Canted Wall Box: What Joinery Technique Should I Use?

[J. Z. Guest]

I'm planning on making this Canted Wall Box (http://www.popularwoodworking.com/upload/contents/339/AUG07PW_I%20Can%20Do%20That.pdf) as a gift when I visit my parents-in-law in Poland this summer. I don't want to nail it together, as the plans say to do. That seems kind of ghetto, and I don't want it painted either, I want to make it out of decent wood.

I could do it a couple different ways:

1) Dadoes for the top & middle shelves, Dowelmax for the bottom shelf and back.

2) Sliding dovetails for the top & middle shelves, through dovetails for the bottom shelf, and dowels for the back. This would be a perfect excuse to buy that Pins and Tails dovetail jig (http://www.mlcswoodworking.com/shopsite_sc/store/html/smarthtml/pages/dovetailjig.html) I've had my eye on. :cool:

What do y'all think? I plan on making at least 4-5 of these, and dovetail-type strength isn't at all necessary, but it would look sweet.

[Jason Beam]

If yer gonna put the trouble into making it out of nice wood and not painting it - and you already don't like nails ... show off the joinery and go with sliding dovetails, i'd say.

[Brent Ring]

I just did a portable diaper box - http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?t=79849&highlight=diaper

And I used half-blind dovetails for the outsides, and sliding dovetail slots for all the interior dividers. It was alot of fun. I think it would look cool on your plan.

[Matt Meiser]

Since you have until summer, I say learn to hand cut the corner dovetails. That fixed template is probably not going to give you ideal spacing, and didn't get glowing reviews when I asked about it a while back. I did some reading and thinking and decided to just learn to do them by hand, and took a class to that end a couple weeks ago.

My next recommendation would be exactly to plan, but substitute dowels in place of nails for all joinery.

Or you could actually nail it, but use cut nails for an authentic look.

[Greg Cole]

Through tenons are another option....
Or DT's.

$0.02

Greg

[Joe Chritz]

Couple brads til' the glue dries???

Dovetails in some form would be a first choice. The through tennons mentioned would be cool also. If you are looking for nice and easy maybe a screw with a square plug of complimentary wood.

Joe

[Jim Dunn]

I voted dovetails just to push you into helping the economy:) Spend that refund check.

[Art Mulder]

My next recommendation would be exactly to plan, but substitute dowels in place of nails for all joinery.

Or you could actually nail it, but use cut nails for an authentic look.

I agree with both of these. The cut nails would be especially good with pine.

[Joe Vincent]

I like the hand cut dovetail suggestion. Through tenons is a good idea, though you could also do round through tenons, aka dowel pins -- but I guess you'd use non fluted dowels instead of those that come with the Dowelmax. Or Miller Dowels because you can easily get different wood dowel pins for contrast.