Kneewall storage ideas

[roadtripray]

I don't have any drawings (yet) to explain, so I'll do my best with words.  I'm in the initial plans approval stage of my builders' cottage.  I am building this with  10' sidewalls and the 12/12 pitch roof, with the loft floor at about 7'6" above the level of the lower floor for extra loft headroom.  I'm using rafters and a ridge beam, so I'll have all that room on the sides, but not much above 5' tall.  On each side, about 2.5 feet of the room will have under 5' of headroom.

I thought about the possibility of having kneewalls on the side, so I'd have storage areas.  However, I had a bonus room over a garage once that had this storage, and it was a pain shimmying through the access door to get to the storage -- especially if you needed something all the way at the other end.  So I thought, "Why not drawers?"

Think of having a kneewall, but framing up drawers using either super long super strong drawer slides.  The problem I found was that drawer slides of heavy capacity and long reach are extemely expensive, like in the $100+ range.  So having a wall of such drawers along the knewall could easily cost you thousands to do both walls.

So then I thought why not frame a box similar to a drawer, but rather than using drawer slides, put the box on casters.  You could nail a 2X2 to the floor to act as a drawer guide so the "drawer" (cart?) would go back and forth in a straight line.  Of course that would only work for one drawer high.

Does what I'm proposing make sense?  Has anyone done something like this or seen anything similar?

Peace,
Ray

[MountainDon]

I think it could work. I'd probably like some real drawers here and there too. We use tubs under beds here at home. They have wheels and pull out the sides and/or bed foot.

I'd suggest insulating the roof not the kneewalls. You never mentioned that, but in the roof insulation makes it easier to seal. The storage dspace becomes semi conditioned space and you don't need to try and seal all those doors and drawers.

[John Raabe]

Good point Don about insulation in the rafters.

I built rolling drawers that slide out from a frame for an alcove bed. There are two large sturdy plywood boxes with a wheeled caster at each corner. They don't have any rails to keep them aligned so you need to fit them back in squared up when you roll them under the bed. All the same they are great for storage that needs only occasional access. If you needed to get into such a drawer several times a day this solution would get tedious.

[UK4X4]

I have done the very same thing before- but for vehicle drawers

ie in the back of every suv I buy I build drawer systems- for my recovery and repair gear

some i have used PTFE strips as the runners
some with drawer slides
some with little wheels on the bottom of the drawers

All work fine, obviously the best are the slides, but the PTFE strips worked well too

the wheels I used were too small for the weight and cut grooves into the wood untill it was just wood on wood.

I've also seen angle iron runners and small bearings as wheels on large drawers.

Things to consider are length of the drawers and weight of the gear to be stored- weight = friction to overcome

[roadtripray]

I agree with insulating the rafters rather than the kneewall.  The house I had with the bonus room over the garage had insulated kneewalls.  the storage area was miserably hot in the South Carolina summers, and if you opened the kneewall door to retrieve something -- even for a few seconds -- it would instantly jack up the room temperature ridiculously high.  Not to mention how much worse  it was on sensitive items you may want to store, such as electronics or musical instruments.

.... and if I do the drawer/cart idea it will make even more sense to insulate the rafters.  I'll try and do a sketchup drawing of my concept one day.

Peace,
Ray