Pet Stairs From Recycled Wood Pallet

I built some low cost pet stairs that assist the pets to climb up on higher beds or a couch with reclaimed wood from a discarded pallet.

We reclaimed a room in the house and put a spare bed in it, but the bed is too high for the pets to climb/jump up on it. While my wife was shopping on Amazon for pet stairs, I went into the garage and whipped these up within a couple hours, before she could place her order. I had the pallet wood laying around from a previous reclaim project, a Lending Library.

1. A salvaged wooden pallet (typically pine or oak)
2. Brad, staples, screws, or other wood fasteners. I used an air powered stapler with 2" staples
3. Staples for carpet. I used 1/2" depth
4. 2'x6' carpet runner (purchased for under $12)

Tools

1. Hammer
2. Crowbar
3. Nailer (air or electric)
4. Hand powered staple gun
5. Utility knife

I had this spare oak lumber laying around from another project. Step 1 (previously completed) would be to disassemble the pallet with Hammer and Crowbar, pulling all nails if possible.

The flat planks measured roughly 1/2" x 5" (varied from 4.75 to 5.25"). I made a rough plan for the depth and height of the stairs with making the minimal amount of cuts. I measured the width of the foot of the bed to know my size limit and just used a nice 18" for the width of the stairs. I used the 2x4 support pieces of the pallet for the interior supports.

Since this was for the pets and not intended for human use, it is not fully supported underneath nor the standard stair height or depth. I just used what was easiest to achieve with what I had on hand. I cobbled together a basic side at a time with scrap pieces to hold the corners of the stairs together. Then nailing on the planks on all sides to hold it all together. Some of the interior wood is actually pine scraps (some damaged), but the exterior is all white oak.

I did rip a few 5" boards down the middle to make the steps about 7.5" deep, as 10" would have been too deep.

The interior four corner supports are a bit longer to act as legs. There is a horizontal 2x4 support at each seam from the 5" planks. The front edge of the step is supported by the vertical 5" kick plate/plank.

All is rough cut, no sanding, no finishing.

Once completely assembled, it's time to add the carpet. I purchased a cheap runner carpet that was wider than my stairs. I started at the bottom of the first step kick plate, aligning the bottom right corner of the carpet and working my way up. I hand stapled the carpet to the oak with 1/2" staples. Some staples that did not go in very deep, I persuaded with a hammer afterwards. The trimmed/sewn edge of the carpet aligned with the right side of the steps. I cut off the excess on the left side and wrapped the carpet over the edge and stapled underneath.

Fast and cheap!