For my proposed plan so far, I have the casters outset so their center is wider than the load, even when the caster wheels are rotating inward, but my question is, are the casters positioned far enough apart to prevent tipping? Bear in mind that every inch of extension is an inch of lost usable space between this cart and whatever wall it is against. Thoughts?
I probably should’ve explained more about both the situation and my needs. Right now I have a stack of plywood stored as in stacked on their sides, just simply by leaning them against the wall. I need them up off the garage floor in case of water. And some of them are beginning to take a curve because they’re leaning too much. The passage way is narrow. I could build a fixed slot to keep them more straight up, but if I ever needed to clear out that area for access to, whatever, having it fixed could be a problem. My thought on the casters was not that this thing would be used to move plywood around at all, or ever, merely giving me the ability to painstakingly get the stack moved, if I desperately needed to clear the way for access in a narrow corridor in the basement garage. I could even unload it before moving it. The greater challenge would be the risk of falling over by merely fumbling through the plywood to insert or remove a sheet. Think of it as a mostly unmoved storage rack that offers the option to move it rarely. The concept that it has wheels on it is why I used the word dolly, but I realize in retrospect I shouldn’t have use the word dolly. I already have a factory made, Grizzly brand, sheet goods dolly for moving plywood from one area of the basement to the other.
If I do make this and I go ahead and put wheels on it, I may, either or both, make the base stance wider, and/or put detachable safety braces at the top, so that it cannot fall over, but then I could use the wheels if I detached the safety brace.
It’s a risk I would not take. While it might be OK, an accident could have very serious consequences indeed!
My last ply storage rack is in use at one of my sons in law’s sheds- it had an 8 x2 bottom and “spine” with sides truncated half inch ply. It was hinged at the “spine” with a couple of ball bearing gate hinges and had a single transverse caster on the outer end.
I have a couple of handy Dollie’s made from roughly 12” triangles of mdf each with 3 chair castors which I use for dragging stuff around
The scenario I have in my mind is rolling that thing and have the two forward casters flip around as they catch on wood chips then the sheets tip to one side and the momentum starts to topple the unit but you can’t catch it because the wheels are now allowing the bottom to roll out from under the unit.
Maybe if you make it deeper than 12" you could use the spaces on the bottom for long ripped scrap - less than 2’ high or so. Or 2’x8’ storage on the front and 2’x4’ storage on the left and right rear.
Can you use non-caster wheels on one side to broaden the stance and limit it’s travel direction?
I would just store all your sheets in the van outside.
Do you need a storage dolly to hold lots of sheets, that could result in a bad day if they tip…
Or, do you just need a Plywood Transport Dolly/Carrier that can help carry 1-2 sheets from your van to storage area, and from storage area to CNC, or your V1E inspired vertical panel saw?
I probably should’ve explained more about both the situation and my needs. Right now I have a stack of plywood stored as in stacked on their sides, just simply by leaning them against the wall. I need them up off the garage floor in case of water. And some of them are beginning to take a curve because they’re leaning too much. The passage way is narrow. I could build a fixed slot to keep them more straight up, but if I ever needed to clear out that area for access to, whatever, having it fixed could be a problem. My thought on the casters was not that this thing would be used to move plywood around at all, or ever, merely giving me the ability to painstakingly get the stack moved, if I desperately needed to clear the way for access in a narrow corridor in the basement garage. I could even unload it before moving it. The greater challenge would be the risk of falling over by merely fumbling through the plywood to insert or remove a sheet. Think of it as a mostly unmoved storage rack that offers the option to move it rarely. The concept that it has wheels on it is why I used the word dolly, but I realize in retrospect I shouldn’t have use the word dolly. I already have a factory made, Grizzly brand, sheet goods dolly for moving plywood from one area of the basement to the other.
If I do make this and I go ahead and put wheels on it, I may, either or both, make the base stance wider, and/or put detachable safety braces at the top, so that it cannot fall over, but then I could use the wheels if I detached the safety brace.
You need to think about the center of gravity (COG), which with several sheets of plywood added, would be 2’ higher than the lower shelf. That means that any sideways force (pulling, moving, bumping into it, etc.) would cause quite a bit of leverage, with the wheels below being the pivot point.
Looking at the picture with the blue background, the casters rotate such that the contact point on the wheels is only an inch or so outside the vertical supports. With the above noted high COG and the associated leverage, this is VERY likely to tip over the way it is currently designed.
I would move the casters out at least 4-6" on each side, and even then I would test it for stability after it was built.
Thanks, everyone for the great feedback. I will either make the stance wider, or adopt a stand that positions the plywood in a leaning stance, with an open side, or remove the casters and build a fixed in place rack, or some mixture.
I made this some years ago for my plywood needs; it doesn’t hold as much as you need, but it’s very handy for lumber and offcuts. Just an idea to get the gears turning.
I haven’t had any tipping issues.
At this point, I am thinking I’ll likely go ahead and make the design like the one @coinbird posted, and rearrange things to make room in a different location.
Found a pic of mine from 2005. The idea was to keep storage to a minimum width, a car parked beside it, to remove ply - remove the car and roll the rack out (hinged on the left hand side)
I was recently working on a way to get some of my 1x and 2x stock off the basement floor and overhead, and built some beefy plywood-reinforced 2x hangers to attach to my joists above, only to realize that I need to take a physics refresher course, because the design was all wrong, so I pulled them down before everything could fall on my head.
A rolling cart is next on my list to try, as having something that could store some dimensional lumber and some sheet goods would be a reasonable compromise…at least I could easily move it around, unlike a pile on the floor.
The irony is that I have a welder so I could probably build a stronger and better designed hanging rack…I just can’t use the welder now because it’s too cold to have the garage open to prevent fumes building up, plus we actually park our cars in the garage like complete weirdos.
BTW - haven’t bought any plans from the ShopNation guy, but he’s definitely a solid resource on YouTube for shop organization stuff.
What if you added hinged outriggers for when you’re moving or accessing stuff in it?
I’m thinking like a triangular plywood panel on each side centered on the wide portion with it’s own caster that could fold into the footprint of the main cart when stored, but fold out and lock in place to provide stability when needed.
Apart from that, the design in the pics needs diagonals somewhere, or it won’t even hold itself up.
@Devhammer - Thanks for the helpful concepts and feedback.
The thin sheet of plywood shown is meant to be an attached skin to provide bracing against skew. Kind of like how adding the thin back on a bookshelf sturdies it right up.
Much more concerned about skew in the narrow dimension.
While there are things you could do to improve the original design and minimize the footprint, I think going with a larger design like the shop nation build would probably be wise.
Easy to underestimate the forces at play, and when you get a few sheets of 3/4” ply moving, whether in the direction you intend, or falling over, those forces can quickly turn against you.
