Adjustable standing desks tend to be extremely pricey — the Ergonomics Now model in our office retails for over $1000. If you want to get the posture benefits without the crippling price tag, this DIY alternative from IKEA Hackers could be worth a look.
The FINNVARD adjustable standing desk requires two FINNVARD trestles which retail for $100 apiece. You’ll also need an IKEA LINNMON tabletop in the colour of your choice, a power drill, a 15mm and 6mm drill bit and four pieces of 1×3 red oak cut into 22-inch pieces. Assuming you own or can borrow a power drill, the whole project should cost well under $300.
Here are the key steps to constructing your own standing desk:
- Mark your holes according to the plans shown in the diagrams.
- Drill the large holes with the 15mm bit. This is the right size to reuse the IKEA wooden pegs that you use to adjust the desk.
- Drill the holes in the one end with the 6mm bit. This is a bit tricky, but see tip below. Also, make sure you drill in the right end.
- Substitute the short vertical pieces from IKEA with the ones you just made (see photo below), and build the FINNVARD trestles just like in the IKEA instructions.
TIPS:
- When drilling the 15mm holes, you can use the IKEA piece as a drill guide if you have a couple of clamps to secure them together. Once you make one piece, you can use that one as a guide for the other three to make sure you get them all the same alignment. A drill press would make things a lot easier.
When drilling the smaller holes, if you have already built the trestle part you can use the trestle as a clamp to hold the wood vertical so you can drill it properly.
“I really like the desk because you can adjust it to your height. It also looks nice and not just like a pile of furniture like many inexpensive standing desks,” the desk’s creator explains. If you’d prefer to make things easier, you can also pick up a kit from DIY Standing Desk which contains all the non-IKEA parts pre-drilled and cut to size.
One thing to be mindful of is that the design is quite wide due to the splayed legs — if you’re looking for a narrower option, check out our previous IKEA standing desk hacks!
[Via IKEA Hackers]
Comments
4 responses to “Hack An IKEA Trestle Into An Adjustable Standing Desk”
That’s one ugly desk!
Looks pretty flimsy, like it would have a lot of rocking side to side and probably eventually shear apart.
“It also looks nice and not just like a pile of furniture” wooooow, did this guy misplace his glasses or something? A pile of furniture is exactly what it looks like… Well that, and it’s also really just ugly…
It looks like it would rock from side to side quite easy, and being supported by only 4 wooden pegs I doubt it could hold much weight…
Depending how tall you are this would be much better and apparently cheaper
http://www.ikea.com/au/en/catalog/products/S99895948/
I am 180cm tall and i think id need it to be 110cm ish high, but it only goes 60 to 90, there is probably a solution for that (click putting some other furniture under it for storage area and to boost the height (74cm is a good height for my sitting desk with this chair, so id assume i need a 14cm high stand for it but thats too much for a sitting position for me).