Patio Umbrella Stand On Wheels!

Here’s the story of building our patio umbrella stand on wheels. Our backyard (in our other house) got a solid amount of sunlight–and it could be especially annoying with the early morning sunshine and late afternoon, all the way through sunset. Our new yard is similar, but it’s also South-facing, so we also have sun overhead ALL DAY LONG. We needed an umbrella that could move around easily, but wouldn’t tip over.

Construct a Box.

For this project, I used discarded wood that had come from underneath a friend’s patio when they tore it down. (This is the same wood we used for our DIY cooler in case you missed that project!) The boards were in good condition, but a little warped, which is perfect for a project like this. I wanted it to be large enough to fit a couple bags of sand inside, but not too large that people were tripping on it. The regular stand that the umbrella came with seemed to be in the way all the time.

The frame of the box is a rectangle. Using 5.5″ width (1 1/8″ thickness) boards, I cut two pieces at 33.75″ and two pieces at 16.75″. I placed the shorter pieces on the inside edges of the longer pieces, for a final width of 19.25″ by 33.75″.

Attach the Bottom.

We needed six boards cut at 19.25″ to create the bottom of the box. I had used the general measurement of those six side-by-side boards to determine how long the box would be: 33.75″. These boards were attached in two places on each side of the frame with 2″ screws.

Revi wanted to join in on the building process, so we got out the template for her to mark the spots for her daddy to drill the pilot holes.

Fix Up the Umbrella Base.

We’ve had this umbrella outside for a couple of years now, so the base was getting a little bit rusted. We removed the original support base from it–the “stand” portion that came with it. It had all been assembled with bolts, which we disassembled.

One of the bolts had to be cut using a metal blade on the oscillating tool. Once the original supports were removed, I sanded off all of the chipped coating, until it was smooth, and then I used spray paint to make it look good again and to seal off the previously rusted areas.

Attach the Wheels.

Since we were building an umbrella stand on wheels, I looked at a few other DIY videos and blogs for what others had used. I ordered a set of 3″ caster wheels for this project.

They’re able to be locked by pressing down on the lever with your foot, making them a safe option. We just flipped the box over to attach. The existing holes on the base of the casters were used to mark the pilot hole placement.

Place the Umbrella Base.

Once the wheels were attached, we were able to flip the box back upright to measure to the center for the placement of the umbrella base.

Resting in the center position, we marked the existing holes in the base to identify where to drill the holes. When it came time to drill the holes, we turned the wooden box on its side.

The holes were drilled through. We used bolts to attach the base, getting all four bolts in place before finally tightening everything.

Add Sand Bags.

We have purchased these sand bag covers a few times for different projects in the yard. It’s nice because the sand bags stay closed, using the weight of the sand without the mess.

It’s like a pillowcase. You just insert the new, closed bag of sand into these black bags. They’re heavy duty, and they also have handles for easy adjustment or movement.

Attach the Upper Part of the Umbrella.

Once everything was set and in place, we attached the actual umbrella portion to the base. We finally had our umbrella stand on wheels, and we rolled it around a few times just to see how easy it was to move. It’s been an amazing addition to our patio!