Let's Build Something Together

[Robert Rozaieski]

I need a cabinet for my shop to store solvents and finishes up high away from toddler fingers since my daughter frequently "works" in the shop with me. Since I have a hand tool only shop, these are really the only dangerous items that need to be kept from her grasp (well sharp tools as well but those are already out of her reach). As I decided what I wanted to build, I thought that this would be a good project to document and post. I know I like to read build threads and from what I've read there is similar interest by others here. It's also a good project for beginners to the craft, or seasoned veterans looking to work on more hand tool skills. Heck, you can even use power tools if you like :D !

Firstly, the cabinet can be built with very little lumber. I'm using mostly leftover pieces of Eastern white pine from other projects but you could get all the required boards for this project from the local home center for about $25. Second, I'm going to be doing this using a lot of traditional woodworking joints; case dovetails, rabbets, dados, blind mortise and tenon, through wedged mortise and tenon, edge joining, and raised panel. Finally it can be made with relatively few tools and is not complicated to build using only hand tools. If you don't have any means of making molding, you can buy premade moldings from the home center since they come in unfinished pine.

The cabinet this is based on is one built by Mike Dunbar in an old issue of Fine Woodworking (Sept/Oct 2001). The main difference is that I'm making this to hang on the wall and his was a free standing design. I also changed the dimensions slightly since it will be hanging on the wall and to better use the lumber I already have. I'll start the documentation of the build in the next post and update as I get a chance to work on the piece. Hope you enjoy!

[Robert Rozaieski]

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This is the lumber I'm using for the cabinet construction. There are two 1x6x8' pine boards and some scrap pine pieces from other projects. This likely won't be enough but I'm trying to build this cabinet on the cheap since it's just for the shop. I buy #2 pine from the home center but if you decide to follow this route, pick through the piles to find the straightest and clearest of the boards. I choose only those with a few pin knots and reject all the others. I typically find 2 or 3 boards each time I visit the home center and buy them even if I don't have a project in mind. Believe it or not, the home center's pine prices (for #2 graded stock) are usually better than your hardwood supplier's pine prices, but you have to be picky to find the best pieces. The upside is, you can spend as much time picking through the stacks as you want.

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Here I'm measuring or the height of the cabinet sides. This measurement and the width of the case are really the only measurements I'll take for the whole project. Really, I didn't even need to take these measurements and would rather have gauged the height off of the items that were going to be placed into the cabinet, however, as I said earlier, I'm trying to stretch the lumber and didn't want to make the sides an inch or two too high, leaving me insufficient board length left to get the top and bottom pieces from the same board. I'm making the case a golden rectangle so the initial side height is important in order to leave enough board length left for the top and bottom. I also cut the boards for the left side, top, right side and bottom in order from the same board so that the grain is continuous and wraps around the case.

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After marking, rough cut the case pieces to length. I'm using the full 5½" width of the 1x6 for the case depth so I won't be ripping these pieces.

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After rough cutting the case pieces to length, keep them in the order they were cut from the board to keep the grain continuous. Witness marks across the cut lines help to keep the correct order and orientation should the pieces get mixed up (which they do).

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Note the witness marks across the cut lines as well as the datum marks on the reference face of each board. There are also similar datum marks on the top edge of each of the cut boards. These datum marks note the reference face and edge of each board. These reference faces and edges are the only place that future marking and gauging will be done from. This ensures maximum accuracy.

[Sam Yerardi]

Great idea! And a very nice workshop. Much, much, much cleaner than mine :)

[Robert Rozaieski]

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After cutting the pieces to length, I shoot the ends to square them up. Here I'm using an old type 11 Stanley #6 but any plane can be made to shoot. I've used everything from a block plane to a #7. As long as the blade can be made square to the platform, it will work.

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After shooting the ends, they are nice and square.

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Use the shooting board to adjust the length of the longer board of each pair. The two sides should be the exact same length and the top and bottom should be the exact same length. This ensures a square case. The exact length is not important (and I don't measure it) as long as the pairs are the same. Check by feel by stacking the two boards and running a finger over each end like I'm doing here (only one side is shown but I'm using the other hand on the other end of the pair of boards). Feel is the most accurate way to judge how equal the lengths are.

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After adjusting the length, you have two pair of dimensioned case pieces.

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I took this picture just to show the reference marks on the edge. In this case the reference faces are the outside faces of each board and the reference edges are the front edges, as viewed when the cabinet is assembled and hanging on the wall.

[Robert Rozaieski]

Great idea! And a very nice workshop. Much, much, much cleaner than mine :)

Probably not, all the mess is behind me swept in the corner :D .

[Robert Rozaieski]

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After your case pieces are dimensioned, it's time to lay out the case dovetails that will join the top and bottom boards to the sides. I begin by setting my marking gauge just a hair wider than the boards' thickness.

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Then scribe the baseline of the tails on all four sides of the tail boards and the baseline of the pins just on the two faces of the pin boards using the gauge you just set. For this cabinet, the tails will be cut on the sides and the pins on the top and bottom. This will prevent the weight placed in the cabinet from pulling the joints apart.

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Set your bevel gauge to the angle of the tails. I have common tail angles drawn on my bench hook for easy setting of my bevel. For softwoods like this pine, I use a 1:6 tail angle.

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Using your bevel with the angle you just set, mark your tails on each tail board. I did it randomly by eye here since these tails will later get covered by a molding. If I wanted to be exact I would step the tails off with a divider.

After marking, cut the tails, sawing on the waste side, right to the line. If you're not comfortable sawing that close to your line you can saw the joint fat and then pare later but I recommend sawing right to the line. The tails aren't that important to get perfect anyway since the pins will be scribed directly from the tails. The only important thing to remember with the tails is that the saw cuts need to be square across the ends to prevent an ill fitting joint.

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After sawing all the tails, I remove the waste by chopping, or in this case, paring since Eastern white pine is such a soft wood. I make a stab cut about 3/16" from the base line and take out wedge shaped pieces until I am about half way through the board's thickness. Note how I've left a "bridge" of wood at the ends of the waste. This wood supports the waste and keeps it from breaking when the board is flipped to the opposite side to complete removing the waste. After one side is done, flip the board and repeat until your cut's meet in the middle.

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After chopping the majority of the waste, use a very sharp chisel to pare back to the baseline, taking very thin cuts and working your way back to the line. Your final paring cut should be made with the chisel set right in the scribe line.

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After paring the inner tails, cut the shoulders on the outer tails and, if necessary, pare to the baseline.

[Robert Rozaieski]

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We mark the pins directly from the tail board. I use an unconventional setup for marking the pins that I picked up from Paul Womack (a.k.a. Bugbear) several years ago. The corner clamps are real inexpensive (mine were free, gloat!) and hold everything in perfect alignment while you mark the pins. It takes a little longer to set up, but I'm in no hurry. No one is paying me for my time, this is just a hobby.

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Here are the pins, marked from the tail board. I used an awl to mark the pins and darkened the lines with a mechanical pencil. It's important to mark your tails and pins with an awl or knife as the scribe line helps to guide your saw as you begin the cut. If you currently only use a pencil to mark your dovetails, you are missing out. Try scribing and watch the saw "jump" into the scribe line as you begin your cut. This is one of the ancient "Arts & Mysteries" of sawing accurate dovetails (sorry Adam, I couldn't resist).

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After marking, saw, chop and pare the pin waste jast as you did with the tail waste.

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Finally, dry assemble your finished dovetail joint and admire your work. What? It's not perfect? That's ok, neither are mine but they will still hold fine. That's the beauty of the dovetail joint. They don't need to be perfect. And they can be shimmed with plane shavings if they are a little loose (shhhh, don't tell, no one will know the difference :D ). I like my dovetail joints to fit together with firm hand pressure only. I don't want them so tight that I need to use a mallet to assemble the joint as you run the risk of splitting a board if they are too tight. The only exception is when joining a hard wood to a soft wood like a walnut drawer front to a pine drawer side. Here, the harder wood will compress the softer wood some so you have more leeway. For case dovetails of the same species like these though, I like to err on the safe side. I don't want to ruin a case piece after cutting 20 tails on a single end.

[Robert Rozaieski]

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Now that the case dovetails all fit well, it's time to plane a rabbet in the back of each piece for the back boards, which will be added later. I start by selecting a piece of lumber about the thickness of what my back boards will be and using this as a gauge to set the fence on the moving filletster. NO MEASURING! This is more accurate. Set the depth gauge in a similar fassion.

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Once the fence and depth stop are set, plane the rabbet on each piece. The skewed iron makes this plane really sweet. Much better than a straight rabbet plane like the Stanley #78. This one cut's across the grain much better too (as we'll see later).

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After the rabbet is planed on each piece, dry fit the case. Ahhh,nice and square.

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With the case dry assembled, use your most accurate measuring tool to measure for the dados to accept the shelves. Ok, I lost mine so I'm using something a little taller than the tallest item that will be placed on each shelf. To measure the thickness of the shelf, use, what else, the shelf.

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Unfortunately, I don't yet own a ¾" dado plane (hopefully I'll remedy that soon). Therefore, I scribe the edges of each dado with a knife and pare the waste with a chisel. Open the side pieces up like a book (disassemble the case first) and scribe both simultaneously to ensure that the dados on each side line up exactly. Again, NO MEASURING! Here, my square is not long enough to span both sides so I'll scribe the near board and part of the far board just to transfer the location. Then I'll reference the square off of the reference edge of the far board and scribe that board. Remember to always register the square on a datum edge. After scribing the dado width, scribe the depth on the edge with a marking gauge. The depth is the same depth as the rabbet you planed earlier.

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After scribing the dados, I pare the waste away gradually with a chisel. I find this more accurate than sawing the sides. I use the chisel bevel down and work slowly. Every so often, I stop and re-scribe the shoulders to deepen the scribe and keep the fibers cutting clean since this is across the grain. Pare close to the finished dado depth which you should have scribed earlier. Leave about 1/16" at the bottom of the dado.

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When you get close to the finished dado depth with the chisel, switch to a router plane to finish the job and make the bottom of the dado level. Again, take thin cuts to avoid tearing out the soft pine since you are working across the grain. The dado is complete when it is as deep as the rabbet you cut earlier. Did I mention I don't measure this.

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Here's the finished dado with the board that the shelf will be cut from (it isn't cut to length and width yet but is the finished thickness). Cutting them with a chisel and router plane certainly works and makes a nice clean dado, however, it will make you long for a dado plane (I do!). This job would have taken much less time had I had a ¾" dado plane. For panels much wider than these, it almost becomes a necessity...almost ;) .

[John Dykes]

Robert -

I recently wrote an email to a well respected craftsman\author pleading with him to write a book about the apprenticeship system. Partly to capture the history and stories, and partly to help me understand how all the pieces (methods) fit together. We have book chapters, videos, and magazine articles that rehash (and rehash, and rehash) every method for accomplishing every woodworking task.

What is sorely missing is a guiding hand of a master; starting with the basics and moving toward the complex. I'll never have the means to attend North Bennett, spend months at Marc Adams, the College of the Redwoods, or take David Charlesworth's "long course."

Your effort is very much needed, and very appreciated...

Kind regards,
jbd in Denver

[Greg Cole]

Nice job Robert.
I see alot of these in the tailed forum.... and not being a true Neander my any means.... I like the job you've done to present this.
I look forward to the balance here.

Thanks.

Greg

[Howie French]

Robert - thanks for taking the time to share this project with us.
I look forward to the rest.


Howie

[Jim Dunn]

Very nice Robert. I too look forward to the rest of the project.

[Mark Stutz]

I can't tell from the picture...did you take the time to make stopped rabbetts on the sides?

For dados, I've made a deep knife lind and pared a slight v groove into the waste, then used this to guide the saw kerf. Sawing to depth seemed a little less tedious to me. For some things I seem to have infinite patience, but not for others.

The only problem with a 3/4 dado plane is that the shelf board has to be exactly 3/4 inch (or greater) thick. If the dado is slightly thinner, you can cut a rabbett (or is it fillister?:D) to make a housed dado of sorts.

[Robert Rozaieski]

I can't tell from the picture...did you take the time to make stopped rabbetts on the sides?
Nope, good observation. There is a gap at the top and bottom where the through rabbets meet. This is not of concern as these gaps will be covered with moldings later and through rabbets are much easier to make than stopped rabbets. This was a common practice on older pieces. With the addition of a face frame and shiplapped back boards, strength will not be a concern. I could also have made the top & bottom boards narrower by the width of the back boards and not planed a rabbet into the top & bottom, but this would result in the end grain of the back boards showing at the top and bottom of the case, which I did not want.


The only problem with a 3/4 dado plane is that the shelf board has to be exactly 3/4 inch (or greater) thick. If the dado is slightly thinner, you can cut a rabbett (or is it fillister?:D) to make a housed dado of sorts. This is true and the reason why the dado is always made before the shelf when working with rough stock. That way, the shelf can be sized to the dado and not the other way around and also why you see plenty of dado planes in 7/8" but very, very few in 3/4". As you've certainly noticed here, I'm not working with rough stock so in this case, your suggestion of making a smaller dado (like a 5/8" maybe) and planing a filletster on each edge of the shelf to fit the smaller dado would make more sense. Or you could knife and saw/pare like I did here to make the dado fit the stock you are using. It just takes a lot longer than using a dado plane but certainly makes just as strong/elegant a joint.

[Robert Rozaieski]

Thanks for the kind words everyone! I am enjoying the process of documenting and writing about the project so I'm glad you are as well.

I didn't get to do much work on the cabinet last night. I had an appointment for a haircut with my 3 year old and she and my 6 month old take priority every time :D ! I did do a little bit after bed time though.

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Once the case has been glued up, we can determine the length of the rails and stiles for the face frame. Here I've cut a piece to rough length for the two stiles. I'll rip two stiles out of this one piece, keeping the pieces oriented as they came from the board in order to preserve the grain orientation. Note the extra length of the stiles. This extra length will provide a horn or overhang on each end of the stile. The horn prevents the end grain of the stile from blowing out when the mortises for the rails are chopped. After the face frame is assembled, the horns can be cut off.

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I use a pair of dividers to divide the stile board equally for ripping. I don't care about exact width as long as the two final stiles look to be about right (there's that no measuring again). It's not important to me if they are 2" wide or 1¾" wide as long as they don't look too fat or too spindly.

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After you have the divider set to step off two equal halves, leave a mark in the center from the divider point. Then set your marking gauge pin in this mark and lock it down. Now you can scribe two exactly equal width stiles without doing any math. I then used this same setting on the marking gauge to scribe the width of the rails, which were cut from another wider board.

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Rip the board on the mark you made into two equal stiles. For the rails, I had to scribe one rail, rip it free from the wide board, plane the sawn edge of the wide board straight and square again, scribe the second rail and rip it free from the wide board.

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Finally, clean up the sawn edges of the rails and stiles until they are all of approximately equal width. Do this by feel like we did for the matching parts of the case, except for the face frame, it is not vital that they all be exactly equal width or length at this point. No one will notice a small difference in width. Once the rails and stiles are cleaned up, we're ready to layout the mortises to join them.

[Steve Pirrelli]

Great thread, keem 'em coming. I want to build something like this out of inexpensive wood and these are great tips.:)

[Alex Yeilding]

After cutting the pieces to length, I shoot the ends to square them up.

Part 2. That is a relief to see!

I'm in the small minority that reads these forums in threaded or hybrid mode and this one appears out of order there. I didn't notice the part numbers in the post titles, and, reading in the order they were in in hybrid mode, I thought you were going straight from cutting to length to scribing the lines for your dovetails. I was thinking "this guy is a LOT better with his crosscut saw than I am (probably true, but still...), or he is pretty sloppy."<g>

I echo the comments of others--this is a very helpful thread. It's helpful to observe someone doing quality work like this. Thanks for taking the time to document it.

[Mark Stutz]

I'm really enjoying this thread, Robert. Keep up the good work.

Mark

[Robert Rozaieski]

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I've placed the assembled case on the bench face up and positioned the right stile and top and bottom rails on the case with a very slight overhang, maybe 1/32". I then mark the position of the bottom of the bottom rail and the top of the top rail onto the right stile. These two marks establish the final length of the stiles.

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I've removed the bottom rail here so you can see the mark. It almost looks like there is no overhang at all but there is. Once again it was done by feel. The rails and stiles will be planed flush to the case after the face frame has been glued to the case. Therefore, I wanted the overhang to be minimal so that I don't have to plane much to flush it up and so the overall look of the face frame dimensions won't change.

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I've put the case aside and clamped the right stile to the left stile with the inside edges facing up. I'm now squaring the final stile length and transfering this length across both stiles in order to ensure identical layout on both stiles. This will ensure the face frame is square when assembled. On the face frame parts, my datum edges and faces are the inside edges where the door will be inset and the front faces. All of my gauging is done off of these reference faces/edges.

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Here, I've laid the bottom rail across the two stiles, marked the width of the rail, removed the rail and squared that width across both stiles. I repeated this at the other end of the stiles with the top rail.

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I mark the mortise length by eye with my square and marking knife. I highlighted the mortise length here with a mechanical pencil but the lines were scribed with a knife first. This gives a positive reference for your mortise chisel when performing the final paring of the mortise ends later.

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Use the chisel you will use to make the mortise to set the width of the points on your mortise gauge. I set the fence of the mortise gauge to mark the mortise approximately centered on the stile stock. I do this by eye. Don't lose this setting after marking the mortises as we will use the exact same setting to mark the corresponding tenons. Since we will be referencing the gauge fence off of the same reference face (the front face) on every mortise and tenon, it doesn't matter if the mortises and tenons are not exactly centered on the stock. The mortises and tenons will all match up since they will all be the same distance from the front face of the face frame. See how important those reference marks are now :D ?

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The sides of the mortises are now marked. I've highlighted them here again with mechanical pencil just to make the marks clear. It really isn't necessary to use the pencil at all as the gauge marks are typically enough. If your eyesight isn't so good anymore, the pencil highlights can be helpful though ;) .

[Robert Rozaieski]

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This is my setup for mortising. The handscrew clamp holds the work steady and keeps it from tipping side to side and the holdfast holds the handscrew to the bench. The work is easily removed from the handscrew for clearing of chips and flipping around to do the other side or change pieces without removing the handscrew from the holdfast. The mortise being cut is placed over top of the leg of the bench so that any mallet blows are supported firmly all the way to the floor and not just by the bench top, although I won't be using a mallet on these particular mortises.

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I start my mortises in the center by removing a wedge. The first cut is bevel down from one side a little offset from center. You want your first two cuts to meet at about the middle of the mortise. Again, since this Eastern white pine is so soft, I just cut my mortises with paring pressure. I did not need to use a mallet. I find that pared mortises in pine are cleaner and more accurate. Pounding with a mallet in this soft wood tends to drive the chisel off course, at least for me. I'm not that good at making mortises. In fact, if you want to learn to hand cut dovetails, learn to hand cut mortise and tenon joints first. I think these are far harder to get right by hand than dovetails.

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Here's the second mortise cut from the other side, again made bevel down. Note the wedge shaped chip removed. Continue removing material in this fassion, alternating sides and meeing in the middle, until your mortise is full depth at the middle. Once you have the mortise depth established, you pare back the ends until you reach your scribed end marks. The final paring cut is perfectly vertical, with the bevel facing the center of the mortise, and the chisel edge in the scribed line defining the end of the mortise.

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Here's the final cut. I used the length of the primary bevel on my mortise chisel to define the depth of these mortises. My mortise chisel is ground with a very shallow primary bevel (about 20 degrees) so the bevel is long enough to define the depth of these mortises (maybe about 1-1/4"). If I need a deeper or shallower mortise, I'll put a piece of masking tape on the chisel to define the depth.

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Here's the finished mortise. Making mortises in this way is very satisfying and can be very fast, especially in this soft wood. I think it took me about 30 minutes to cut all 4 mortises, including taking the pictures. If I wasn't stopping to setup the photo, I could probably do these mortises in about 5 minutes each. Harder wood would take a little longer, maybe 10 minutes each.

[jonathan snyder]

Nice project and great thread Robert. Keep the pictures coming.

Jonathan

[Robert Rozaieski]

I apologize for the following pictures. In my haste to upload them to the photo server, I forgot to edit them to make them brighter first, so they may be a little darker than the previous ones. My shop isn't the best environment for taking pictures so they don't always come out the best.

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I've arranged the face frame parts on the case again, this time to mark the position of the tenon shoulders on the bottom rail.

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Now the position of the tenon shoulders is squared across both rails simultaneously to ensure that the rails will have the exact same distance between tenon shoulders. Once again, this ensures a square face frame assembly.

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I then gauge the mortise depth off each mortise and use the shallowest gauged depth, minus a small amount for clearance and to provide a reservoir in the mortise bottom for excess glue to flow into.

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The gauged tenon length is then added to each shoulder and this mark scribed across the rail. These scribe marks establish the finished rail length, including the tenons.

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Here's the result. The scribe on the left is the shoulder of the tenon. The scribe on the right is the tenon length. The material to the right of the tenon length scribe is waste and will be sawn away before any more tenon layout is done.

[Robert Rozaieski]

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2255/2385258824_ff59fd67f8.jpg?v=0
After the rails are cut to final length, mark each tenon for height. This dimension is taken directly from the tenons' mating mortises'. They will likely not be the same for each tenon so scribe them each separately. This ensures an accurate fit of each tenon to it's mating mortise, but also means that if you mix the parts up, they likely won't fit together correctly. Yet another reason to mark all your parts and reference faces/edges clearly ;) .

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3289/2385258826_6e07216584.jpg?v=0
After transferring the tenon height to each tenon, use a marking gauge to transfer this height around all three sides from shoulder to shoulder. Simply set the gauge pin into the scribe mark, slide the fence against the stock and scribe around the tenon. You will have to reset the gauge twice for each tenon for a total of 8 times. DO NOT USE THE SAME GAUGE YOU USED TO MARK THE MORTISE SIDES :eek: ! Remember, that gauge is still set to the width and more importantly the offset of the mortise sides and that exact same measurement will be needed to scribe the tenon thickness, so use a different gauge to scribe the tenon heights.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3089/2385258830_4bbaecaf98.jpg?v=0
The finished tenon height scribed on each piece will look like this.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2304/2385258834_bc4fbe613b.jpg?v=0
NOW, pick up you other gauge that has the tenon thickness and offset already set. Use this gauge to scribe from shoulder to shoulder along the edges to establish the tenon thickness. This gauge setting will be the same for all four tenons as it was set to the width of the mortise chisel used to make the mortise. As with all other gauging and scribing, only run the gauge fence on a reference face or edge.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3248/2385258836_ae26662f03.jpg?v=0
Finally, the tenon layout is complete. Believe me, it takes a lot longer to write about and read this than it actually takes to do it. All four tenons were layed out in just a couple minutes. Sorry, this is a bad picture.

[Robert Rozaieski]

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2015/2385258840_686f3e224f.jpg?v=0
To saw the tenons, we begin with the shoulder cuts. Start on a face, saw to depth, rotate the stock 90 degrees, saw to depth, rotate 90 degrees, saw, rotate, saw. By rotating as you saw, rather than say sawing the two face shoulders first then sawing the two edge shoulders, you have a place to start your saw on each side (i.e. the previous cut). This ensures a continuous shoulder around the entire tenon and prevents one shoulder cut from not lining up with another, requiring you to then attempt to pare them even with a chisel. This is one of the tricks to going from the saw to assembly without requiring any adjustment of the joint. Of course, you need to have nice deep knife lines defining your tenon shoulders for this to work easily. So put the pencil down and pick up a knife :) .

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3036/2385294532_2294df4364.jpg?v=0
After the shoulders are cut, then make the cheek cuts. I make the long cheek cuts first as these are more critical to the joint than the edge cuts. Saw down both lines (end grain scribe and edge scribe) at the same time. When both cheeks have been sawn off, then saw the edge cheeks off.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2294/2385294534_25eafeddc3.jpg?v=0
This is the finished tenon. If all goes well, you should be able to assemble the tenons in their mating mortises with no more than firm hand pressure (PUT THE MALLET DOWN :D ). If necessary use a wide chisel to lightly pare the offending cheek of a thick tenon. You can also use plane shavings to shim a loose tenon, but don't tell anyone I told you so ;) .

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2078/2385294536_c6b4b4f5de.jpg?v=0
Finally, dry assemble the face frame. Everything goes together with firm hand pressure and is nice and square. You can't ask for any more than that.

[Greg Cole]

Robert,
Your thinking of M&T being harder than DT's by hand is welcome "music" to my ears. I've become pretty proficient at M&T by hand and have yet to try DT's...... Guess there's one more thing on the list for "one of these days".
Thanks for taking the time to put this kind of thread together. I'll never be a true Neander, but I'm adding more of this style of work into my hybrid shop and methods.

Cheers,
Greg

[Robert Rozaieski]

Robert,
Your thinking of M&T being harder than DT's by hand is welcome "music" to my ears. I've become pretty proficient at M&T by hand and have yet to try DT's...... Guess there's one more thing on the list for "one of these days".
Thanks for taking the time to put this kind of thread together. I'll never be a true Neander, but I'm adding more of this style of work into my hybrid shop and methods.

Cheers,
Greg
Greg,
Glad you are enjoying it.

It may be just me but I do believe hand cut M&T is harder than hand cut dovetail to do well. M&T requires longer straighter cuts to have a joint fit properly and you can't really fudge it by compressing the tenon as the mortise sides are usually too thin. Dovetails on the other hand are relatively short cuts and you can make up for an error cutting one part of the joint since you scribe the other part directly from the first part (whether you do pins or tails first).

If you drive a too fat tenon into a mortise, you will split out the mortise side. In a dovetail joint, especially when one wood is a softer wood like in a drawer construction, you can compress a slightly fat piece and it will look real nice and tight (though you can still split the joint if you're not careful). With dovetails, you also have a much stronger mechanical connection so if it fits a little loose or you have a small gap in a tail, the joint will still hold. Not so with M&T. In order to get this kind of mechanical connection with M&T you need to peg your joints (which I will do and show with this one) or cut through mortises and wedge the tenon (which I will do with the cabinet door for this project).

Another plus with dovetails is that in a lot of traditional construction, dovetails get covered with moldings so you won't ever even see a small gap that has been shimmed. On the other hand, most M&T is right there for you to see, i.e. table apron to leg joint, cabinet door frame, cabinet face frame. If there are gaps at the shoulders of these joints, they are blatantly obvious and stick out like a sore thumb, and while a tenon's thickness can be shimmed, if there are gaps at the shoulder, the only fix is to shorten the sholder to shoulder length by adjusting the shoulders with a plane or chisel. This could ruin a piece if it changes the final dimensions of the assembly too much (e.g. inset cabinet door becomes too narrow leaving a large gap). Again, maybe it's just that I have a harder time with M&T versus dovetails, but that has been my experience.

I think the biggest problem that people have with hand cut dovetails is that the joint has become more than a way to hold two pieces together. It has become an art form; an asthetic accent to a piece of furniture if you will. So much so that a lot of people will choose other construction methods if they cannot produce a perfect dovetail, even if those methods are not as strong or appropriate for the application. People who don't know any better will look at a piece of furniture and if they see dovetails they will immediately assume it is a high quality piece, even though these days this very often isn't the case. When the joint first came into vogue, it was just another way to mechanically hold two pieces of wood together that didn't depend on glue strength/longevity, not the decorative element that it has become today.

Personally, I'd rather focus on the overall look of the piece; the first impressions if you will. Is it proportioned well? Do the legs look too fat? Too thin? Too Curvy? Too Straight? Are the drawers all the same size or do they graduate from bottom to top? Do the moldings fit the piece or do they look out of place? Do the drawers and doors fit well or are there large uneven gaps around them? A piece could have the most beautiful and perfect dovetails ever cut by man, but if the rest of the piece is junk, it doesn't matter much. Chances are, you won't even see the dovetails the majority of the time. I mean how often does a piece sit in a room with it's drawers wide open? I like nice dovetails, but the other aspects of the piece are much more important to me.

Wow, that was a lot of rambling :o. Sorry for being so long winded :) .

Sorry I don't have more to post today. Didn't get a chance to work on it last night. Hopefully I'll get some time tonight after the kids are in bed. The plan is to drawbore and peg the face frame tenons, make and fit the shelves and possibly attach the face frame to the case. But we'll see :D . You never know. Hopefully I'll have more to add tonight or tomorrow morning. We're getting DSL installed today :D . Finally out of the dark ages!

Bob

[James Mittlefehldt]

I am enjoying this very much thanks Robert.

I concur with you that mortice and tenon joints are much harder to do than dovetails. The last project I did was a closet organizer and it required when done sixty two mortice and tenon joints. I was getting pretty good towards the end at chopping the mortices out.

For some reason it never occurred to me to saw the tenon shoulders the way you did, but it makes perfect sense, so I learned something.

As to dovetails I have said this before but I have seen a lot of 150 year old pine kitchen cupboards with less than perfect dovetails and they are still holding together. In fact I can do better dovetails (most of the time) than a lot of the antiques.

[Greg Cole]

Robert,
Thanks for the long reply. I tend to wind on & on when I post too... see I'm starting out rambling?
Anyway, your words are encouranging. I think you're right about the "mystique" factor that's put on DT's, especially the hand cut variety. I've done some DT's on an incremental positioner via a router, but that limits the width of the board. I've condisered a 24" DT jig, but can't get over the $ for such a specialized gizmo.
I've had my trials and trivulations with learning M & T. I've blown out some ends, sides and the like (put the mallet down for dry fit & get out the shoulder plane!). So I used my noodle and surfed the net for some guidance, and reading how to means more after failing miserably a few times.:rolleyes: Like just about everything else in life, I seem to go after the hardest first, whether I know it at the time or not. So DT's will be a breeze! LOLOL
I have plans (well working on them) for a proper work bench, the set up I have now is a "jack of all" bench that isn't really conducive to Neander work. I am telling myself learning DT's will come after that (as always I have more things to do that time to do them).
Talk of a workbench brings lasagne to mind now, thanks James. :rolleyes:

Greg

[James Mittlefehldt]

Anytime Greg anytime. I have to confess though we had company last Saturday and we bought the lasagna. Got caught short and did not have time to make it, so we went to a good Italien bakery which makes their own noodles etc, so not bad, just not homemade.

Confession is good for the soul they say.

[Greg Cole]

James,
We won't tell Chris to strike your comment from his book...LOL
FWIW, when I do build my bench, you'll know that it was "homebaked" and the sauce was home made too.... I deal with alot of stainless steel for the day job & we have some 1/4" wall tubing that I can get for a VERY LOW PRICE (as in zip, zero, nadda, FREEBIE, one of the perks for working at a very small business and being related to the owner I guess) that is destined to become the base for the bench.
Racking will be a non-issue, nor will "heft".;) I cut the legs and each one weighs @ 40lbs, nevermind stretchers etc. The base should push 250-300 lbs.:eek:
How the heck did I go from had cut DT's to this in Roberts build a thread here anyway? TSA's coming after me for hijacking I think.
Sorry Robert....:rolleyes:

Greg

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

[IMG]Bugbear

HA HA Bugbear now that's a n blast from the past.
You still see references to this handle all over the internet.

Nice DT tut' ya got there.

[John Powers]

Robert, I'm enjoying your thread. can you till me how you got your wife to let you move your stuff into the living room. I can't get out of the garage. I do have plans to put your cabinet into that garage soon.

[Robert Rozaieski]

Robert, I'm enjoying your thread. can you till me how you got your wife to let you move your stuff into the living room. I can't get out of the garage. I do have plans to put your cabinet into that garage soon.
She's very understanding. It's nice being inside :D. Another benefit of not having any machines. The shop is actually a small (7½' x 13½') room that is attached to our family room. Look at the first picture and the fourth picture in Part 1. That's basically the entire shop except a wall and door behind me. The long wall with the window fits my workbench and not much else. But I really don't need any more space than I have. I'm not sure what the original intention of the room was but it really isn't good for much but maybe an office or home gym...or a shop :) . I had a choice of the garage or this much smaller room. I chose climate control and a window ;) . Actually the room is neither heated or cooled but it is insulated. The family room and this small add on room were an addition to the back of the house done before we bought the house. As such all the walls and ceiling are all insulated, except for the wall between this room and the family room. This cuts down on the noise I make in the rest of the house so I can work while the kids are sleeping. But because we don't have a basement (we're on a slab) or attic space above the addition, there is no ductwork into the shop. I have a small space heater for the few real cold days of winter but no AC. It can be warm in the summer.

[Zahid Naqvi]

robert, thanks for taking the time to record and share this project.

[Robert Rozaieski]

Ok, well after a busy weekend doing other things, I managed to get a little shop time to get a little more work done on the cabinet.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2222/2395076295_83dd929b0a.jpg?v=0
Now that the face frame all fits together well, it's time to do some assembly. Start by heating up the glue pot. Here's my hot hide glue setup. You don't need an expensive electric glue pot. My cast iron double boiler style glue pot was $10. The hot plate was free. I like hide glue because it is reversible, repairable, doesn't cause blotching like yellow glue and in dry form it has an infinate shelf life. Just mix it up with some water and heat up. I don't measure the temperature either. It's really not that critical as long as it flows freely and doesn't burn. Hold your hand to the outside of the outer pot. If it feels too cold, it is. If it feels too hot, it is. If it feels like a hot cup of coffee, it's perfect. Leave the water at that temperatue for awhile until the glue runs from the end of your brush like maple syrup. Then you're in business.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3047/2395076301_39dec4c62c.jpg?v=0
Outline the position of the tenons on the face of each stile. This wll serve as a rough guide while boring the drawbore holes in the mortises.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2034/2395076309_0c16c86539.jpg?v=0
Bore the mortises for the pegs. I bored all the way through both sides, boring from the back when the lead screw started to poke out the back. If you don't want the pegs to show in the final product, bore them from the inside face and don't bore all the way through the front. I don't bore mine centered on the mortise, rather I offset them to protect the fragile mortise walls.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3123/2395076311_bd02cbd248.jpg?v=0
Place the tenon in it's mortise and using the same bit, mark the position of the hole on the tenon with the lead screw.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2006/2395076317_418c2570c1.jpg?v=0
Remove the tenon from the mortise and bore the hole in the tenon about 1/32" - 1/16" offset from the mark you made. Offset the hole toward the shoulder of the tenon. This will force the joint to pull tight when the peg is hammered in. Drawboring this way keeps the joint together when the glue eventually fails 100 years from now. It also means you don't need any clamps to assemble the frame.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3048/2395076319_5185334685.jpg?v=0
Taper the pegs to ease their entry into the bored mortise and help align them with the offset hole bored in the tenon. I'm just using poplar dowel stock here. Traditionally riven hardwood pegs would be wittled roughly round and pounded in. The riven stock is stronger than sawn stock since it is split along the grain. However, this is not a joint that will receive a lot of stress like chair joints would and these dowels are fairly straight grained so they will work just fine for this application.

[Robert Rozaieski]

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3289/2395102635_2041e8f20e.jpg?v=0
Once your mortises and tenons are bored and your glue is ready, apply glue liberally to the tenon and fit it to its mortise. Then tap the peg through the drawbore from the front face. There should be sufficient glue in the hole already to hold the peg in place so you don't need to add any more. It will just make a mess on the piece as it is scraped off as you tap the peg home.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2047/2395102647_b6e823553a.jpg?v=0
Allow the glue to dry, then trim the pegs. Plane the face surfaces of the face frame to clean them up real nice and finally, you can cut off the horns. Don't plane the edges yet. This will be done after the face frame is attached to the case to ensure everything is flushed up nice.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2045/2395102655_9477bb3b1e.jpg?v=0
While the glue was drying on the face frame, I cleaned up the front edge of the case where the face frame will eventually be attached. Be careful at the corners where the grain changes. This spot is very easy to tear off a big chunk, especially in this soft pine. Turn around the corner, go slow and take a light cut to avoid a major disaster.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2112/2395102657_6a10ed6988.jpg?v=0
I used a block plane and a card scraper to clean up the inside of the case. This is easier to do now, before the face frame is attached.

[Robert Rozaieski]

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3050/2395102661_fdfa256cd4.jpg?v=0
Once the case was cleaned up, I moved on to making the shelves. First, I straightened the edge of this board and squared up the left end on the shooting board. Then place the squared up end in the dado and mark the length. Scribe the length with a square and knife, cut it to length with your panel saw and make any minor adjustments to length on the shooting board, checking the fit in the dado as you go.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2294/2395102663_28c0857a1a.jpg?v=0
Once the shelf fits in the dado, align its straight back edge with the back of the dado (not the back of the case, we still need to add the back boards inside the rabbet). Mark the depth of the shelf so it will be flush with the front of the case. Mark both sides of the shelf in case there is minor variation in the width of your case sides.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2342/2395958070_d730547e96.jpg?v=0
Connect the marks with a straight edge, then rip the shelf just shy of finished depth. Clean up the sawn edge with your plane.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2183/2395958074_c9563c6a99.jpg?v=0
Fit the shelf to the case every couple swipes of the plane and sneak up on the final depth. This allows you to make minor corrections to one side or the other and end up with a perfectly fit shelf.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2016/2395958078_e280dd6503.jpg?v=0
I decided to add a double bead detail to my shelves. This bead serves two purposes. First it removes the sharp arrises of the shelf edges and keeps them from breaking off from the occasional bumps they are bound to receive when placing things into the cabinet later. Second, they make the shelf look nice. Here I'm using a side bead molding plane to make the bead on one side. This plane has a built in fence and depth stop and makes perfect beads every time with zero setup time. With the iron real sharp and set for a light cut it will even do a good job against the grain, which will be necessary when I bead the opposite corner of this shelf.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3131/2395958082_b248949927.jpg?v=0
Here's the finished shelf edge detail. Two nicely formed beads that require zero sanding.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2417/2395958084_187e70cce3.jpg?v=0
Finally, I attached the finished face frame to the case with glue and nails. Liquid hide glue is a better choice here due to the limited open time of hot hide glue. You can add urea to hot hide glue to increase the open time but the liquid stuff is just easier to use for these applications. Cut nails would have been more traditional, but I don't have any and being just a shop cabinet, I settled for standard 2" drawn wire finish nails. After the face frame is attached, slide the shelves in from the back all the way against the face frame. No glue or nails are necessary here as the back boards will keep the shelves in place. Finally, plane the outside edges of the face frame flush with the case sides. This is also a good time to plane the dovetails of the case flush if you have not yet done that. I'll make the back boards next.

[Robert Rozaieski]

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3226/2400943662_c95b041c00.jpg?v=0
Here I've gauged the height of the back boards off of the rabbets in the back of the assembled cabinet, cut the boards to rough length, squared the ends and adjusted the final length on the shooting board. The back is made up of three pieces that will be shiplapped and beaded. This method of constructing cabinet backs allows for seasonal expansion and contraction of the back boards and prevents them from cupping or splitting.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2250/2400943668_c8fc919395.jpg?v=0
Normally, in a deep case, I would just leave the back boards at whatever thickness they were milled to since a difference in depth of ¼" or so doesn't typically matter. However, in this case I want to maximize the interior depth of this case since it is a very shallow cabinet, so I will need to do some grunt work. I gauged the backboard thickness from the rabbet that was planed on the cabinet backs. I then planed the first two boards down in thickness taking very thick shavings until I got close to my scribe line. Then I took thinner shavings until I reached the final thickness. This was a lot of planing and sweating so I decided to resaw the third board. It was just about the same amount of work but did go a little faster than planing all the extra material away. The final board thickness was in the area of 7/16".

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2131/2400943676_07de17f467.jpg?v=0
This is the third board after resawing and some cleanup planing. You can still see some of the saw marks that need to be cleaned up yet. I've found that resawing from each of the four corners and meeting the four cuts in the center of the board is the best technique for me. I don't do it often enough to be good at it and I find that I have the fewest stray cuts when I do it this way. This means less planing to clean it up after the cuts.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3028/2400943678_56c3a4f2ec.jpg?v=0
After the boards have all been brought to final thickness, I planed the rabbets. The left back board has a single rabbet on its right edge on the top face. The center board has two rabbets. One on its left edge on the bottom face and one on its right edge on the top face. The right back board has a single rabbet on its left edge on the bottom face. The rabbets are half the boards' thickness deep. I achieve this depth by setting the depth stop a little shy of finished depth and sneaking up on the final depth with gradual changes in the depth stop. I work on the mating rabbets of the first two boards at the same time, constantly checking the two mating boards until they mate flush. Once the first set of rabbets are done and the first two boards mate flush, the rest of the rabbets go quick because the depth stop is now set to the final depth needed to achieve a flush fit. Alternating the rabbets helps to keep the boards flat against the back of the cabinet.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3126/2400943680_3e2d81e2d0.jpg?v=0
Here I'm planing a bead inside each of the top rabbets (right edges of the left and center boards only) in order to protect the fragile arrises inside the cabinet and hide the small gaps that will appear during seasonal movement. The bead also looks nice. The back faces do not get beaded, only the faces that will show inside the cabinet. The fence of the side bead plane sits in the rabbet as I plane, and because these boards are so thin and the rabbets so shallow, I had to increase the projection of the iron slightly with each pass after the first couple in order to get the profile full depth. This is not necessary when working thicker boards with deeper rabbets but can be with these thin boards and shallow rabbets.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2228/2400943682_3448c593f2.jpg?v=0
Here are the finished back boards before being attached to the case. You can just see the bead at each joint. I used the same size side bead plane as I did for the shelves, mostly because it's the only one I have but it also ties the cabinet together nicely having the same bead on the back and shelves.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2261/2400986964_d461a50e87.jpg?v=0
Finally, install the back boards with nails. Again, cut nails are traditional but I did not have any so I used 1½" wire finish nails. Any adjustment to board width should be made to the un-rabbeted edges of the two outside boards. There should be some room for the boards to expand and contract as the seasons change so don't make them a perfect snug fit.

The boards are nailed in the top and bottom rabbets in the center of each board width to allow for seasonal movement. I leave some play between the boards to allow for this movement. I also put a nail in the center of each board width into the backs of the shelves to help hold the back boards and also provide additional support to the shelves. In the winter when the humidity is at it's lowest, I allow a larger gap between back boards as I expect the boards to expand. In the summer, when the humidity is at it's peak, I allow almost no gap between back boards as I expect the boards to contract. At this time of year (or in the fall), I allow a moderate gap between 1/16" and 1/8" as the boards will need room to move in both directions in the coming months.

If you are satisfied with a simple open cabinet, you can stop here, apply a finish and put it on the wall. It is certainly very nice as is. But I'm going to take this cabinet a few steps further and add some moldings and a raised panel door. I'll work on the moldings next.

[Greg Cole]

Robert,
Once again thanks for the effort.
I also like the delivery in nuts n bolt terminology seems to stick in my noodle that way.


Cheers.
Greg

[James Mittlefehldt]

Regarding the resawing I hink it woudl be eaier to do that then take the boards down to width with a plane. In his book the complete dovetail Ian Kirby said it is generally faster to saw than plane or chisel.

I have done a few boards that way white ash and walnut, no fun but no big deal either.

Keep it coming Robert it is almost like looking over your shoulder watching you build your cabinet, something I have to do this summer I think, though what I need to do is a saw cabinet, they seem to be having babies out there, as there are more every spring.

Thanks for your trouble, it is really appreciated.

[Dan Lee]

Great thread. I'm mostly a power tool user but am really enjoying this.

[Robert Rozaieski]

Regarding the resawing I hink it woudl be eaier to do that then take the boards down to width with a plane. In his book the complete dovetail Ian Kirby said it is generally faster to saw than plane or chisel.

Really about the same amount of work I think. The resawing went a little faster but my rip saw is a 5½ point. The teeth tended to clog up with sawdust and then I'd have to stop cutting, clear the teeth , start cutting again, etc. A coarser pitch would be nice for this kind of sawing. Maybe 2½ to 3 points per inch. Planing wasn't that bad but I needed to take a pretty thick shaving to take off as much material as I did. I did work up a sweat with both methods though.

[Joe McMahon]

Robert, very nice job but may I digress? In some photos we see your shop and the tools mounted on the wall behind your bench. They look neat and very well organized.

On behalf of the myriad of untidy persons such as myself, would you please post more pictures of the wall behind your bench, concentrating on your tools and their mounts, and especially their mounts?

TIA, Joe

[Don C Peterson]

VERY cool Robert. I usually don't think about taking pictures of my projects until I'm nearly done...:o

[Robert Rozaieski]

Robert, very nice job but may I digress? In some photos we see your shop and the tools mounted on the wall behind your bench. They look neat and very well organized.

On behalf of the myriad of untidy persons such as myself, would you please post more pictures of the wall behind your bench, concentrating on your tools and their mounts, and especially their mounts?

TIA, Joe

Joe,

Sure, I can take some pics of the tool boards. But, I'll do you one better. I'll start a new thread called Tool Storage & Organization rather than hijack this thread. That way, the tool storage won't get lost in this thread and will be easier to find in a search later. Also, I'm sure a lot of other folks on the site have good storage ideas and could contribute as well.

[Robert Rozaieski]

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3071/2407102273_e8598c5c07.jpg?v=0
I have chosen an astragal as the base molding. I am using a Sargent 1080 with a wide beading iron to make a bead a little in from the edge. This helps to guide the cut straight. As with any plane of this type (plow, dado, bead), it helps to start the cut at the end of the board and make the first few passes gradually longer until you are planing the full length of the board.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2119/2407102275_6a553c63f3.jpg?v=0
Here's what the board looks like when the bead has been finished. Make enough to get all your pieces from one length if you can. Also, make sure you have enough to discard about 6-8" from each end as the ends usually have some dings from starting and stopping the planing stroke. Now I need to separate the bead from the rest of the board. I could rip it off with a saw but......

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3054/2407102277_38fa89b679.jpg?v=0
Using the smallest plow iron you have actually works much better than sawing. Simply plow a groove from both side that meets in the middle. Once the molding is separated from the main board, you can clean up the plowed edge with a few simple swipes of a plane.

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Then use a chisel to pare the extra wood off the fillets of the astragal leaving only the bead standing proud. It will surprise you haw smooth a surface you can get just using the chisel. There will be some small facets left when you are done but I like this look. You don't really see it until you look real close or feel the molding, but it gives a nice hand made touch that doesn't look or feel like it came out of a machine.

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Once you have the long length of molding done, miter one end of the front piece and gauge it's final length off the front of the case.

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Then fit the side moldings the same way. They are trimmed to length at the back after the miter fits well.

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Finally, attach the moldings with nails. Add some glue at the miters to keep them from separating.

[Ben Sedwick]

Robert, I was just wondering if you ever leave haunches on your rails when doing face frame work. It is something I do on cabinet doors and the like but I guess that is due to the fact that they are not fastened to anything except themselves. Do you know if face frame joinery is traditionally done in the fashion you have documented? Also, love the hand tools. Is that skewed fillester a contemporary maker or antique? thanks, ben

[Robert Rozaieski]

Ben, I do use haunches for other applications but I do not typically do so for face frames. I have read that it was done both was so I do not think one way or the other was universal. Since the face frames are attached to the case, the haunces don't really seem necessary to me.

In contemporary cabinetry, haunches are done on cabinet doors because they are done with cope & stick router bits. In traditional doors, like the one I'm building for this cabinet, the front of the plowed groove is cut away to allow for mitering or coping of the sticking that is traditionally on the inside of the frame so there would be no haunch. I think haunches are more appropriate & necessary for heavier, longer tenons like apron to leg joints on tables, lower case sides on highboys, lowboys, etc. where a wide piece could cup/twist much more severely. On the relatively narrow pieces of a face frame, I don't think it is as much of an issue.

Thanks for the compliment on the tools. Almost all of mine are antique, including the moving filletster plane. I have new chisels and carving tools because putting together an antique set proved to time consuming and too much work to bother with. My planes are all antique. My saws are mostly antique (2 were new). Tools that wear out like rasps & files are new. I would love to have new Clark & Williams planes and new Wenzloff saws but they are not nor will they likely ever be in the budget. For that kind of coin, I'd rather buy an old tool and spend the rest on wood.

[Robert Rozaieski]

The door frame for this cabinet is the most complex part of the entire project. The joinery is not difficult to make, as we've done most of it already for the face frame assembly. What is tricky is the layout. It may be helpful to draw out the joint prior to layout in order to have a clear guide of the final joint layout.

Rough cut the rails and stiles long to leave waste at the ends that will be cut away later. The rails and stiles are the same width as the face frame rails and stiles. Once the pieces are cut to rough length, plough a groove for the raised panel.

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My groove is about 3/8" deep and it is not centered on the edge. The groove is slightly offset toward the inside face of the door as the raised panel needs room in the front and there will also be a molded edge on the front inside edge of the frame parts. I use a plow iron the same width as the mortise chisel I will use to make the through mortises, in this case, 1/4". The groove helps guide the mortise chisel straight. Make sure you reference the fence of the plow off of the reference face of the piece. This way your grooves are sure to line up when the frame is assembled.

Again, make the stiles extra long to leave a horn to protect the mortise ends. Make the final length of the rails just a hair longer than the width of the door opening. Since the door frame will have through tenons, the final length of the rails is the finished width of the door. Leaving them slightly long ensures that the door will be a little too wide when the frame is assembled. This leaves material for final trimming and fitting of the door to the opening. You don't want a door that has a large gap around it.

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Set your pieces on the bench top and lay out the position of the rails on the edge of the stiles like we did for the face frame. If the molding is in the way and prevents gauging directly from the case like it is for my cabinet, cut a scrap stick to the dimension of the height of the door and use it to transfer the height to a stile. Add a little bit so the final door is a little long. Again, this leaves material to trim and fit the door to the opening later. Use the upper and lower rails to gauge the positions and widths of the rails on the stiles. Gauge the depth of the groove.

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The depth of the groove is then transferred to the stile insde of the rail edge and becomes the inside mortise edge. The outside mortise edge is placed arbitrarily by eye.

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Once the mortise length is layed out on the reference edge (the edge with the groove), transfer it down the reference face (the front face).

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3096/2413485386_916eb39a7d.jpg?v=0
Then transfer the mortise length from the reference face to the outside (non-reference) edge.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2148/2413485392_1e0be88bb9.jpg?v=0
Gauge the mortise width from the groove, which is the same width as your mortise chisel.

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Finally, mark the mortise width on the non-reference edge.

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Chop the mortise half way through from the grooved edge. Then flip the piece over and chop through from the other edge and meet in the middle.

[Robert Rozaieski]

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2234/2413528494_3ee7f9836b.jpg?v=0
Now we come to the slightly more complex tenon layout. We will be molding the front edge of the groove on this frame, and coping the joint at the inside corners so we will need to layout offset tenon shoulders. The reason for this will become evident shortly, but suffice it to say that we will be cutting away the front edge of the groove on the stile to make the cope later so we need a tenon with two different shoulder distances. Using your marking gauge, scribe the rear shoulder to be the width of the stile. Then reset your gauge to scribe the front shoulder to the width of the stile MINUS the depth of the groove. Gauge both of these measurements directly from the stile. Finally, scribe the height of the tenon from the stile like we did before (remember the inside of the tenon is the bottom of the groove so that side will not need to be cut away in this case).

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After making all of your tenon cuts, your finished tenon will look like this. The edge closest to me is the non-reference or outside edge.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2095/2413528504_318910e7d1.jpg?v=0
Here's the finished tenon viewed from the other edge. Note how the groove creates the edge of the tenon on this side. Once you are at this point, do all your dry fitting of your tenons. Your front shoulder should fit tight against the edge of the stile. At this point your rear shoulder will not. It should be away from the stile by a gap equal to the depth of the groove. I apologize for not taking a picture of this as I now realize how helpful it would have been to do so.

[Joe Cunningham]

What a great thread. Thanks for taking the time to document your build, and it is really inspiring to see how much one can do with hand tools. I hope to improve my skills enough to be able to create a thread like this.

[Robert Rozaieski]

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Once the dry fitting of your tenons is complete, you can create the molded thumbnail profile on the edge of the groove. Begin by making a rabbet. The width of the rabbet should be equal to the depth of the groove. When the rabbet is finished, its shoulder should align directly above the bottom of the groove when viewed from the end. The depth of the rabbet should be very shallow. You are just trying to create a small shoulder for the thumbnail, not a structural joint. I set my depth gauge to it's shallowest setting and took only about 6 passes to cut each rabbet.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3285/2412731585_3ec449db01.jpg?v=0
After the rabbet is planed, create the thumbnail profile. I used a small hollow molding plane but a block plane or a scratch stock can be used as well if you do not have a hollow. Take light cuts and check the profile often.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3221/2412731589_54c01afc6e.jpg?v=0
Here is where the reason for the offset shoulders on the tenon should become apparent. In order to cope the molded profile at the corners, we need to remove a portion of the sticking on the stiles. Remove the molded edge up to the bottom of the mortise, to the depth of the groove. Only remove the front molded edge, do not remove the back edge.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2055/2412731591_867051570e.jpg?v=0
The next step is to cope the rail molding around the stile molding. This joint can also be mitered, however, mitered joints tend to separate with seasonal movement and they are more difficult to make due to the precise 45 degree angle required to have a tight fitting miter. Coping is much easier to do than mitering and solves the problem of miters opening up with seasonal movement. The cope will not show a gap. Also, unlike with cope & stick joinery done with a power router and high priced bit set, when done by hand, only the molded portion gets coped, not the entire shoulder. This is a traditional method of making frame & panel doors.

Use a small gouge with a sweep close to the profile of your thumbnail to cope the molding on the rail. I have a 1/4" #7 sweep that was almost a perfect match. This is where in-cannel gouges really shine if you have them. With an incannel gouge you can make a vertical plunge cut to do the cope. If you don't have incannel gouges (and I don't), you can use a regular outcannel carving gouge but be careful to keep the coped wall vertical. The bottom of the cope will be approximately the depth of the rear shoulder but go slow and check the fit often. It's easy to take more material off if the joint doesn't close tight at the shoulders but if you take too much off you will have an irreparible gap at the cope. DAMHIKT. I apologize that this picture isn't clearer. I think I need a new camera.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3020/2412731595_cb2528caba.jpg?v=0
When finished, the coped joint should look like this. Take your time and this seemingly complex assembly of joints and molding is really not that difficult to do. Next, we raise and fit the door panel.

[Mark Stutz]

Robert,
Please tell me those tenons are not straight from the saw.:eek::mad: Seriously, great job. I find sawing tenons to be more difficult, i.e., a steeper learning curve than sawing dovetails. Mine look like that only after a few minutes with a router plane or chisels to tweak the fit. Did four of them yesterday for a door...got the last one down to about 30 minutes.

Mark

[Robert Rozaieski]

Robert,
Please tell me those tenons are not straight from the saw.:eek::mad: Seriously, great job. I find sawing tenons to be more difficult, i.e., a steeper learning curve than sawing dovetails. Mine look like that only after a few minutes with a router plane or chisels to tweak the fit. Did four of them yesterday for a door...got the last one down to about 30 minutes.

Mark

Mark,
Yes, these particular ones and the ones on the face frame are straight from the saw. I do need to pare a too tight fit on occasion (and maybe even shim a loos fit, shhhh) but I also get it right on occasion too :D . Pine is easier as it will compress some. Hardwoods are more difficult as the tolerances are tighter. Going straight from the saw is a benefit of making deep scribes with the knife and marking/mortising gauge. When you make a deep scribe and then start your saw close to the scribe line, the saw will jump into position as you begin your cut. It's still up to you to track it straight down both scribes until you have a straight kerf established but the deep scribe marks make starting in the correct position much easier.

I agree that learning mortise and tenon by hand is harder than dovetails, but the mechanics are similar. They are both about sawing a straight line. Working only by hand, I get to do a lot of sawing. This is actually a benefit as I get a lot of practice sawing straight. If you want to learn to saw a straight line, put down the dovetail and tenon saws and pick up a rip saw. Then use your dividers to divide up a wide board into equal strips (like face frame or door frame parts :D ) and rip them from the wide board by hand rather than using the table saw or band saw. Stop and check your form often. You will quickly improve your ability to saw a straight line in just a few cuts. It's all about form and feel. In my opinion, this is why a lot of folks who like to do the "grunt" work by machine and the joinery by hand have difficulty learning to cut these joints by hand. They have no practice sawing a straight line.

Even if you like to use your table saw/band saw to do the majority of the grunt work, I strongly recommend practicing your sawing by ripping some boards by hand. Maybe try on some secondary pieces for a project you are currently working on (drawer sides or back boards are a good place to practice). Use pine, it's soft and easy to rip. I can rip a 6' pine board in half in just a minute or two. And the straighter you saw, the easier the cleanup.

30 minutes to saw and fit 1 tenon :eek:? How big was this door. I think it took me less than 15 minutes to saw and fit all the tenons for this door (not including layout). Just kidding you Mark ;). It doesn't matter how long it takes as long as you enjoy doing it. Unless your being paid by the tenon :D . Practice ripping some pine and I gaurantee you will see this time come down and find yourself using the router plane and chisel less.

[Joe Cunningham]

Any updates Robert? I need to make a small cabinet for my bathroom and was thinking of using this thread as a model.

[Greg Stanford]

Shoot! I thought Part 20 (is it part 20?) had been posted. Outstanding thread, like taking a class for me. Thanks again for taking the time to put this togeather!

g

[Robert Rozaieski]

Sorry it has taken so long to get back to this thread. We've been quite busy around our house the last couple of weeks. However, the good news is that the cabinet was completed yesterday (except for the finish) and I'll be posting the last few parts later this morning, so stay tuned ;)!

[Khalid Khattak]

very beautiful ...brilliant pictures and nice detailing...you are very hard worker...I wish u make CNC router out of MDF and release ur self from such hard work...
Keep up posting..

[Robert Rozaieski]

Without further ado!

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I finally had to break down and buy a piece of lumber. I ran out of pieces big enough to continue with. Since I had to get lumber anyway, I bought a 1x12, which, as it turned out, was the perfect width for a single wide panel for the door. So no glueing or ripping, just cut to length and shoot the ends square. I love it when things work out like this. I did need to plane out a little minor cupping though as the panel needs to be as flat as you can get it.

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I'm using the full ¾" thickness of the board for the raised panel. No sense in thinning it out for no good reason. This means that I need a rabbet on the inside of the panel, though, so the front doesn't sit proud of the rails and stiles. Gauge the inside rabbet depth directly from the rails and stiles like we've done for other parts of the piece so far and transfer the depth to the panel ends and edges. Then use the moving filletster to plane the rabbet. Here is the cross grain rabbet, a.k.a. filletster. The skewed iron makes this cut very nice compared to a straight mouthed rabbet plane. I did score the shoulders with a knife though as the scoring iron on my moving filletster plane was less than razor sharp and needed some tuning. No, I didn't miss my mark, the line you see to the right of the filletster is the mark where the brass depth stop rubbed the panel.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2219/2467793850_5568c5b50b.jpg?v=0
Plane the filletsters in the ends first, then plane the edges, that way, any tearout caused by the cross grain planing of the filletsters is removed by planing the long grain rabbets. When the inside rabbets and filletsters are done, we can move on to fielding and raising the panel on the outside.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3236/2467793854_93c9213edb.jpg?v=0
First, the field layout. Here, I've marked the width of the bevels, which defines the center part of the panel or field. I've also marked the final outer depth of the beveled portion. Note, this is not the depth of the field. I marked this as well but after I took this picture.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2043/2467793860_349fe3ac2a.jpg?v=0
My moving filletster plane is not wide enough to make the rabbets to define the center field so I'm using an unfenced, 2" wide skew rabbet plane. Because this plane has no fence or depth stop, I need to clamp a batten to the board to guide the plane against, and work to a scribed depth mark. Really not a big deal.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3019/2467793866_948abd672e.jpg?v=0
Again, plane the filletsters on the ends first and then follow with the long grain rabbets. Once we are at this point, the panel is almost done. All that's left is to plane the bevels to depth.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2170/2467001551_dc7bdf5933.jpg?v=0
To plane the bevels, again start at the ends and follow with the edges. It's a simple matter of holding the plane at an angle and working to your scribed depth. It's not as hard as it sounds as you don't need to hold a precise angle. Just hold the plane at an approximate angle and take a few swipes. Check the angle and your scribed depth. Adjust your hold on the plane a take a few more swipes. Check again. Keep doing this, making passes and checking the angle and depth as you go. You can continue to adjust the angle of the bevel right up to the final pass. Just be careful as you get near final depth that the corner of your iron doesn't take a chip out of the edge of the field. Oops :eek:! Leaving the batten on would help to prevent this, but I like the hand made character it gives ;).

[Robert Rozaieski]

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3186/2467001555_57f85a9702.jpg?v=0
Once you reach your scribed depth, on all the bevels, begin fitting the panel to the door frame. If it's too thick, adjust the bevels or back rabbets until it fits properly. It should not be loose, but it should not be too tight either. Leave room for expansion and contraction of the panel.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2396/2467001561_220c091308.jpg?v=0
Once the panel and door frame dry fit nicely, we can assemble the door. I begin by making saw kerfs in the tenons for the wedges. Some people start the splits for the wedges with a chisel, however, this method makes me nervous. The last thing I want to do after all this work on the most complex part of the project is to split off a tenon shoulder. I'll saw mine, thanks :)!

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To make the wedges, I take a piece of the thin stock left from resawing the back panels and saw some rectangular pieces from it. Then saw the rectangles diagonally into wedges. Finally, I clamp my jointer plane in my vise upside down and move the small pieces over it to clean up the wedges. Be careful not to plane your finger tips :eek:. I have done this before and it doesn't tickle :mad:. It does add a nice patina to your project though :D.

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Here are the final wedges. They are the same thickness as the tenons and were fit to the mortise to make sure they were not too thick before assembly. You don't want to find out the wedges are too thick after they are covered in glue.

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Heat up your glue pot again and assemble the door frame. Assemble the rails to one stile first. Then fit the panel without any glue. You want it to be able to move with the seasons. Finally, fit the other stile to the rails, adjust the assembly for square if necessary and then install the wedges with glue. As with the rest of this project, I did not use any clamps to do my assembly. This is a benefit of traditional joinery like dovetails and wedged or drawbored mortise and tenon. You don't need any clamps.

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After the glue has dried, saw off the wedges and clean up the edges of the door. Saw off the horns on the stiles and clean up the ends as well. Then begin fitting the door to the opening in the cabinet. Plane a little off each side and check the fit. You want a small, even gap all the way around the door.

[Robert Rozaieski]

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3112/2467035851_271cce30b4.jpg?v=0
Once the door fits the opening, hold it in position with wedges all around the opening so you can mark for the hardware. The shelves will support the door and keep it flush with the front of the face frame. Here, I only wedged one side as I planned on planing the far side to fit after the hinges were installed. You can plane this side before or after the hinges are installed, it's up to you.

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Position your hinges and mark the location for the screws with an awl.

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Drill pilot holes for the screws. Even in this soft pine it is best to drill pilot holes. If you just force the screw in, it will rip and tear wood fibers as it enters the wood. This ultimately weakens the wood's screw holding ability. When you drill a pilot hole, the screw threads it's way into the hole and holds much better.

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Finally, install the hinges and repeat the fitting, drilling and installation for the door handle. These hinges were $2 for the pair and the handle was another $2. I like them and they agree with the minimal budget of this project.

[Robert Rozaieski]

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The last part of the project is the installation of the top molding. I had another design for the top molding in mind when I designed this cabinet, however, it called for a 1¼" thick piece of pine, which I found I did not have. I didn't want to go out and buy another piece of wood and gluing 2 pieces together would show in the finished molding so I changed the design. I had some pine cove molding left over from a house project that turned out to be a good size so I decided to use it. This is a good option for you if you don't have any means for making moldings. The big box stores have a lot of pine molding profiles to choose from. It was mitered, fit and nailed to the case just like the bottom molding. Turning the case upside down on the bench made this easy to do.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2115/2467893206_6f8f99daa7.jpg?v=0
The only problem with the cove molding I had is that it is a 45° style molding meant for a corner. This leaves the top unsuported. To remedy this, I decided to add a top board since I had a piece of 1x12 left over from the door panel.

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Place the case on top of the board to mark it for length and width. Then cut it to length, rip it to width and clean up all the cuts with a plane.

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I used a couple hollow planes and some 220 grit sandpaper :eek: to make a nice roundover on the edge and two ends of the top board. The back is straight since it will be flush against the wall. The nicest period roundovers are all eliptical in shape, not quarter circles, so I tried to emulate that here. Router bits are typically a quarter circle, which to me does not look as nice. I placed the case upside down on top of the top board, attached the cove molding to the top board with more nails, flipped the case and nailed the top board to the top of the case. You can add glue as well between the top board and the top of the case if you want but this board won't bear any weight so I felt it unnecessary (and I didn't want to wait for the glue pot to heat up again just for this ;)). I think the final effect turned out quite nice, even if it was not my original intended design.

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So there you have it. The cabinet construction is done. All that's left to do is put on a finish and hang it on the wall. I'm just going to put a few coats of linseed oil on this as oil finishes, while not the most protective, are my favorite finishes. You can use whatever finish you like, even paint, which is period correct. With time, the pine will oxidize and turn a deep golden color that will look real nice. This was a real fun project. I hope you've enjoyed it!

[Alex Yeilding]

This was a real fun project. I hope you've enjoyed it!

Very much so. You are a talented instructional writer as well as woodworker. I hope you will do this again.

[Greg Stanford]

Just wanted to say thanks for all the time & effort you put into this. For someone as new to handtools as I am, seeing them applied has been a great help. I have a better idea of what tools I will need to do the sorts of things I want to be able to do & I have a better idea of how to use the tools I have now. So thanks!

g

[Tim Leo]

All that's left to do is put on a finish and hang it on the wall.


I enjoyed that very much. Thanks for sharing. How, exactly, did you hang it on the wall? The shiplap panel on the back doesn't lend itself to screwing through the back of the cabinet to attach it to the wall...or did I miss something?

[Robert Rozaieski]

I enjoyed that very much. Thanks for sharing. How, exactly, did you hang it on the wall? The shiplap panel on the back doesn't lend itself to screwing through the back of the cabinet to attach it to the wall...or did I miss something?

Well, it's not on the wall yet but I do plan on screwing through the shiplapped back. While not glued, the back boards are nailed (at the center of each board) inside a rabbet, which is all the way around the back of the case, and also to the back of the shelves so the weight will be supported by the case not the nails. It's not a large cabinet and only designed to hold small cans of stain and solvent so I don't expect any issues. It won't be holding that much weight. In order for the back boards to come loose you'd have to pull the case straight out, which will not happen. If it looks like loosening back boards will be a problem, I'll put one nail into the center of the end grain of each back board from the top and bottom and that will prevent the back boards from pulling out but still allow movement. I don't expect to have to do this though.

[John Padgett]

Anyone know where to get a nice moving filletster plane like that? Thanks. John.

[Robert Rozaieski]

Anyone know where to get a nice moving filletster plane like that? Thanks. John.
Got mine from an online dealer:
http://www.workingtools.biz/

I've gotten a few wooden planes from Tom and he is very good to work with. Of course there are a lot of other online dealers who might have one as well, I just haven't used very many. Check Alf's website (http://www.cornishworkshop.co.uk/tooldealers.html) for a list of dealers in the UK. In the US you can also check with:

Lee Richmond at The Best Things, also have bought from him and he is very good
Jon Zimmer's Tools, no experience
Sandy Moss (Sydnas Sloot), no experience
I'm sure there are plenty of others that I'm not aware of.

Also check any local antique shops. Sometimes they will have them. If the dealer knows what it is it will likely be priced too high but not always. I've not had much luck at flea markets with finding good useable woodies.

If you want new, Clark & Williams will make you one as will Phil Edwards of Philly Planes in the UK. For a price of course, but both makers turn out some beautiful work.

Only other choice is ebay, where they frequently come up, though not always in the condition that mine is in. I've found that on ebay, buying wooden planes is hit or miss as pictures don't always tell the whole story and sellers aren't always sure of what they have so it can be more work than it's worth trying to find what you are looking for there. Because of this, I try to support the dealers instead if I can as they have not let me down yet and are always willing to take back anything if I'm not satisfied and provide a refund. I gave up ebay awhile ago as it just became too much of a hastle to find exactly what I wanted. For me ebay is a very last resort if I absolutely need something now and can't wait for a dealer to get it. Otherwise, I'll let one or more of the dealers know what I'm looking for and they can usually get it in a couple weeks/months time.

[James Mittlefehldt]

Anyone know where to get a nice moving filletster plane like that? Thanks. John.

ECE from Germany make one new and is available from Lee Valley.

The worst thing about this project is that it is done, I did not want it see it end. I have been making a dovetailed blanket box with white pine and have to say it was a rea PITA, the wood split and chipped out in places I never thought it would, though every one who see it thinks it looks good, I am not so sure.

If I was to do it again I think I would use yellow poplar, or something else a bit more amenable to the process. I should add that the project was done from rough to finish, hand tools only with what was essentially 1x 12 rough barn board from home depot, but I could not resist the .95 a board foot cost.

Thanks Robert it was a great tutorial.

[Joe Cunningham]

I should add that the project was done from rough to finish, hand tools only with what was essentially 1x 12 rough barn board from home depot, but I could not resist the .95 a board foot cost.


That is a thread I'd love to see.

Just to play around this weekend, I took some nice looking red oak from the wood pile, split it (I'd have used a froe if I had one), then ripped using my hand saw to get one decent face. Used a block plane to get it fairly flat, then moved to my table saw to produce a longish, quartersawn billet.

Now I have enough stock to use for a smallish box (when I resaw the billet), but my digital camera is MIA, otherwise I might have taken some pictures to put together a thread once I get the box completed.

[Graham Hughes (CA)]

Interesting that you use poplar for pegs. The last time I tried that the peg disintegrated when I tried to pound it in; had to drill it out and replace it with some oak, which did work.

[Dan Andrews]

Good instruction Bob. I look forward to following your project and learning some new methods.

[william scott]

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2076/2381945325_b0bab056c9.jpg?v=0
I've put the case aside and clamped the right stile to the left stile with the inside edges facing up. I'm now squaring the final stile length and transfering this length across both stiles in order to ensure identical layout on both stiles. This will ensure the face frame is square when assembled. On the face frame parts, my datum edges and faces are the inside edges where the door will be inset and the front faces. All of my gauging is done off of these reference faces/edges.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3190/2381945331_a0b5e4abc9.jpg?v=0
Here, I've laid the bottom rail across the two stiles, marked the width of the rail, removed the rail and squared that width across both stiles. I repeated this at the other end of the stiles with the top rail.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2078/2381945333_182b4ece0a.jpg?v=0
.


This is a great thread with lots of good info that I'm learning from. This post has something in it that loses me. I don't understand how you are setting this measurement up. I understand measuring the 'width of the rail', (lets say that's 2 inches)....

But what do you mean by 'squared that width across both stiles?'. The picture shows two lines parallel too each other, and not very far apart. A 2 inch width squared is 4 inches and there aren't four inches (as an example) between each set of parallel lines, are there? :confused:

[Robert Rozaieski]

This is a great thread with lots of good info that I'm learning from. This post has something in it that loses me. I don't understand how you are setting this measurement up. I understand measuring the 'width of the rail', (lets say that's 2 inches)....

But what do you mean by 'squared that width across both stiles?'. The picture shows two lines parallel too each other, and not very far apart. A 2 inch width squared is 4 inches and there aren't four inches (as an example) between each set of parallel lines, are there? :confused:

Squared as in drawn square to the face, not X². There are actually four lines here, drawn square across both stiles. The two stiles are clamped together and the location of the rail (the two outer lines) and the length of the mortise (the two inner lines) is scribed across both stiles at the same time. This ensures that the rail and the mortises are in the exact same location on both stiles, without worrying about marking each stile separately. Marking both stiles at the same time helps to ensure a square assembly later by eliminating the opportunity to make a measuring mistake during layout.

[william scott]

O.K., I"m with you up to the point of deciding how long the mortise is going to be. The two outer lines are the edges of the rail. So what did you base the two inner lines on?

[Robert Rozaieski]

Just did it by eye. It's not a vital dimension. I think I just used a chisel to gauge about a 1/4" shoulder.

[Michael Peet]

Great thread and great-looking cabinet, Robert.

[william scott]

Just did it by eye. It's not a vital dimension. I think I just used a chisel to gauge about a 1/4" shoulder.

Thank you! That's what I was wondering about.

[Garth Keel]

to show the details of the project. I always find it very interesting to see how others do a project. I'm sure everyone realizes the extra time and effort it took to put this together. :)