Category: Harbor Freight

Based upon Michael Olson’s  “Heavy Duty Mobile Cart from 2×4’s”   I made my own heavy duty cart with half-lap joints much like his, enough so that I thought I should attribute his video as a source of inspiration. Furthermore, I put together a sketchup file for the project. For the wheels I took apart a Harbor Freight furniture dolly.

Some of the things I would differently is that the drawers are a little deep and too tall. I think that after I load them up with typical items that belong to a drill press cart the drawers might end up being too heavy. So ideally the drawers should be at most 7″ tall and maybe put drawers in from both sides while using the rear drawers for more permanent storage (all those things that I never use and should probably get rid of) and place the diagonal cross member in the middle making the drawers about 13″ deep. It would be nice if two of the front casters would lock in place so the cart does not wander around at all when I am using it.
The drill press I placed on top is a Dayton 3Z993C with a RJ33A-13L chuck. The drill press comes in at around 110 lbs. I have no qualms with placing 300+ lbs on the cart.

I will add some more picture soon of the project on the way to completion along with the completed version. Let me know if you have any questions!

Here is the finished cart:

I got the inspiration for this build from when Nick Ferry on YouTube had a shop organization project using the Harbor Freight parts bin storage units.

I did not have any vertical wall space to use and I felt that having to reach a little higher if they were in a stacked manner would not be convenient. Furthermore, the white wire shelf that I replaced always had the brackets in the way and never really was good at keeping somewhat unstable footprint items from falling.

Here is the finished product. I just need to spend some time labeling the parts bin so I don’t waste any time searching for the right bin.

 

The way I am going to label them is much easier than Nick’s method. I think he would appreciate it since he has a background in theater work. It is gaffer’s tape. The kind I have has an extremely strong adhesive with a cloth surface that a Sharpy really takes well to.

 

Here is the file for the Sketchup plan.

Please let me know what you think!

–Tim