Furniture Dolly

Homemade Furniture Dolly

If you have experienced moving homes then you will be familiar with the furniture dolly device and its use as a valuable time saving tool. You could have only a few people helping you to move your belongings and furniture, but as long as you have a few of these moving dollies handy it won’t take more than one day. If you have never heard of the furniture dolly then it is a very simple tool made of either a flat piece of board or frame that rests on a set of 4 swivel coaster wheels. In some cases the board will be covered with a layer of soft material, such as carpet or rubber to prevent your furniture from being scratched and to grip to the surface of the item.

If you’re looking to buy a furniture dolly then you are likely to find various types at your local home depot store. The price range varies greatly depending on the brand, type of material used and any additional features it might have included. Most of the popular models will be constructed from hardwood, with a soft layer of carpet over the top; these will sell for any price under $100.

You probably have a good deal of furniture to move and for that you will need 2-3 furniture dolly trolleys to speed up the moving process. For a fraction of the cost of buying that many dollies, you can actually build your own, if you look through your home and garage you will probably be able to find all of the materials needed to get started. All you need to build a single furniture dolly is 4 swivel coaster wheels, a handful of screws, a few lengths of 2 x 4 planks, a 18” x 32” flat plywood board, some glue and a roll of carpet material.

Even if you don’t have all of the mentioned materials in your home, you could easily purchase them for well under $100 at your local home depot store. To get started on building a furniture dolly, you’ll need to first trim the plywood board if it isn’t already 18” x 32” in length and width, do this with a regular hand saw of another wood cutting device.

The second step is to build a bottom frame to attach to the underside of the plywood board, cut the 2 by 4 plank into 4 separate bits; two of them will be 32” in length, while the other two will be 10”. You will want to screw the two 32” lengths to each side of the board and then attach the two 10” lengths to either end, forming a rectangular frame around the bottom edge.

The main platform has now been built and reinforced with a frame, you can cut out a piece of carpet to glue to the front side of the plywood board, this will act as a scratch protecting layer. After it has fully bonded to the wood, screw the 4 swivel coaster wheels to the frame underside, keeping them 2.5” in from each edge so that the furniture dolly can be tilted to fit under a large item of furniture. To add extra maneuverability to the dolly you can drill two ½ inch holes through the front side of the board and thread a length of rope through and knotting the ends, this will act as a pulley.