Introduction: Easy Folding Ping-pong Table

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About: I am a student of industrial electronics engineering at the University of Seville. I love DIY projects and sport. I don´t have much time to get involved in new projects but I'll try to upload some of them !

Let's make a folding ping pong table as my first DIY project published in instrucables.com. The actual dimensions of a a ping pong table are 274 x 152 cm, due to the difficulty of transportation, our table will have the following dimensions 200 x 122 cm.

It is ideal to enjoy with friends or family, very easy to do and practical to save. I hope you enjoy it as much as me !

Step 1: Buy Everything You Need

The materials to use are:

Note: The materials and other items needed are purchased from Spain, prices and links may be different depending on each country. Wood and paint could be cheaper looking in specialized store instead of department stores.

Step 2: Preparing Wood

First of all we have to prepare the wooden board that we have bought. To do this, we will perform the following steps:

  1. Cut the board with the dimensions of our table (Remember: 200 x 122 cm). We'll use a jig saw:

  • We make a horizontal cut to the length of two meters, getting a board of required dimensions.

  • Thereafter, we again make a horizontal cut, to the length of one meter obtaining two boards of 100 x 122 cm.

2. We took a recess to place the hinges..

  • We place face to face our two boards placed on a work bench or ground if you do not have one.

  • We make a mark on the union of both boards at a distance of 7 cm from the right edge, a mark to 7 cm from the left edge and one mark last half of the board. These marks will be those that will indicate the positions of the three hinges that we will use

  • We place the three hinges on their respective marks, matching half of each hinge with the cut between boards.

  • We mark the outline of the hinges.

  • Once done the marks, we proceed to cut the wood, using a hammer and a chisel, we make a recess at each mark previously made. In these "gaps" shall be fitted the hinges.

3. We sandpaper well all the wood to remove the impurities, as well as the holes made to have a surface as regular as possible.

Step 3: Painting

For priming and painting we performed the following steps:

  1. We place both boards on trestles or on our workbench.

  2. With the aid of a roller and a beaker, extend priming uniformly throughout our board. We wait 3 hours and return to give a second primer.

  3. Let it dry for about 8 hours.

  4. The primer will help us to make the white lines on the court. To do this we put duct tape making the lines before starting to paint.

  5. With a new roller and a beaker (you can use the same used before), we paint both boards in green.

  6. We wait 6 hours and apply a second coat. After waiting 8 hours or more for drying, gently remove the duct tape.

Our ping pong is almost finished!

Step 4: Putting All Together

Finally, we put our hinges on the marks previously made in step 2, we will make a few finishing touches, place the network and play !

The steps involved are the following:

  1. We place both boards face to face, matching the recesses of each.

  2. We place the hinges on the said recesses (if not fit properly, you can use a hammer, by gently tapping the hinges to make them fit perfectly).

  3. Positioned the hinges in place, proceed to screw them.

  4. Once installed the 3 hinges in their place and screwed, proceed to fold the table to check the correct operation thereof.

We have our table tennis ready to use. It's time to give a final finish, such as paint the lines of the court well or tighten the hinge screws.

We place the net in place, and now we can play that table tennis tournament in our garden. As you can see on the pictures, the table can be placed both outside and interior. I hope you liked it!