Question
I'm building a bed for a customer. Bed includes frame and panel head and foot boards and side boards. Their desired look includes four posts that are about 4" X 4" in cross section. Looks like I'm going to get about 1 1/4" out of my stock for the rails and panels and side rails.
The question is where to make the connection for the side rails and head and foot boards into the head and foot posts. If I center the head/foot boards and the side rails on the posts, which I think would look best, I will have a 1 1/4" triangle from each post protruding into the mattress area. Looks like this might get into the way of the mattress. However, if I pull the posts "outward" from the head/foot board and side rails, they will look too bulky. What do you folks think? I've made beds before, but not with such large posts. Always centered the panel/rail on the post, or nearly so, and it looked and worked fine.
Forum Responses
(Furniture Making Forum)
From contributor P:
Could you make the tenons off-center to take up some of that corner? I think I'd be concerned about not centering the mortise. It seems to me that if the occupants of the bed get a little rambunctious, the torsional force would be increased if the mortise is off-center, and this could create a problem.
I inset the hardware about 1.25" in from the inside of post, that gives me about 3/8's to .5" of play for the mattress. I also make my siderails an inch or two longer then the mattress length to allow for thick bedding or comforters.
