For my final project I am building a camping table to put in the back of my car. I am a fan of camping out of my car, and I would love to have something that I can put things to cook on when I want to. I would also love it if it’s something that I have made myself, even if it is technically worse than buying a camping table from REI or some other outdoor store.
There are some serious specifications I have for my project. I want the table to be large enough so that I can work with it. I can use the trunk of my car for some storage, but to be able to put up a cutting board and a grill on it so I can have cook comfortably. I also want it to connect to my car. If the table connects to the trunk nicely I would be happy with it. I also want it to be able to store in the back of my trunk, so if I could fold it up and store it with other camping gear it would be awesome. I want the table to look good too, so I am not going to make it out of plywood or anything like that, but nice wood stained boards so that it can fit to my aesthetic. I also want to make the legs touching the ground to be adjustable so that I can put it on uneven ground.
There are some constraints I have for my table. I need it to attach to the trunk of my car using the trunk latch hook, I need to find a way to properly connect it to the hook so that it stays on. I also need it to be the proper height of my car, with the adjustable legs, so that it can be as flat of a surface as possible for cooking. I also needed the folded down size of the table small enough to fit in the trunk of my car so that I cant take it around. I want to laser cut some designs into the side boarding and maybe legs, so I need them to be small enough to fit in the laser cutter. A final major constraint is that I live in an apartment and can not do any major woodworking at home, so I need to arrange times so that I can do some work on it at my friend’s house.
The trunk latch in my Toyota Forerunner
4 Comments. Leave new
Hey there Gare Bear, I think this is a wondrous idea. You might run into some trouble fitting some of your pieces in the laser cutters so you might want to consider hand carving the designs into your table. This would also let you carve closer to the edging of your table, which would make for some very interesting designs. I personally have never done this, but I think it would add a level of pride knowing that you did all the edging yourself.
Thanks for the comment Ethan! I think I would take a lot pride in doing the edging myself, that is a great idea!
Hi Garrett. I think that this is a great plan for your project. Also, I think that having it connect to your car will definitely help with the stability of the table. I’m not sure how many legs you are planning on doing, but I know that chairs/tables with three legs cannot be wobbly, so I would recommend doing two legs in addition to the connection to your car.
Thanks for the comment Jonathan! I am planning on adding to legs to the other side of the table from where it attaches to the car, so it should be stable.