A spice shelf

[Federico Mena Quintero]

Here are some work-in-progress pictures of a small shelf for spice jars.

The problem: our spice jars are tucked in a corner of the kitchen counter, perpetually in disarray, and some are even hidden behind the toaster. I want to move them to a small 1-jar-deep shelf so that they are always tidy. The Tron aesthetic seems to be in vogue, so I'll just draw the outline of the desired result.

177394

You can clearly see a shelf with two storeys for spice jars, right? :)

First I grabbed the first stick I found, a piece of broom handle, to make a story stick. I marked a few things: the maximum length of the shelf, the maximum height so it doesn't bump into the shelf above, the diameter of a typical spice jar, and the height of the jars.

177397

Note to self: that round story stick worked well, but it kept rolling off the workbench. I should have planed a flat section or something.

I cut/planed/squared a board of 1" cedar to be a rectangle with the depth and height I needed. Then I ripped it diagonally to get two triangles; I then clamped them together and planed them to the same size.

177396

(Ignore the joinery - I took that picture after I had already cut some pins into the triangles.)

Then I took another section of the same 1" cedar, and cut a long rectangle at the length I need for the shelf. I marked half the thickness all around the board, and resawed it with a 6tpi saw - a good workout. Then I planed both thin boards and squared them up.

The width of those boards is about a spice jar's height, plus a little more. Each board will form the back of each spice shelf. The two storeys are like a stair's steps - each "tread" is a bit more than the diameter of a spice jar, and the "riser" is the height of a jar. These thin boards are the risers. The shelf is stepped so that I don't need to add clearance above the jars to pick them up - they wouldn't fit in their final location otherwise.

I laid out and cut dovetails in each of those thin boards.

177400

These are just eyeballed, and laid out with dividers symmetrically from each side of the board. The angle is something that looked good on the bevel square. The length of the tails is about 2/3 of the thickness of the triangular boards.

Then I transferred the tails to the pins with a knife, and cut the pins in each triangular board.

177401

A test fit is happy and square. I think I'm getting the hang of dovetails now.

177403177404

Murphy's law came in full force, and the top pin had to be right in the middle of a small knot. I intended for that knot to be decorative on the back of the shelf. Oh well.

The grain orientation is different between the back and sides. Should I be concerned? I mean, Batman is a joiner in his spare time, and *he* wouldn't be concerned, right?

(The worst that can happen is that the shelf self-destructs, and the spice jars would end up as messy as they began - so no overall harm done, I guess.)

Next, I'll cut stopped dados on the triangular boards, starting from the bottom pin, to fit the shelves. The shelves are also resawn, similar to the backs.

177408

[Jim Koepke]

Thanks for sharing.

The problem I have with a spice rack is we have about 6 different sizes of bottles plus a lot of odd bottles we picked up along the way.

jtk

[Pam Niedermayer]

Very nice looking, Frederico. Yes, you should be concerned about putting dovetails in a long grain orientation, because it's easy for that grain to break off; but, as you said, the worst that can happen is it trashes itself and drops the bottles which break and spread spices all over the counter and floor, which will then be mixed, of course. :)

Pam

PS The better joint for this piece would be mortise & tenon, maybe pegged.

[Federico Mena Quintero]

Pam, you are right again. Those pins could certainly split.

The shelf won't experience horizontal tension, I hope - if it's crammed with jars and you try to push in one-too-many too hard, the shelf will tip over before the jar manages to push the others to the sides. Famous last words, but that's the theory :)

I dadoed the triangular boards last night for the top shelf, using a wide chisel to gradually deepen the dado's sides and a narrow chisel for removing wood. Pictures to follow.

For the other vertical wall, I think I'll use beveled through tenons with mortises on the triangular sides. I saw a picture of a table that had the stretchers done that way, and it looked quite nice.

[Eric DeSilva]

I had the same issue a while back. Your solution is prettier and a better project. My solution was ordering a bunch of jars/lids that were uniform, then cutting shallow dadoes in a drawer bottom-sized piece of plywood. The thin drawer that used to collect junk now has all the bottles on their sides, resting in the dadoes so they don't roll. I thought about trying to use solid wood and do a sequence of more rounded channels, but the only option I could come up with was a cove cut on my TS, which--I'm sorry to say--freaks me out.

[Federico Mena Quintero]

These are the dados to receive the top shelf. I don't have a router plane, so I cut the dados with a chisel almost as wide as the dado, and a wide chisel for the edges.

177537

First I made a stop cut at the back of the dado, near the triangle's hypotenuse. Then, I used the wide chisel to make shallow side cuts at the knife line. Back to the first chisel to remove the wood in between. Then, the wide chisel again to deepen the sides, and the small chisel to deepen the stop cut and remove the wood in between. I repeated this until I was happy with the depth of the cut. I didn't go all the way down to the end of the pin. Maybe I should have; it would have made it easier to determine the shelf's length, as I already had the dovetailed back cut to its final length.

To cut the shelf to length, I took the length of the dovetailed back and used dividers to "subtract" the depth of the pin without the dado, twice, and subtracted a millimeter more for safety. I think I'll bevel the inside corners of the shelf to avoid obstructions; it's a couple millimeters out of square when assembled right now, probably due to some not-really-clean corners.

177538

Next I'll make the back for the bottom shelf, which basically abuts the top shelf and also works as a front stop for the top shelf - to keep the jars from sliding out should the shelf be accidentally tipped a bit.

[Pam Niedermayer]

Pam, you are right again. Those pins could certainly split.

The shelf won't experience horizontal tension, I hope - if it's crammed with jars and you try to push in one-too-many too hard, the shelf will tip over before the jar manages to push the others to the sides. Famous last words, but that's the theory :)...

I was talking more about future projects than your current spice rack. For example, if you were to hang your rack or build a basket of sorts, or tool tray....

Pam

[Federico Mena Quintero]

I finally got some more shop time on this!

I cut mortises on the sides and tenons on the back for the bottom shelf. My original intention was to make the back join to the sides with nice beveled through-tenons. I screwed it up by cutting the back too short - I took the length of the dovetailed upper back plus a bit more for the protruding tenons, and only later realized that the dovetailed piece is *way* too short! If I had cut the lower piece much longer instead of trying to skimp on wood, it would have worked.

Anyway, blind mortises and tenons it is. I used a combination square to gauge the depth of the mortises; it worked very nicely.

179962

Then, I used a coping saw to cut some feet on the triangular sides, clamped together. Layout is just eyeballed for something that looks good. There is some checking in one of the feet; I'll have to glue it later.

179963

Look, ma, we have rough feet! Then, rasp/file/chisel/sand the feet's curves and flat parts.

179964179965

It's ready for gluing. I wish I had hide glue - only yellow glue for now.

First, the bottom back to one of the sides.

179966

Then, glue the bottom shelf to the bottom back, while fitting the shelf in its dado.

179967

Then, glue the other triangular side.

179968

Finally, glue the dovetailed top back. This is where I ran out of clamps; they are to press the shelves against their respective backs.

179969

When the glue dries, I'll glue the molding-like front stops to each shelf.