Using Some Oak Cast-offs To Do Good

I lamented about some red oak that I’d cut up for a cabinet project but that just wasn’t working for the piece.  No sooner had I thrown all those pieces on the shelf than my wife brought home a “home theatre system” with a remote control that looks like the cockpit of the Space Shuttle.  It was a gift cuz she’s so smart and I was tasked with setting it up and deciphering its functionality.

And what could this possibly have to do with rejected oak you ask?  Well, the system comes with a bunch of speakers, four of which have to be scattered around the TV room and, presumably, hung on the walls.  So, I grabbed a couple pieces of oak that looked close in color  and imagined them as four small shelf units, each holding a single speaker.  Each needed to have a shelf that was 4 1/2″ wide and around 5″ deep.  This shelf had to hang on the wall.  A wire had to run up behind the shelf and be fed through the back to the speaker.  And so it began.

At this point I became a poor woodworking blogger as I was in “make it” mode, not photograph it mode and so I can’t step through this project.  In thinking about it, however, I realized that it might be a case where I can talk a bit about minimalist woodworking, that is, woodworking without a room full of tools.

A popular question in hand tool forums is “What tools do I need?” and while the answers seem to flow freely, the best one is “It depends on the project.”  And so here are the tools I used to:

1. Cut out basic parts
2. Drill some holes
3. Cut some dados

Basic Parts Creation:

• Panel saw (used to rip boards to width)
• Carcase saw (used to cut them to length – panel saw could be subtituted)
• Scroll saw (I burned electrons to cut the curves but a fret saw could be used)
• Pencil (and a grinding wheel which was just the right “template” for the shelf curve)
• Ruler, marking gauge & square for layout
• Bit of ply to cut templates for the other curves.
• Block plane for cleaning up edges

Drilling holes:

• Brace & 1/4″ and 1/2″ bits + countersink

Cutting dados (front and back):

• Marking knife
• Carcase Saw (to cut the edges of dado)
• Chisels (1/4″ & 3/4″ to pare out the dado)
• Router plane (to clean up dado)

As Elmer Fudd was fond of saying “That’s All Folks!”  Well, I did use some rags to pad on boiled linseed oil and shellac.  No other tools were needed.  I did start with wood that I’d already surfaced for the previous project and if you were starting with rough-cut lumber you’d need to add at least a jack plane to the mix.  I apologize for the electron deaths due to my scrolling but I do woodworking for fun and my scroll saw is one of my power tools that is actually fun to use.  The others sometimes make things quicker but they’re never fun. Well, my lathe and I have good times together.

Because I have no progress photos you might have a hard time visualizing where the dados are so while I “designed” these shelves on the fly, I put together this SketchUp drawing showing front and back views as well as the actual shelf piece.  Nothing fancy here but you can see clearly where the dados had to be cut.

Let me know if you have any questions about this or anything having to do with woodworking.  I certainly don’t have all the answers but I own a lot of books (grin).

Cheers — Larry

larry@woodnbits.com

Planning My Bathroom Vanity – Help!

I’m struggling with the design of the vanity area of a bathroom, as described in a previous post.  While I’ve been keeping SketchUp warm, everything I come up with looks like a big box and I’m not sure what to do about it.  So, I’m coming to you.  Any and all ideas will be appreciated.

Here’s one idea I’ve come up with and it does meet all the criteria laid down by my wife.  Its inspiration comes from Tom Fidgen’s Made By Hand book, specifically his small cabinet project.  It kinda sorta works and if I’d take the time to orient the grain in the proper direction on all the boards would look decent.  But it’s lacking something, maybe many somethings.

Here’s where I’m leaning towards  at the moment as this approach produces a more ‘free’ look in my view.  Again, Tom provides the inspiration as does Krenov but I’ve to use trim to provide a flow between the two cabinets.  What I can’t figure out, though, is what to do about the mirror.  No matter what I do, I can’t get it “right.”  I’ve left the area blank in this drawing.  Anyone have any ideas on how to fill it in?  Would sure like to hear from you.

Cheers — Larry

larry@woodnbits.com

Asymmetric Tenons: A Follow Up

It seems I was a bit spartan in my word use in my asymmetric tenon post, leaving much to be desired in terms of explanation.

Shannon Rogers commented, “I’m a little confused or maybe I’m missing a step. After you cut the tenons and mortises then you then go back and run a rabbet on the inside of the stiles. I’m guessing you didn’t include that in the sketchup model. Am I seeing this right?”

In fact, I cut the rabbets on both rails and styles before doing either mortises or tenons.  Given the orientation of my original Sketch Up drawing, you just can’t see the rabbet on the tenoned piece.  If I rotate that drawing, however, you see this:

Notice that when you shove the two pieces together you end up with a rabbet around the inside of the frame while the front has straight edges interfacing at 90-degree angles.  Here’s a front view:

I hope this clarifies things sufficiently.  Thanks, Shannon, for helping me make things more clear.

Cheers — Larry

larry@woodnbits.com

Building a Square Casket/Box -Pt1

As I was pondering the construction of the casket for Lisa, my two neurons rubbed together and spoke.  They said, “Why don’t you step through the construction of this box with the folks, showing them some of the things you do when building miniatures?”  As these two neurons are all I have to work with, there were none available to counter the argument so here we go.

First, the target.  Lisa wants to do a casket with four main petitpoint side panels and petitpoint panels on both inside and outside of the lid.  Her ideas come from here:

She wants to line the insides and so has asked me to make a divider for it but not to glue it in place.  She has feet picked out for her casket and so wants to apply those herself as well.

So, what’s left.  Well, I’ve got to build the basic box.  I’ve got to hinge the lid.  As the finish will be petitpoint I won’t be applying finish.  Nothing says you can’t, however, and I’ll talk a bit about that towards the end of this series.

As the box is so small, I’m going to rely upon butt joints rather than worrying about any fancy joinery as strength isn’t really required here.   But alignment is important and to make it easy on myself when gluing up the box, I’m going to put a rabbet all around the bottom of the box to accept the side panels and to provide some help with alignment.  To make it easy for Lisa to apply internal lid petitpoint and to create a nice interface between lid and box when it closes I’m going to put a rabbet all around that piece as well.

Here’s the basic plan:

All of the pieces are 1/16″ thick except for the top which is 3/32″.  The rabbets are all 1/32″ deep and 1/16″ wide to accommodate the side panels.  As they say, “Easy Peasy!”

I’ll leave you to your own devices to cut the basic parts but I want to make a comment or two about the rabbets. I cut my rabbets by installing a 1/16″ wide blade in my Preac table saw.  With fence adjusted properly I can run all the pieces through the saw, generating the rabbet on each side.  In this photo, a side panel is below the pushblock I’m holding.  This helps to hold the panel tight to the table, ensuring proper rabbet depth, and it also keeps my fingers far from the blade.

This is certainly the easiest way but if you don’t have a Preac table saw, the alternative is not much harder:

1) Cut a 1/32″ piece the size of the box bottom.

2) Cut another 1/32″ piece that’s 1/8″ (two times 1/16″) in both dimensions.

3) Glue piece 2) in the exact center of piece 1) and you’ll end up with a 1/32″ deep rabbet all around.  This is the bottom piece.

4) Do steps 1), 2), and 3) the same for the lid except use 1/16″ thick wood in step one.

We don’t do hard at Wood’n Bits.  Just lots of square cuts here.

Next time we’ll talk about assembling the box.  Have your parts ready.  If you have any questions thus far, you know where to find me.

Cheers — Larry

larry@woodnbits.com

Doing the Casket Shuffle

Remember Lisa Salati?  She’s the wonderful lady who got me involved in the casket project I’ve reported on recently.  Well guess what?  She wants another one.  This one should be a bit easier as there’s no pyramid top, no drawers, and no doors.  Just a box with a hinged lid.

We’ve discussed sizes (it’ll be 1″ wide and 3/4″ deep) and the lid will be rabbeted into the box.  As we were having these discussions I was also interested in figuring out how to use layers to create an animation in SketchUp.  Putting the two ideas together and me in a giddy mood, and you end up with a casket moving to the music.  Hope you like it.

Cheers — Larry

larry@woodnbits.com

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