Michael Weber
09-08-2016, 10:30 AM
Another recent thread about building plantation shutters has sent me back 30 or more years when I built 4 (2 sets for 3x6 windows) of plantation shutters with almost no woodworking tools at all and no plans. Had zero shaping tools so used brick molding for stiles and one by material for rails. Found some thin material at a used building material store I cut up for the slats using a circular saw bolted under a piece of plywood as a table saw. Used dowel material for pins. I did the slat tapers on a borrowed 4 inch bench top jointer and still had all my fingers afterwards. Drilled the dowel holes in the slat ends with a a locked down B&D 1/4 inch hand drill and an edge guide. Frames were held together with long wood screws through the stiles. Assembly was time consuming, manually pushing in each staple with needle nose pliers to attach the slats to the operating rod. I remember sore hands :) This was all very primitive and they were never works of art but remain one of my most cherished memories of woodworking. They stayed in the house when we moved 8 years ago. They are still there.