Bicycle Display Hook Made From Pallet Wood

My task for myself was to make something to display my bicycle in my living room in a way that looked awesome! And the key part was on the cheep! (pretty much free!!) 

Materials- A scrap piece of wood from a broken down pallet, screws, wood glue and clear coat paint or stain of your choice..

Tools- Table Saw
             Hand drill and Drill press with 3/8 pocket hole bit
             Belt sander with 120 grit paper and 320 grit sand paper for hand sanding
             Miter saw

 

Step one was to rip down the wood to straighten it out somewhat and make square-ish. 

As always practice Safety! Yes I do not have a blade guard but that is how mine was bought second hand. I do use a push stick which keeps my hands away from the blade. 

2nd Step Was to use the Belt sander on the wood to remove the roughness of the wood but still leave some of the look of the wood.
I had 120 grit sanding belt on which took a while to sand down to what I liked.

I didn't have any set lengths for this project so I just made sure that I had a longer piece for the front piece, two are for the side supports and the third holds the bike wheel.

Cut lengths
Front- 10 and 3/4 
Sides- 5 and 3/8 
Wheel support- 4 and 3/4

Sorry forgot to take photos of this process. But what I did was premark each hole with it just dry setup to figure out where I wanted each support at for the wall.
My wall happens to be 5 and 1/2 inch's wide so I made my wall supports just a little wider. I then measured out for the wheel support, being that I'm only going to display my road bike I didn't need much room for the skinny tire. I spaced it out from the wall support at two inch's.

If you are going to use a Mountain Bike type of tire you will just have to increase the front brace piece of wood to allow for a greater distance from the wall support to the wheel support.

As you can see in this pic I have screwed the pieces together, I just used standard drywall screws I had around. I also put some glue on each joining piece of wood for greater strength. You will also notice the inset holes for the screws which are 3/8 for the wood plugs. 

The wood plugs I cut using my drill press and a 3/8 hole plug bite, I used some different wood to add contrast to my project (Tiger Maple)

I once again turned to the belt sander to quickly sand down the wood plugs. You can also see my little mess up with the drill bit where it snagged the wood, I just used a little wood filler.

After I was satisfied with the sanding I made sure to wipe down the piece with a tack cloth before clear coat was put on. 

I put on two coats with one sanding in between with 320 grit paper.

This project was pretty simple to make and only took a day. As you can see I do not have it attached to the wall which is what my whole intentions were for this project, its just held in by the weight of the bicycle. I made it at TechShop

Hope you enjoy checking out my project I made it at TechShop