Every now and then, some random interest takes hold of me and drags me around by the pinky toe until suddenly letting go and disappearing forever. They've run the gamut from language-learning, to music composition, to game system development. This time, it's woodworking. (Super convenient, since I live in a small apartment, and can't afford expensive power tools anyway, yay!)
Behold my slow, clumsy progress at crafting a deck vault for a double-sleeved commander deck.
Tools:
"Mighty Mite" mini table saw from Harbor Freight
A few cheap clamps
Sand paper in various grits from 80-400
A square/level
Digital caliper
Coping saw
3" clamp-on vise
Protective eyewear
Earplugs because I'm a sensitive pansy
Various wood stains and a polyurethane finish
A few other things I haven't actually used
I have to set up shop at work, meaning I can only really do anything on the weekends. I work in the tech department for a school district, and our offices are located in the garage where the old auto shop class used to be.
I was surprised how much material ends up in the form of sawdust. The cut pieces on the left came from a board the same size as the one on the right. Geez.
All 4 walls of the box in their larval form.
After arranging and gluing the pieces, the final design of the box begins to reveal itself. (Note: I made the mistake of aligning the outside ends instead of the inside ends on the first batch, making the joint impossible to fit together cleanly. Tomorrow I'll have to finagle some way to dig out enough material to even them out without causing too much shrinkage. Will likely have to rig up some contraption on my very non-adjustable table saw to trick it into being a dado cutter.)
Will update tomorrow with pics of the lid and base. I'll either figure out a good way to cut rabbets or lose a finger (or both!)
This has me rather curious. Too bad I can't see your images. I'm just past being a novice woodworker. And yes, LOTS of saw dust. Protecting your ears doesn't make you a pansy, makes you smart. I protect my eyes, ears and mouth/nose. My next personal project is a custom deck box. Being able to see your progression will be nice. Keep it up
Ah, butcher block style. Also, that table saw is smaller than I expected. I would've suggested a sled, but tiny saw. A sled makes it so you can make duplicate cuts and dado cuts. What type of wood are you using?
So far looks good. Can't wait to see more.
EDIT: Side note, I also work in IT and art/woodworking are my get away hobbies.
I intend to build a sled for it. Even just having a functional fence would be wonderful... but the thing cost under $35 with a coupon. Not complaining.
I'll post an update once dinner has happened. (Got a link to your art?)
UPDATE:
Deckbox in a deckbox.
This is the ill-advised ingenuity I resorted to in order to get a dado stack effect. What you're looking at is an already-underpowered table saw loaded up with two aftermarket saw blades. With one of the endcaps positioned in-between the blades, their combined kerf is almost exactly the width of each finger of my joints. As hodgepodge as it looks, it works like a charm. I'll absolutely be using this method to cut the joints from the get go from now on. NOT having this ability is the only reason I resorted to the faked box joints in the first place.
The dinky little fence/sled that came with the saw is ALMOST useless. you have to turn it upside down in the track, and hold it tight against the "table" in order to get it square, and even then it requires a lot of torque to prevent wobbling along the threads. And the table height is only nominally adjustable. There aren't any measurements, and the action of raising and lowering it is no more precise than just free lifting it. Getting it to the right height takes finesse and sanity to spare.
Well at least some of the joints fit passably well...
I bought a random orbital sander. Under $20 at Wal-Mart. This is 60-grit sandpaper that I used on both sides of all 8 wall pieces (yes, 8. Hold that thought)
This is the bottom half of the box being test-fitted with the base of the box. I intended to have a band of wood in a 3rd color going around the box at the midpoint, so the top and bottom halves were assembled and glued-up separately. Somehow, I grossly overestimated the total height I'd need to clear the cards once it was finished, and had to remove 7/8" of material from the bottom section. The center band will now go just above the base of the box, along the bottom.
The sliding lid of the deck vault is the first element so far that has worked on more-or-less the first attempt. Actually kind of proud of this part. It has a very satisfying fit.
I stacked up all the pieces just to get a look at the rough dimensions of the final product. (single-sleeved prerelease deck for scale)
--------------------------
Now, here's where I admit that I made some big-ish mistakes today. Correcting the misalignment of the wall pieces actually worked fairly well, but I inadvertently made some unwanted resizing of the finger width in some of the joints. The result is unsightly gaps in a few places. I'll probably "fix" them with wood filler before staining, and just be satisfied with a less-then-aesthetically-perfect result.
But that's not the big mistake. I carefully marked the top edges of each bottom wall, so I wouldn't get them confused while running them through my makeshift dado stack. Then I promptly got them confused and ended up over-adjusting one of the walls. This resulted in a lopsided fit and too much shrinkage. If I had adjusted the other pieces to even out the fit, the box would not have been big enough to accommodate cards... which sort of defeats the purpose. I'm not sure how I'll compensate for this. Either more wood filler, or I'll try to insert wood shims of the appropriate size to make up the difference. Either way, I'll have to sand the outside of the box down quite a bit to make up for the bad fit. I'm crossing my fingers that the thinner walls will still be sturdy enough.
I'm honestly kind of burnt out on this project now. I'm anxious to use what I've learned to start something new that I can do the right way from step one. Bit this one will probably still get finished as a labor of love. It wouldn't be a good sign if I abandon my first project.
The deck vault was a bust. In trying to avoid the preparation needed for actual box joints, I cheated by cutting all those strips, and just offsetting them to mimic the appearance. As a result, my crappy table saw introduced tiny variations on every cut, making the fit gappy and misaligned. This is to say nothing about all the mistakes I made.
So, I hunkered down and built a modest little box joint jig...
The two blades I'm using as a dado stack have ever so slightly different diameters, so the joints aren't perfectly flush. Maybe after this project I'll build a jig for use with a single blade.
Test fitting everything. I got it more-or-less perfect this time. You can tell the top and bottom panels are a bit too wide, as they cause the joints to not fully connect. I'll be fixing that this evening. There's also a little gap between the front panel and the sliding top. I think I can pretty easily fill it with a small piece of wood. Maybe it'll be an accent color, and I'll call it a feature
I actually find it rather fun seeing you make the jigs you need to make things work. Eventually I'll get to doing this myself as well... SOOO MUCH ART to do first... I did purchase a planer so I can sorta make my own thin stock wood from 1/2in and 1/4in stock. Which I have quite a bit of. Taking apart old drawers from a repurposed desk nets you some nice wood.
Booo... your pics aren't loading right. Could be me... not sure on that one. I've still not had a chance to get to my box making. I did find a fun jig to make that allows you to make a box using the kerf of your saw blade on the joints. I'll have to find it again. I saved it, but that device is not on me atm.
Sorry, it seems like Google has disallowed hotlinking, or just changed how it's done. I'll use a different hosting service for image-posting from now on.
Here's the box:
Also, I might soon have my own little woodshop! Gonna buy some basic power tools and set up in Mom's garage. I just can't realistically expect my tiny saw to hold up to continued abuse, and my friend's crowded, dingy garage shop with old, wobbly tools just isn't cutting the mustard. It'd be nice to be able to work at my own place, but this is an acceptable compromise.
That is a nice looking box. I can see that you are getting better the more you do this. Yeah, having a dedicated work area is fantastic. My workspace is my garage and most of the time I move my setup out into the driveway to keep from getting a layer of sawdust on everything.
Every now and then, some random interest takes hold of me and drags me around by the pinky toe until suddenly letting go and disappearing forever. They've run the gamut from language-learning, to music composition, to game system development. This time, it's woodworking. (Super convenient, since I live in a small apartment, and can't afford expensive power tools anyway, yay!)
Behold my slow, clumsy progress at crafting a deck vault for a double-sleeved commander deck.
Tools:
I have to set up shop at work, meaning I can only really do anything on the weekends. I work in the tech department for a school district, and our offices are located in the garage where the old auto shop class used to be.
I was surprised how much material ends up in the form of sawdust. The cut pieces on the left came from a board the same size as the one on the right. Geez.
All 4 walls of the box in their larval form.
After arranging and gluing the pieces, the final design of the box begins to reveal itself. (Note: I made the mistake of aligning the outside ends instead of the inside ends on the first batch, making the joint impossible to fit together cleanly. Tomorrow I'll have to finagle some way to dig out enough material to even them out without causing too much shrinkage. Will likely have to rig up some contraption on my very non-adjustable table saw to trick it into being a dado cutter.)
Will update tomorrow with pics of the lid and base. I'll either figure out a good way to cut rabbets or lose a finger (or both!)
URGEDH Biovisionary.dec BShirei WBSelenia
The brain is the muscle that pumps stupid through the body
Google Drive doesn't make it simple to hotlink images. I had forgotten to change the sharing settings.
So far looks good. Can't wait to see more.
EDIT: Side note, I also work in IT and art/woodworking are my get away hobbies.
URGEDH Biovisionary.dec BShirei WBSelenia
The brain is the muscle that pumps stupid through the body
I'll post an update once dinner has happened. (Got a link to your art?)UPDATE:
Deckbox in a deckbox.
This is the ill-advised ingenuity I resorted to in order to get a dado stack effect. What you're looking at is an already-underpowered table saw loaded up with two aftermarket saw blades. With one of the endcaps positioned in-between the blades, their combined kerf is almost exactly the width of each finger of my joints. As hodgepodge as it looks, it works like a charm. I'll absolutely be using this method to cut the joints from the get go from now on. NOT having this ability is the only reason I resorted to the faked box joints in the first place.
The dinky little fence/sled that came with the saw is ALMOST useless. you have to turn it upside down in the track, and hold it tight against the "table" in order to get it square, and even then it requires a lot of torque to prevent wobbling along the threads. And the table height is only nominally adjustable. There aren't any measurements, and the action of raising and lowering it is no more precise than just free lifting it. Getting it to the right height takes finesse and sanity to spare.
Well at least some of the joints fit passably well...
I bought a random orbital sander. Under $20 at Wal-Mart. This is 60-grit sandpaper that I used on both sides of all 8 wall pieces (yes, 8. Hold that thought)
This is the bottom half of the box being test-fitted with the base of the box. I intended to have a band of wood in a 3rd color going around the box at the midpoint, so the top and bottom halves were assembled and glued-up separately. Somehow, I grossly overestimated the total height I'd need to clear the cards once it was finished, and had to remove 7/8" of material from the bottom section. The center band will now go just above the base of the box, along the bottom.
The sliding lid of the deck vault is the first element so far that has worked on more-or-less the first attempt. Actually kind of proud of this part. It has a very satisfying fit.
I stacked up all the pieces just to get a look at the rough dimensions of the final product. (single-sleeved prerelease deck for scale)
--------------------------
Now, here's where I admit that I made some big-ish mistakes today. Correcting the misalignment of the wall pieces actually worked fairly well, but I inadvertently made some unwanted resizing of the finger width in some of the joints. The result is unsightly gaps in a few places. I'll probably "fix" them with wood filler before staining, and just be satisfied with a less-then-aesthetically-perfect result.
But that's not the big mistake. I carefully marked the top edges of each bottom wall, so I wouldn't get them confused while running them through my makeshift dado stack. Then I promptly got them confused and ended up over-adjusting one of the walls. This resulted in a lopsided fit and too much shrinkage. If I had adjusted the other pieces to even out the fit, the box would not have been big enough to accommodate cards... which sort of defeats the purpose. I'm not sure how I'll compensate for this. Either more wood filler, or I'll try to insert wood shims of the appropriate size to make up the difference. Either way, I'll have to sand the outside of the box down quite a bit to make up for the bad fit. I'm crossing my fingers that the thinner walls will still be sturdy enough.
I'm honestly kind of burnt out on this project now. I'm anxious to use what I've learned to start something new that I can do the right way from step one. Bit this one will probably still get finished as a labor of love. It wouldn't be a good sign if I abandon my first project.
The deck vault was a bust. In trying to avoid the preparation needed for actual box joints, I cheated by cutting all those strips, and just offsetting them to mimic the appearance. As a result, my crappy table saw introduced tiny variations on every cut, making the fit gappy and misaligned. This is to say nothing about all the mistakes I made.
So, I hunkered down and built a modest little box joint jig...
The two blades I'm using as a dado stack have ever so slightly different diameters, so the joints aren't perfectly flush. Maybe after this project I'll build a jig for use with a single blade.
Test fitting everything. I got it more-or-less perfect this time. You can tell the top and bottom panels are a bit too wide, as they cause the joints to not fully connect. I'll be fixing that this evening. There's also a little gap between the front panel and the sliding top. I think I can pretty easily fill it with a small piece of wood. Maybe it'll be an accent color, and I'll call it a feature
URGEDH Biovisionary.dec BShirei WBSelenia
The brain is the muscle that pumps stupid through the body
Thought I'd post a pic of the finished box. It's far from perfect, but not bad for a first completed project.
If you're into jigs, here's a single-blade box joint jig I designed. Still haven't built it, so no idea if it works as intended
URGEDH Biovisionary.dec BShirei WBSelenia
The brain is the muscle that pumps stupid through the body
Here's the box:
Also, I might soon have my own little woodshop! Gonna buy some basic power tools and set up in Mom's garage. I just can't realistically expect my tiny saw to hold up to continued abuse, and my friend's crowded, dingy garage shop with old, wobbly tools just isn't cutting the mustard. It'd be nice to be able to work at my own place, but this is an acceptable compromise.
URGEDH Biovisionary.dec BShirei WBSelenia
The brain is the muscle that pumps stupid through the body