (tube) end, but you don't need to waste space with a square or rectangular stand.

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Lobby Dosser 15 years ago

Probably, it has four feet. Those, you have to support well, so put the legs and whatever bracing goes under the tabletop under those four feet.

The tabletop, actually, is only to collect clutter like the remote or a TV guide... shelves well below the TV are more useful than a tabletop.

-------------------------------------------------------------------- And a DVD player is bound to be added. Maybe X-Box ...

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basilisk 15 years ago

crt=cathode ray tube

basilisk

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clare 15 years ago

For a 30 inch CRT?????

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