How to Build a Picnic Table

mom this thing is terrible it is don't sit in the middle don't sit in the middle I don't P you so this table has been around for 25 years so for it being that old I honestly don't think it's in that bad a shape but I do think it's but I do think it's high time that my folks get a brand new one so in this week's video I'm going to be building a traditional style picnic table now I've been getting a ton of comments and questions regarding when I'm going to be getting my new shop unfortunately it's not going to be for a few months so in the meantime I am primarily working from the tailgate of my truck and or my dad's shop which is fine because the weather's perfect for it right now but also I hope it gives you a reminder you don't have to have a dedicated Workshop in order to do projects that you want for the picnic table I set up a stop block at the miter and started cutting all of the boards that will make up the top to link now if you want specifics I do have a set of plans on my website for you to build your own I'm going to be building the entire table from treated material so once the wood fully dries then I'll come back and give it a coat of paint after getting all of the top pieces cut I decided to cut the outside boards with an angle just to give it a little bit of a of a decorative look I laid out all of the boards and arranged them in the way that I wanted them then I cut the boards that will be attached to the underside in order to connect all of the boards for the tabletop on these end pieces is I went ahead and used pocket holes then for the inside boards I went straight into the underside next I moved the tabletop up to some saw horses and started attaching the legs and since I'm building it upside down it's also acting as my makeshift workbench to attach the legs I clamped them in place and pre-drilled hole I use carriage bolts with some flat washers and nuts to attach them after getting in one in each leg I can then remove the clamps and then repeat the process in order to put a second Carriage bolt into each leg when it came time to add on the leg bracing I would first cut one end off hold it in place by way of of a makeshift shelf which is made out of clamps and then just Mark the other end on where it needed to be cut then I could clamp that into place and repeat the process using two carriage bolts per leg now you could stop there however I decided to come back with the diagonal member just to give it some more left and right stability now if you have a helping hand then it would be great just to each take an end and flip it over but if you're like me and you're working by yourself then you just got to take it slow and be a little creative I'm a champion I know I said I was going to build a traditional style picnic table but I decided to make removable benches instead of attach benches just because I personally find it easier to be able to scoot the bench out sit down and then scoot it back in but the benches are very simple they're pretty much a direct duplicate of the table but just in the smaller form so I cut the top attach the underside bracing and then attach the legs again using some carriage bolts [Applause] however when I put the first bench down and sat on it I realized that it was just a tad bit too low I called in my dad to get a second opinion look good I think it might be too low it's little low I mean it's not stupid it's kind of maybe a little low okay no big deal so the cool thing about this build is that it was very easy to correct I could just simply take out the carriage bolts take off the leg pieces cut some longer ones and then reattach them and that turned out to be a much better height however since I did extend them I figured I'd add in some additional support some leg supports and then also cutting in a diagonal member and you can see here just how much of a big difference this diagonal member makes here's one with the diagonal members and then this one I don't even want to step on it and if I can't step on it well then I can't trust it with all three pieces done I loaded it up in the back of my pickup truck actually using those Lumber racks that I made last summer man they come in handy hey that's cool that is cool then I just drag it over to where my folks wanted it and offloaded it into place now this is a very quick build so if you're looking for a fun Springtime project to do maybe even with to family and I definitely recommend this one one last test yep I trust all three of these pieces that's going to be it for this one I hope that you enjoyed the video I'm definitely going to get tons of use out of this you would like to build your own then of course I have a set of plans on my website and I will link those in the description below big thank you to Rockler for supporting my channel and as always I will see you on whatever it is I'm working on next yeah we'll move in in just a second okay this looks

Channel: April Wilkerson

Views: 414,253

Keywords: Picnic table, building a picnic table, outdoor project, easy woodworking project, limited tools project, Good DIY present, Woodworking present, 2x4 project, Triton tools, April Wilkerson, picnic table designs, Picnic table plans, free plans for picnic table, how to build a table, strong picnic table, picnic tables

Id: 5l5ckkep7K0

Length: 5min 44sec (344 seconds)

Published: Sun Mar 12 2017