Scrap Pallet Desk

I started off on Google and YouTube looking for ideas for a desk and came across ideas made from pallets. After I had saw a few very interesting things, I decided to take it into my hands and ideas. This whole project was to be resourceful more than anything using only wood I had left from projects, although I had to break down and spend 3.50 on a 2×4.

I had 2 pallets to use, one 2×4 (which was THE only wood purchased to use for the just the legs), a piece of plywood, and other scrap wood to join the legs together and make a angle leg brace, a cross brace under the table for stability and a couple pieces of 1×6 to attached the to the underside of the table.(to be able to attach it to the table frame).

I cut a piece of plywood to the size of the desk I wanted and start miter cutting the pieces of pallet wood on a 45 angle across on one side. After I had all the pieces laid out to fit and style I wanted, I glued them down and used finish nails around ends and across the middles and clamped them down.

Note: I did not miter and measure to fit, I only mitered one side, after the glue had dried I ran a circular saw to cut off the access wood on each side. I then sanded the top to my liking.

I then cut the pallet frame to fit table top of the desk, flipped upside down and attached 1×6 around the edges to the table top, then used pocket holes to attach the top to the frame of the desk. I then, cut my legs to the height I wanted, made some braces to fit between them, used a piece of the long part of a pallet to attach the back legs, I also built a shelf to match the top, and used the keg jig to attach it into place.

I also stained the legs dark walnut; I had an odd leg that didn’t match so taking a stain to them made sense, the legs are the only thing that got stained, all was natural colors. After all was assembled I took the sander out again to smooth out the edges and give a final look over I used three coats of a Polycyclic water-based clear coat.