Yet another (mostly) hand-tool box WIP

[Dr.Al]

I had a couple of hours free this evening so I thought I'd get on with the box. I started by planing a small piece of ash to get it smooth and to the same thickness as the other parts of the box:

I then marked it up...

... and chopped it into three bits.

After planing all the edges square and straight, I planed one edge a few times with my #5, using the one side of the cutting edge in the way I would if I were trying to correct an off-square edge, except this time I was trying to introduce an off-square edge. It's only a degree or so out of square, but hopefully that's ample. I tried to take a photo, but I don't think the angle is that obvious:

I then lined the pieces up on the box and marked the approximate length:

After chopping them slightly oversize, I took the box apart and chamfered the ends of the tenons on the wenge bits. I did that using a chisel on the edges that would end up horizontal in the finished box and then a block plane for those that would end up vertical (the difference was partly so I could chop down onto a flat surface, acting as a back stop, with the chisel to protect breakout and partly because getting a plane in between the two tenons seemed like it would be a bit awkward).

With that done, I gave all the faces a quick skim with a smoothing plane (I won't be able to plane the outside after assembly due to the protruding tenons) and then glued it together. Once the box body was assembled and clamped together, I used the shooting board to bring the top pieces down to length until they matched the width of the base perfectly (again, it won't be easy to adjust these later due to the tenons). I then glued them in place, using some wooden cam clamps with cork faces, which are quite handy for clamping lightly and then tweaking the position before tightening further:

I'll drill the holes for the dowels once the glue has dried.

 

[AndyT]

Those nice cam clamps look rather new... are they another little project you've run up in a few spare minutes?!

 

[Cabinetman]

Those nice cam clamps look rather new... are they another little project you've run up in a few spare minutes?!

Yes I was casting my eye over those too

 

[Dr.Al]

Those nice cam clamps look rather new... are they another little project you've run up in a few spare minutes?!

They're not home-made (although I think they'd be quite straightforward to make). The guy I bought my bandsaw off had them and didn't like them so he chucked them in with the bandsaw. I haven't found much use for them but they seemed a good idea for this.

 

[Pete Maddex]

Steve Maskery did a video of how to make them.

Pete

 

[Woodbloke]

I made a maple version of Steve's clamps a while back; excellent;



Also available at Axminster - Rob

 

[Dr.Al]

Steve Maskery did a video of how to make them.

Thanks! Added to my watch later list, which also has a Paul Sellers hand-tool build equivalent on it:

Also available at Axminster - Rob

I think that's the ones I've got

 

[Dr.Al]

I didn't have much free time this evening, but it was enough to do a bit more gluing. I started by getting a sharp pencil and a steel rule and putting a mark on the top pieces aligned with either side of the wenge pieces:

I did that on all four corners, then joined the dots together to make a pair of lines showing the edges of the wenge pieces. I could then bisect those lines and mark crosses 20 mm from each edge. Those crosses then got a light touch with an awl:

After a little bit of experimentation on a bit of scrap ash, I found that drilling 4 mm with my 4 mm wood drill resulted in quite a loose fit but I could get a good fit by drilling 3 mm (to a depth of 20 mm) with a spur drill bit...

... then 4 mm (also to a depth of 20 mm) with one of my normal drill bits:

After that I got a 2 mm normal drill bit and extended the hole a bit deeper. The dowels are 4 mm diameter so they'll obviously never go into the 2 mm hole. However, I wanted to give the displaced air / glue somewhere to go when pushing the dowel in. For dowels joining pieces together I think the normal practice is to cut a groove up the side of the dowel so the excess glue could escape. For these dowels that groove would be visible on the top so I thought that a small hole extension at the bottom might do the trick as an alternative.

With the holes drilled, I used a small paintbrush to put some liquid fish glue in the holes and also on the bottom two thirds of the (25-30 mm long) dowels and then tapped them into place, doing my best to line the end-grain lines on the ends of the dowels up with the grain on the ash pieces:

While I had the glue out, I also made a little ash wedge, 9 mm wide and 1 mm thick at its widest point and tapering down to about half that. That got glued (again with liquid fish glue) into the gap in the one slightly gappy mortice and then I chopped it flush-ish with a chisel. I'll clean it up more when the glue has had a chance to dry:

 

[Dr.Al]

Another brief outing to the garage this evening saw a little more progress made. I started by chopping off the tops of the dowels with a flush-cut saw:

Then planed the tops to give a smooth finish:

With that done the body of the box is basically finished. I'll do a bit of light chamfering here and there, plane the end grain on the end of the box and plane the bottom before applying oil, but other than that it's done I think.

Unfortunately, the cross-pieces attached to the box used up my last little bit of prepared ash. To get the cross-pieces that go on the lid, I needed to dig out a big plank and attack it with the Ryoba:

The cut-off piece got planed on one side and one edge and then fed through the bandaw:

I could then pick the bit I wanted (with the grain as similar as possible to the other top pieces) and mark out a rectangle:

I chopped that up in the vice (rather erratically):

I then planed the edges until they were parallel and square to the first side...

... and, after chopping the piece in two, I planed the bandsawn face:

That left it slightly thicker than the pieces that are currently attached to the box, but I'll deal with that once they're glued in place. The lid was planed until it was a fairly loose fit width-wise in the box (to allow for a bit of expansion of the lid) and then I used the shooting board to reduce the length until it would just slip past the back stop when the other end was tucked under the wedged front stop:

I could then figure out and mark where the top pieces needed to go and mark the locations with masking tape:

The fish glue went in a mug of hot water to loosen it up a bit and I got everything else ready to go:

I started by gluing the edge joining the little bit of wenge ("prepared off camera as the youtubers like to say!) to the ash piece:

As is now traditional, I then stopped taking photos and just got on with applying glue and getting everything clamped in place. I used the wooden cam clamps again so that I could easily tweak the position after getting it in roughly the right place. Once the clamps were tight, I peeled away the masking tape and wiped off the squeeze-out with a moist cloth.

Tomorrow I'll hopefully drill the dowel holes and glue the dowels in place. I'll also make the wedge.

 

[Dr.Al]

Before lunch, I took the lid out of its clamps and, having fitted it to the box, used a steel rule to mark along either side of the intended dowel locations, lining up with the dowels in the base:

While the lid was in place, I used a knife to mark the length of the cross-pieces:

I could then bisect the two lines to find the dowel locations in one axis and then find the middle of each ash piece for the locations in the other axis. That got marked with pencil and then awl:

As these dowels will be through-dowels, I wanted to avoid break-out. The top surface will get planed down a lot later, so I could have just drilled from the bottom and not worried about it, but marking from the top was easier. To prevent break-out, I clamped the lid firmly down to an off-cut for each drilling operation, using a C-clamp for speed and convenience:

That left some nice clean exit holes on the underside:

I was feeling too lazy to warm up the liquid fish glue, so just applied it to the holes and dowels as it came out of the bottle (which worked absolutely fine) and tapped the dowels in:

While the glue was drying, I got on with making the wedge. I started by using a sliding bevel to gauge the wedge angle from the box base:

After shooting one end of a wenge piece square, I could use it as a reference for the sliding bevel's stock:

That bit got cut off with a dozuki:

I then planed the two edges square and flat. I could then tap the wedge into place and check the angle. It took a couple of minor tweaks to get it right, but it was quite quick. I then planed both edges at a slight angle to match the taper on the lid and base piece against which the wedge will ride. The wedge is hence narrower at the top and it shouldn't be possible for the wedge to lift up while it's tightly in place.

With the wedge tapped into place, I could find some convenient round objects and draw round them:

To get rid of most of the waste, I used a cross-cut dozuki to make a couple of saw cuts through the wedge:

I then used a chisel to gradually turn the edges into a curve:

The #4½ was then clamped upside down in the vice and I used it to further smooth over the ends:

I was quite pleased with that. It really wasn't very long ago that I would have resorted to sandpaper for something like that and it's much more satisfying to do it with a cutting tool.

To plane the cross-pieces to length, I clamped the lid in the vice with a conveniently sized off-cut of sweet chestnut against the cross-piece to prevent break out. I then attacked the ends with the low-angle block plane until the knife line I'd made earlier had just disappeared.

Unfortunately, I somehow still managed to have a tiny bit of breakout on the wenge piece (it looks much, much smaller in real life than in this photo!):

Fortunately (and really quite surprisingly), I managed to find the bit that broke off.

This is where I made a stupid mistake. I wanted to carry on sorting out the other ends, so I put the tiny little wenge piece inside the box body (where it couldn't possibly get lost) for safe keeping, with the plan that I'd glue it back into place as soon as I'd done the other cross-pieces. I promptly forgot about it and instead decided to plane the top surface of the cross pieces.

To do that, I fitted the lid and tapped the wedge into place. I then realised that I'd arranged the grain on the cross pieces such that planing them would need to be done in the direction that would push the wedge out. To deal with that, I came up with a simple planing stop that supported both the side of the box and the end of the wedge:

The other end was much simpler:

I was very close to completion at this point, so I felt it was time to give all the corners a light chamfer. Mostly that was done with the block plane, but the internal corners (which I really should have chamfered before putting the box together) I did with a card scraper (which was satisfying again as previously I would have done this with sandpaper):

At that point, there were lots of little card scraper curls that had fallen into the box, so I tipped it up and blew into the box to get rid of them... and then remembered the little piece of wenge that I'd put in there for safe keeping. Never mind, it's really not that obvious unless you're looking for it, so I think I'll put it on the list of mistakes made and (hopefully) lessons learnt!

With that, the box is essentially complete. I've given it the first coat of Mike's Magic Mix, but it was getting a bit dark for a decent photograph, so I'll get some pictures tomorrow.

 

[GaryR]

Thanks for the many pictures!

 

[AndyP]

Very nice Al and deserves to used for something special.

 

[Dr.Al]

I was hoping for a sunny day but it's really overcast again. Nevertheless, I thought I'd get a few photos of the finished box. It's only had one coat of finish so far but it'll get at least one more, perhaps two depending on how I feel.

Overall, I think it was an enjoyable project. The ash was a complete pig as it has been on other recent projects: the grain direction is all over the place and I had to keep resorting to a high cutting-angle plane to deal with it. The wenge, by comparison, was lovely and planed and chiselled really easily. It's just a shame I have (somewhat unsurprisingly) got a heck of a lot more ash in stock than I have wenge!

It's already been claimed by Carolyn so at least I don't have to worry about what it might be used for!

 

[duke]

This looks great Al, I like the contrast of wood colours. The protruding tenons look great.

 

[Dr.Al]

This looks great Al, I like the contrast of wood colours. The protruding tenons look great.

Thanks Duke

 

[Cabinetman]

Very nice Al, a lovely thing that most people would want to own.
It’s a shame about your Ash, I have used lots including a whole bench top recently and not encountered any alternating grain problems really.
Ian