Slat Display Wall

While looking for a way to display my rifles, I decided that a slat wall would be the best option.  That is until I saw the price.  Now, this may not be the best display for a retail location, since we all know what happens when we are not looking.  So, I had some inquiries on how I built the project.  I chose to use Cedar fence planks for rough finish and to keep cost low.  These ran just over $3.00 per plank at 6' in length.  It would have been better to use Cedar boards but the cost being 4 times as much for an experiment was something I couldn't justify.  The planks came dogged eared like typical fence pickets.  I trimmed these off at 70" OAL.  Then I cut a groove on the bottom of each plank the width of my sawblade so the bracket could fit inside.  This measurement will very depending on the brackets used.  Next, I cut three sections of 2x4 at 40" in length and attached the planks at the correct spacing.  In my case, the spacing between boards was equal to the width of the bracket arm, which resulted in an overall height of 40".  Next was securing it to the wall, which I did with typical concrete anchor screws.  Total material cost was around $50 for this little experiment.  If I were to do it over and use dimensional correct Cedar boards, it would be around $125 to $150 by my estimates.  So that will be the next project.  Does this have the strength of a retail slat wall display?  No, but it doesn't have to for my situation which is why the cost is 4 times less.