Mailboxes are used to receive letters, newspapers and magazines. At the entrances of apartment buildings, each time passing by, one involuntarily has to admit their unattractive uniformity. Anyone can do mailboxes with their own hands. Surprise your neighbors with your creativity!
Mailbox: bright accent at home
You can select a standard mailbox from the total mass, making it noticeable, recognizable, distinguished by originality.
The easiest way is to repaint it in a different color, different from the rest of the boxes. You can go further and apply any pattern or pattern, it depends on the artistic abilities. There must be an apartment number on the box. Diagonally applied numbers will also give the box some originality.
The impossibility of making changes to the design of the apartment box somewhat limits the embodiment of creative and design fantasies. You can make a mailbox yourself from improvised materials.
A variety of styles and shapes
Another thing is the installation of a mailbox in a country house or in the country. You can make it yourself, and it will look exactly the way you want. Making a box with your own hands, you can stick to a certain style. There are several basic styles:
- Standard. An ordinary box of rectangular shape, can be metal or wooden. Mounted to a wall or fence.
- American. An elongated box, on top of a semicircular shape. It is mounted on a support. A decoration can be a voluminous figure. A distinctive feature is the signal flag, indicating the presence of correspondence in the box.
- English. Emphasizes its solidity. This is a metal box mounted in the wall or a brick stand with an impressive niche for mail, installed near the entrance to the house.
- Original. It involves the use of cases from old household appliances (microwave oven, system unit) as a mailbox.
Requirements
It’s easy to make a mailbox with your own hands. The photos below will help determine the design of the product.
Whatever the style of the mailbox, it must meet some requirements: durability, convenience and protection against rain drops and snow falling on correspondence.
Standard wooden mailbox
For the box you will need the following set:
- plywood sheet with a thickness of at least 5 mm;
- wooden blocks 15 × 15 mm;
- furniture hinges;
- small tin plate;
- wood hacksaw or jigsaw;
- hammer;
- fastening material (screws, nails).
The size of the mailbox should be such that a standard A4 sheet of paper fits freely in it. Let's try to make mailboxes with our own hands right now.
Getting to work
Two blanks with dimensions of 350 × 250 mm and 350 × 70 mm are cut from plywood. These will be the front and back walls and sides. For the lower part, a workpiece of size 250 × 70 mm is cut. It is from this that a wooden mailbox begins to be created. With his own hands, anyone can do it.
At the top of the box there should be a gap of about 20 mm for correspondence. Therefore, the workpiece is made with a size of 250 × 50 mm, in this case, the slot will be placed near the edge of the upper part of the box. You can also cut two workpieces with a size of 250 × 25 mm, then the slot for correspondence will be located in the middle. The lower bar should be 250 × 70 mm in size.
Four bars are cut in lengths of 350 mm and 220 mm. They will be located in the corners of the box and give rigidity to the structure.
For durability, it is advisable to treat all parts before assembly with solutions that repel insects and prevent rot.
Drawer assembly
Using emery paper, deburring is removed on all workpieces and smoothing small irregularities. The bars are assembled into a rectangle. The front wall (350 × 250 mm) is laid on them. The sides of the bars are combined with the ends of the plywood blanks, and they are fixed with nails or screws. The use of glue together with nails will increase the strength of the joint and increase the tightness. Glue is applied to the side of the bar and to the edge of the plywood blank. Then they are connected and fixed with nails.
In a similar way, the back wall is connected to the bars. A very important point - do not forget about fixing the box to the fence or wall of the house. To do this, two eyes are screwed to the upper edge of the rear wall.
The front and rear walls are placed on the end edges and sequentially fastened to the side strips (350 × 70 mm). The upper part of the box consists of two slats (250 × 25 mm). They are fastened with nails and glue so that a gap of about 20 mm remains between them.
The bottom of the box is folding so that it is possible to take out correspondence. To do this, two furniture hinges are screwed to the long edge of the plank, and a small corner loop for the mail lock is attached to the opposite side of the plank. Then the furniture hinges are connected to the rear wall, the bottom is closed, and at the level of the hinge for the lock, a second eyelet is attached to the front wall.
To prevent rain and snow from falling into the mailbox slot from above, a protective plate is cut out and installed from the sheet. It should be with rounded edges, slightly larger than the top of the box. The plate is made folding, for this it is attached to the rear wall on small furniture hinges.
There is an option for a mailbox with an opening front wall. In this case, the box is assembled in the same way, only the front side is hinged.
After assembly, the box is carefully processed with sandpaper, painting and decorative finishing are performed.
Recently, a widespread technique of decorative finishing - decoupage. This is a cut out of paper, magazines or postcards of bright colorful pictures. Cut pictures are glued to the surface and covered with several layers of varnish. The subject of pictures can be selected in accordance with the house or the surrounding landscape. This is how the original mailboxes are obtained. Do it yourself with your own hands.
Signal flag mailbox
The box will be located on the inside of the fence. With an alarm flag make an American mailbox. We will decorate it with our own hands, in addition, for it you will need a stand with a slope. They are made from a profile pipe 50 × 25 mm.
The base of the box is cut out of plywood with a thickness of at least 10 mm with dimensions of 400 × 400 mm, carefully primed and stained.
When the paint dries, the base is attached to the rack with screws. The resulting platform is installed to the fence and fixed.
Creative process
On the outside of the fence, opposite the platform, a slot for correspondence is cut. Its dimensions are 250 × 20 mm. The plates are fixed on both sides of the slit. From the outside of the fence, on the upper part of the lining, a shutter is fixed by bolting. The screw and nut are not completely tightened, allowing the shutter to move to the right and left. To prevent the connection from loosening during operation and the nut to slip off the screw, a lock nut is tightened over it. Self-made mailboxes will not only attract attention, but will also bring joy to the owners of the house.
The signal device consists of two plates located at an angle of 90 ° relative to each other and mounted on a steel rod. The signal device is located so that the raised plate is opposite the slot in the fence, and the other is on the platform. The mail correspondence inserted into the slot will lay the plate, and the signal plate will rise. In the absence of mail, the device must be in the working position; for this, a counterweight in the form of a small load is installed on the upper edge of the signal plate.
A rod with plates is fixed on the platform using carbon loops. The hinges are screwed to the platform with self-tapping screws, located as close to the plates as possible. This will prevent the rod from falling out of the loops.
The frame for the box is assembled from bars with a cross section of at least 15 × 15 mm. The parameters are determined by the size of mail correspondence - 350 × 250 × 250 mm. On the platform, the box is located so that the signal plate is outside.
The box is sheathed, depending on what it will be stylized. This can be a dollhouse, in a rustic style or in the form of a warehouse, sheathed with sheets of iron.
To simulate a village house, trim boards of lining are well suited. The walls of the dollhouse can be made of fiberboard (wood-fiber board) with glued napkins for decoupage. The storage room is sheathed with pieces of galvanized sheet. A signal plate cut out in the form of a corresponding character will help to make a complete look.
To be able to pick up mail, the upper part of the box, it is the roof of the house, is folding. To do this, use small furniture hinges that connect the base of the roof to the back wall of the box. Also in the back wall of the box you need to make a cutout for correspondence.
Fasten the components
The connection of all parts is done on glue and nails. After assembly, we color the mailboxes with our own hands using paints of the corresponding colors. Wooden details of the house are carefully painted over. The paint is selected glossy waterproof. The assembled house is attached to the platform, close to the fence, the cutout in the rear wall is combined with a slot in the fence.
Any mailbox can be supplemented with an electric alarm. It consists of two contact plates, two wires, a battery and a light bulb. A simple electrical circuit is assembled, in the gap of which are the contact plates. The plates are cut out of a plastic bottle, some ends remain fastened together, contact strips are fixed on the others. A soft spring is installed between the plates. Plates are placed at the bottom of the box. Correspondence placed in the mailbox closes the contacts with its weight, and the control lamp lights up.
When everything is finished, and the structure is installed in place, on the outside of the fence, near the slit for correspondence, it is necessary to make an explanatory inscription “MAIL”.
Style and prestige
The forged mailbox looks gorgeous. With his own hands, he can be made by a person who does an excellent job with a welding tool. First comes up with a layout. It is cut out of metal, the parts are fixed by welding and set in a constant place. It is important to consider a small foundation for the box. So it will stand for a longer period of time.
Any shape and size can be a street mailbox. With your own hands you can create a real masterpiece.