Lift Lid Box with Small Tutorial

[glenn bradley]

I took a break from making Christmas gifts to knock out a box for LOML's daughter. She wanted a gift to give her coach and asked for something like this.

I used a method that I saw in one of the mags along the way. Assuming a mitered box this is an end view of the sides. The dados are cut for the top and bottom and then the middle dado is cut as part of the lift-off lid joint.

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You insert your top and bottom and glue / assemble the box.

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Now you can add miter keys, dowels or whatever details you like and sand the solid cube. You can see a walnut cube in the back of the last pic with keys but not sanded all the way. Now use the same dado width that the middle dado was done with and cut just a bit deeper than half way (the spoil is shown with dotted lines and diagonal stripes in this pic).


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The two parts seperate and you have a perfectly fitting lift-off lid.

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Add a handle or feet or both if you'd like.

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[Mike McCann]

nice trick. thanks for sharing

[Ed Sallee]

Great idea.... I'll have to put that to use sometime in the near future...

Thanks for taking the time to post...

[Michael Sobik]

Hey that's pretty cool.. Thanks!

[John Thompson]

Nice little box and I will keep the idea in mind as I might make a few boxes for Xmas presents. I've only done a set of two as I mainly build large carcass so I am a rookie in that department. The good news is Ed Sallee lives not too far up the street so..... :)

Thanks for sharing...

Sarge..

[glenn bradley]

The good news is Ed Sallee lives not too far up the street so..... :)

I feel a tag-team box making Saturday coming on :).

[John Thompson]

I feel a tag-team box making Saturday coming on :).

For the protection of all if we do a tag team.. probably would be wise for the State of Georgia to place barbed-wire around the ring and bring in the Georgia National Guard to protect the innocent. He's a wild man I tell you.. a wild man.. :D

Regards...

Sarge..

[Richard Dooling]

Hey Glen,

I made some ornament boxes like these last Christmas. How are you getting consistant thickness splines? They have been dicey off the table saw and I've been afraid they would blow up in the planer.

.

[glenn bradley]

Hey Glen,

I made some ornament boxes like these last Christmas. How are you getting consistant thickness splines? They have been dicey off the table saw and I've been afraid they would blow up in the planer.

.

I rip mine on the bandsaw enough oversize so that a plane stroke or two on each side (to remove the saw marks) gives me the thickness I need. I use pieces about 18" long but that just happened to be in the scrap bin. As it turned out, for this size box, each spline is about an inch long so I had some leftover. This is a perfect time to make that bench stop you've been thinking about.

[John Keeton]

Glen, that is a slick idea! I keep toying with the idea of box building to use up some scrap. Sarge appears to be in the same mode!

Not to hi-jack, but have you, Ed, or any of the box builders that may view this thread, done dovetail splines in the corners? I saw this in an article at one time, and it was an interesting look. It would appear that running the stock for the spline could be a bit tricky.

[glenn bradley]

I haven't used it on a box yet but did prepare some material. I made the profile on the edge of a larger board run vertically across the RT, flipped end for ed and run again. Then I rip the DT 'strip' off at the bandsaw. The rip cut edge is in the area that will be sanded flush to I just get it close. Rip a new clean edge on the table saw and repeat. I'll snap some pics next time I run through the procedure.

[Brad Wood]

very nice details on how to do that, thank you