Thread: Antique Steel/Cast iron bed frame restoration

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This bed is for my daughter Izzy. We purchased it at an auction 3-4 years ago. I had it sand blasted and it has been in storage since. Well, the time has come where she needs a bigger bed. You know what that means, another project for me. Haha When I dug it back out this time, I noticed some one has cut off the upper half of the foot board. I searched to find pictures of this particular bed with no luck. My wife wanted to sell the frame and use a different one we have since she was upset that someone hacked the foot board. I told her I could replicate the original one. So we are keeping it and following through with it. Izzy wants the bed yellow, so yellow it will be.

The first pic is when I assembled the bed for the first time. 2nd and 3rd pic are making the upper rail for the foot board. I have been working splits at work so rather than waste fuel driving home, I just stay and work on this. I thought the foot board was supposed to match the head board in the fashion that the top rail would curve out. But after I bent the top tube, I noticed that they also cut the bars at the bottom. They are supposed to go up to the top tube. So now I'm trying to decide if I should make the top tube straight or use the curved one I made. I'm leaning towards straight so the upright bars have no bends in them. The foot board tube is 1" so I got some 1" conduit to make the upper bar. I couldn't find anyone with a 1" conduit bender, and wasn't feeling the need to buy 1 for a 1 time use. So I improvised as seen in pic 2. I cheated and got some 1" 90s off of ebay. 3rd pic is just mock up of the front rail on the head board. Once I decide to go straight or curved on the foot board, I can get going on it.