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The New Yankee Workshop - Chapter 1 The Medicine Cabinet

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#1 ·
The New Yankee Workshop - A Skill Development Journey

Like many (I assume) my woodworking started as a tentative hobby. Something I'd always been interested in, but never made the time for. As I began experimenting and creating I realized that it is something that I truly love to do. However, like many (another assumption) I've bounced from project to project, learning or making things up as I went. This has worked fairly well so far, but I know that along the way I have skipped learning some fundamental skills.

This morning I was sitting at the dining room table (one of my first real projects) drinking my coffee and reading The New Yankee Workshop by Norm Abram, trying to pick out a new project to tackle. I was toward the end of the book, reading about a blanket chest when I read "...using the skills you developed building the first project in this book…" when I had a "duh!" moment.

This blog series is a result of that "duh!" moment.

Over the next several months I will be methodically working through each project in The New Yankee Workshop book. I will start at the beginning of the book, and blog my progress as I move through each project.

Hopefully, as I move through each project I'll pick up new skills/techniques/jigs/and experience and maybe break some bad habits along the way.

I'll try my best to take photos and write about the steps I am taking in each project. I may also attempt some video blogging as well.

I'm excited to "start over" and learn some new things that will hopefully allow me to tackle future projects with less frustration, and more success.

I'm looking forward to hearing everyone's thoughts on my projects, the approaches the book recommends, and any other thoughts my fellow 'jocks have about my woodworking journey.

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#2 ·
The New Yankee Workshop - A Skill Development Journey

Like many (I assume) my woodworking started as a tentative hobby. Something I'd always been interested in, but never made the time for. As I began experimenting and creating I realized that it is something that I truly love to do. However, like many (another assumption) I've bounced from project to project, learning or making things up as I went. This has worked fairly well so far, but I know that along the way I have skipped learning some fundamental skills.

This morning I was sitting at the dining room table (one of my first real projects) drinking my coffee and reading The New Yankee Workshop by Norm Abram, trying to pick out a new project to tackle. I was toward the end of the book, reading about a blanket chest when I read "...using the skills you developed building the first project in this book…" when I had a "duh!" moment.

This blog series is a result of that "duh!" moment.

Over the next several months I will be methodically working through each project in The New Yankee Workshop book. I will start at the beginning of the book, and blog my progress as I move through each project.

Hopefully, as I move through each project I'll pick up new skills/techniques/jigs/and experience and maybe break some bad habits along the way.

I'll try my best to take photos and write about the steps I am taking in each project. I may also attempt some video blogging as well.

I'm excited to "start over" and learn some new things that will hopefully allow me to tackle future projects with less frustration, and more success.

I'm looking forward to hearing everyone's thoughts on my projects, the approaches the book recommends, and any other thoughts my fellow 'jocks have about my woodworking journey.

Publication Poster Font Wood Advertising
Steve, I have added your blog to my RSS feeds so will be watching how it goes. I have seen Norm build all these projects so it will be interesting to watch someone else doing it.
 

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#3 ·
The New Yankee Workshop - A Skill Development Journey

Like many (I assume) my woodworking started as a tentative hobby. Something I'd always been interested in, but never made the time for. As I began experimenting and creating I realized that it is something that I truly love to do. However, like many (another assumption) I've bounced from project to project, learning or making things up as I went. This has worked fairly well so far, but I know that along the way I have skipped learning some fundamental skills.

This morning I was sitting at the dining room table (one of my first real projects) drinking my coffee and reading The New Yankee Workshop by Norm Abram, trying to pick out a new project to tackle. I was toward the end of the book, reading about a blanket chest when I read "...using the skills you developed building the first project in this book…" when I had a "duh!" moment.

This blog series is a result of that "duh!" moment.

Over the next several months I will be methodically working through each project in The New Yankee Workshop book. I will start at the beginning of the book, and blog my progress as I move through each project.

Hopefully, as I move through each project I'll pick up new skills/techniques/jigs/and experience and maybe break some bad habits along the way.

I'll try my best to take photos and write about the steps I am taking in each project. I may also attempt some video blogging as well.

I'm excited to "start over" and learn some new things that will hopefully allow me to tackle future projects with less frustration, and more success.

I'm looking forward to hearing everyone's thoughts on my projects, the approaches the book recommends, and any other thoughts my fellow 'jocks have about my woodworking journey.

Publication Poster Font Wood Advertising
I like this idea! Very curious to see how you progress. I had never thought of taking a step back and cover the basics. I am going to watch your progress, maybe this is what I need to do.
 

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#4 ·
The New Yankee Workshop - A Skill Development Journey

Like many (I assume) my woodworking started as a tentative hobby. Something I'd always been interested in, but never made the time for. As I began experimenting and creating I realized that it is something that I truly love to do. However, like many (another assumption) I've bounced from project to project, learning or making things up as I went. This has worked fairly well so far, but I know that along the way I have skipped learning some fundamental skills.

This morning I was sitting at the dining room table (one of my first real projects) drinking my coffee and reading The New Yankee Workshop by Norm Abram, trying to pick out a new project to tackle. I was toward the end of the book, reading about a blanket chest when I read "...using the skills you developed building the first project in this book…" when I had a "duh!" moment.

This blog series is a result of that "duh!" moment.

Over the next several months I will be methodically working through each project in The New Yankee Workshop book. I will start at the beginning of the book, and blog my progress as I move through each project.

Hopefully, as I move through each project I'll pick up new skills/techniques/jigs/and experience and maybe break some bad habits along the way.

I'll try my best to take photos and write about the steps I am taking in each project. I may also attempt some video blogging as well.

I'm excited to "start over" and learn some new things that will hopefully allow me to tackle future projects with less frustration, and more success.

I'm looking forward to hearing everyone's thoughts on my projects, the approaches the book recommends, and any other thoughts my fellow 'jocks have about my woodworking journey.

Publication Poster Font Wood Advertising
Steve,

NYW and Norm are all fine and good but don't be tempted to pick up some of his bad habits…...

Like buying 46 routers.
16 dedicated morticing machines.
312 circular saws.
10256 framing hammers…. not to mention the other multi-thousands of hammers he and Tommy Silva have picked up!
 

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#5 ·
The New Yankee Workshop - A Skill Development Journey

Like many (I assume) my woodworking started as a tentative hobby. Something I'd always been interested in, but never made the time for. As I began experimenting and creating I realized that it is something that I truly love to do. However, like many (another assumption) I've bounced from project to project, learning or making things up as I went. This has worked fairly well so far, but I know that along the way I have skipped learning some fundamental skills.

This morning I was sitting at the dining room table (one of my first real projects) drinking my coffee and reading The New Yankee Workshop by Norm Abram, trying to pick out a new project to tackle. I was toward the end of the book, reading about a blanket chest when I read "...using the skills you developed building the first project in this book…" when I had a "duh!" moment.

This blog series is a result of that "duh!" moment.

Over the next several months I will be methodically working through each project in The New Yankee Workshop book. I will start at the beginning of the book, and blog my progress as I move through each project.

Hopefully, as I move through each project I'll pick up new skills/techniques/jigs/and experience and maybe break some bad habits along the way.

I'll try my best to take photos and write about the steps I am taking in each project. I may also attempt some video blogging as well.

I'm excited to "start over" and learn some new things that will hopefully allow me to tackle future projects with less frustration, and more success.

I'm looking forward to hearing everyone's thoughts on my projects, the approaches the book recommends, and any other thoughts my fellow 'jocks have about my woodworking journey.

Publication Poster Font Wood Advertising
Thanks for the interest everyone!

LifeSaver2000- I appreciate it! I've never actually seen any Norm Abram - the book was a thrift store gift from my Mom when she found out I was into woodworking. I always thumb through it for ideas but had never thought to try and follow it as a guide.

Dave T - Hopefully we all learn something from it. I've picked up a few things already working through the first project. Mistakes and new techniques already! Should be posting the first project this weekend.

Dallas - Those definitely sound like bad habits! I already have an addictive personality and sometimes find myself thinking "I could totally do this easier if I had X, Y or Z new tool…" Maybe I'll stick to the book and avoid actually ever watching any of Norm's shows.
 

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#6 ·
The New Yankee Workshop - A Skill Development Journey

Like many (I assume) my woodworking started as a tentative hobby. Something I'd always been interested in, but never made the time for. As I began experimenting and creating I realized that it is something that I truly love to do. However, like many (another assumption) I've bounced from project to project, learning or making things up as I went. This has worked fairly well so far, but I know that along the way I have skipped learning some fundamental skills.

This morning I was sitting at the dining room table (one of my first real projects) drinking my coffee and reading The New Yankee Workshop by Norm Abram, trying to pick out a new project to tackle. I was toward the end of the book, reading about a blanket chest when I read "...using the skills you developed building the first project in this book…" when I had a "duh!" moment.

This blog series is a result of that "duh!" moment.

Over the next several months I will be methodically working through each project in The New Yankee Workshop book. I will start at the beginning of the book, and blog my progress as I move through each project.

Hopefully, as I move through each project I'll pick up new skills/techniques/jigs/and experience and maybe break some bad habits along the way.

I'll try my best to take photos and write about the steps I am taking in each project. I may also attempt some video blogging as well.

I'm excited to "start over" and learn some new things that will hopefully allow me to tackle future projects with less frustration, and more success.

I'm looking forward to hearing everyone's thoughts on my projects, the approaches the book recommends, and any other thoughts my fellow 'jocks have about my woodworking journey.

Publication Poster Font Wood Advertising
It seems like you either like Norm and NYW or hate them.

Personally, I like Norm and feel that he was a great ambassador to the world from woodworkers.
 

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#7 ·
The New Yankee Workshop - A Skill Development Journey

Like many (I assume) my woodworking started as a tentative hobby. Something I'd always been interested in, but never made the time for. As I began experimenting and creating I realized that it is something that I truly love to do. However, like many (another assumption) I've bounced from project to project, learning or making things up as I went. This has worked fairly well so far, but I know that along the way I have skipped learning some fundamental skills.

This morning I was sitting at the dining room table (one of my first real projects) drinking my coffee and reading The New Yankee Workshop by Norm Abram, trying to pick out a new project to tackle. I was toward the end of the book, reading about a blanket chest when I read "...using the skills you developed building the first project in this book…" when I had a "duh!" moment.

This blog series is a result of that "duh!" moment.

Over the next several months I will be methodically working through each project in The New Yankee Workshop book. I will start at the beginning of the book, and blog my progress as I move through each project.

Hopefully, as I move through each project I'll pick up new skills/techniques/jigs/and experience and maybe break some bad habits along the way.

I'll try my best to take photos and write about the steps I am taking in each project. I may also attempt some video blogging as well.

I'm excited to "start over" and learn some new things that will hopefully allow me to tackle future projects with less frustration, and more success.

I'm looking forward to hearing everyone's thoughts on my projects, the approaches the book recommends, and any other thoughts my fellow 'jocks have about my woodworking journey.

Publication Poster Font Wood Advertising
JesseTutt - From what I've read/heard I like Norm and the NYW…experience has been limited but positive.
 

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#8 ·
The New Yankee Workshop - A Skill Development Journey

Like many (I assume) my woodworking started as a tentative hobby. Something I'd always been interested in, but never made the time for. As I began experimenting and creating I realized that it is something that I truly love to do. However, like many (another assumption) I've bounced from project to project, learning or making things up as I went. This has worked fairly well so far, but I know that along the way I have skipped learning some fundamental skills.

This morning I was sitting at the dining room table (one of my first real projects) drinking my coffee and reading The New Yankee Workshop by Norm Abram, trying to pick out a new project to tackle. I was toward the end of the book, reading about a blanket chest when I read "...using the skills you developed building the first project in this book…" when I had a "duh!" moment.

This blog series is a result of that "duh!" moment.

Over the next several months I will be methodically working through each project in The New Yankee Workshop book. I will start at the beginning of the book, and blog my progress as I move through each project.

Hopefully, as I move through each project I'll pick up new skills/techniques/jigs/and experience and maybe break some bad habits along the way.

I'll try my best to take photos and write about the steps I am taking in each project. I may also attempt some video blogging as well.

I'm excited to "start over" and learn some new things that will hopefully allow me to tackle future projects with less frustration, and more success.

I'm looking forward to hearing everyone's thoughts on my projects, the approaches the book recommends, and any other thoughts my fellow 'jocks have about my woodworking journey.

Publication Poster Font Wood Advertising
The projects in this book are all based on the first season of the show. That was before Norm started to have a lot of the fancy tools. I recall he did mortises on the router table (which was a bench top model) and was using the wobble dado blade. No wide belt sander or even a hollow chisel mortiser. Don't think there was a biscuit joiner either. He did like his nail gun though.
 

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#9 ·
The New Yankee Workshop - A Skill Development Journey

Like many (I assume) my woodworking started as a tentative hobby. Something I'd always been interested in, but never made the time for. As I began experimenting and creating I realized that it is something that I truly love to do. However, like many (another assumption) I've bounced from project to project, learning or making things up as I went. This has worked fairly well so far, but I know that along the way I have skipped learning some fundamental skills.

This morning I was sitting at the dining room table (one of my first real projects) drinking my coffee and reading The New Yankee Workshop by Norm Abram, trying to pick out a new project to tackle. I was toward the end of the book, reading about a blanket chest when I read "...using the skills you developed building the first project in this book…" when I had a "duh!" moment.

This blog series is a result of that "duh!" moment.

Over the next several months I will be methodically working through each project in The New Yankee Workshop book. I will start at the beginning of the book, and blog my progress as I move through each project.

Hopefully, as I move through each project I'll pick up new skills/techniques/jigs/and experience and maybe break some bad habits along the way.

I'll try my best to take photos and write about the steps I am taking in each project. I may also attempt some video blogging as well.

I'm excited to "start over" and learn some new things that will hopefully allow me to tackle future projects with less frustration, and more success.

I'm looking forward to hearing everyone's thoughts on my projects, the approaches the book recommends, and any other thoughts my fellow 'jocks have about my woodworking journey.

Publication Poster Font Wood Advertising
The wobble dado….I have one of those…thought about using it for this blog series…put it on and fired it up…quickly decided I could wait to start until after I ran out to Midwest Woodworkers and picked up a dado stack. I've heard those things are hell on the arbor for table saws…and to be completely honest it kind of scared me too.
 

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#10 ·
Medicine Cabinet - First Project Day 1

A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step…Lao Tzu

After writing the initial blog I could hardly wait to get started. Took care of few things around the house, re-read the first chapter a few times, checked my lumber supply, kissed the baby and retreated to my shop for the day.

The book opens with some initial information about types of saws and tools a woodworker needs, an overview of the fundamental joinery and some other basic terminology. Great information, but all stuff that I was already pretty familiar with.

Chapter 1 is the first real project of the book, the medicine cabinet

Brown Wood Window Book Publication


A little context…our home came with a perfectly good medicine cabinet when we moved in, but to be honest, practicality was never part of the equation. Woodworkers don't build furniture because they need it anyway…right? And, when I started thinking about this project I decided that whatever doesn't find a place in our home will more than likely be donated to Habitat for Humanity or a similar organization for another family to enjoy.

The project calls for oak, pine, or any other hardwood of your choice. I happened to have a stack of 4/4 oak that a friend gave me that would work perfect. Following Norm's instructions I began by cutting my components for the case to size. first step, ripping it to the appropriate width.

Wood Rectangle Flooring Floor Hardwood


Next up, cutting the pieces to length. A great opportunity to try out my new miter saw station - (based on an article in Fine Woodworking)

Saw Drill Handheld power drill Wood Milling


After the pieces had been ripped and cut to length it was time to build the first jig for the project - The Finger Joint Jig.

In full disclosure, I've been looking for an excuse and instructions on building one of these jigs for a while. I'd put it off for various reasons. Short attention span… Lack of materials… Fear of complexity… so this was a great opportunity to finally do it.

I won't go into too many details on the process for building the jig - you can find them all over Lumberjocks with a quick search. StumpyNubs can also hook you up with plans for one of the coolest box joint jigs I've ever seen. The jig Norm recommended is pretty simple - 3/4" backer board, two 3/8" cuts with a dado blade and some 3/8" keys to help space everything out consistently.

This was one of the spots where I had to hit the pause button. The jig called for a 3/8" wide by 3/4" high cut using the table saw and a dado blade. When I bought my old craftsmen tablesaw at a garage sale it came with a brand new wobble dado blade - never used. After fiddling with the contraption for a little while - and some quick reading on the internet and LJ forums I decided a replacement was in order. From what I gathered, the wobble dado blades work…but they're hard on the table saw arbor, and to be honest the thing kind of scared me. A quick (relatively) trip to Midwest Woodworkers and I was back in business.

Automotive tire Wood Bumper Gas Font


This is where the lessons from the book started paying off. I tend to have a 'give er hell' attitude when I build things like jigs or set-up cuts. Sometimes it works out - most times I end up having to re-cut pieces and add to my "cutting board pieces" box. Norm recommended running some test cuts on some scrap stock to get the spacing on the fingers dialed in. Too much or too little space between the blade and the pin and your fingers don't fit.

I cut my test pieces and beamed with pride at their beauty and perfection…until I tried to fit them together. Hand pressure didn't do the trick…out came the mallet…and I beat the poor thing into submission.

Wood Wooden block Varnish Hardwood Plank


After some fiddling with the jig and cutting my slots and key the second set came together MUCH better.

Wood Flooring Beige Rectangle Hardwood


With the finger joint jig dialed in, I was ready to take the plunge and start cutting the finger joints into my case pieces.

This part was fairly quick and uneventful….line up the first piece with a spacer, cut, move over to the key, stack it's mate on top, cut, move to key, repeat. Although this was pretty routine and quick, it did offer up a "duh" moment. A smear of paste wax on the key made moving the fingers on and off MUCH easier.

Brown Wood Floor Flooring Hardwood
Wood Hardwood Wood stain Flooring Door


After it was all said and done, the dry fit…

Wood Rectangle Wood stain Hardwood Gas


To be honest, it turned out better than I had anticipated. I was VERY happy with the results and the jig. I took it apart, attached all the pieces and hung the jig on the wall for future box making adventures.

In the next blog I'll show you the next steps I took, drilling the shelf pins, cleaning up the pieces, assembling the case and milling the pieces for the face frame and door.
 

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#11 ·
Medicine Cabinet - First Project Day 1

A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step…Lao Tzu

After writing the initial blog I could hardly wait to get started. Took care of few things around the house, re-read the first chapter a few times, checked my lumber supply, kissed the baby and retreated to my shop for the day.

The book opens with some initial information about types of saws and tools a woodworker needs, an overview of the fundamental joinery and some other basic terminology. Great information, but all stuff that I was already pretty familiar with.

Chapter 1 is the first real project of the book, the medicine cabinet

Brown Wood Window Book Publication


A little context…our home came with a perfectly good medicine cabinet when we moved in, but to be honest, practicality was never part of the equation. Woodworkers don't build furniture because they need it anyway…right? And, when I started thinking about this project I decided that whatever doesn't find a place in our home will more than likely be donated to Habitat for Humanity or a similar organization for another family to enjoy.

The project calls for oak, pine, or any other hardwood of your choice. I happened to have a stack of 4/4 oak that a friend gave me that would work perfect. Following Norm's instructions I began by cutting my components for the case to size. first step, ripping it to the appropriate width.

Wood Rectangle Flooring Floor Hardwood


Next up, cutting the pieces to length. A great opportunity to try out my new miter saw station - (based on an article in Fine Woodworking)

Saw Drill Handheld power drill Wood Milling


After the pieces had been ripped and cut to length it was time to build the first jig for the project - The Finger Joint Jig.

In full disclosure, I've been looking for an excuse and instructions on building one of these jigs for a while. I'd put it off for various reasons. Short attention span… Lack of materials… Fear of complexity… so this was a great opportunity to finally do it.

I won't go into too many details on the process for building the jig - you can find them all over Lumberjocks with a quick search. StumpyNubs can also hook you up with plans for one of the coolest box joint jigs I've ever seen. The jig Norm recommended is pretty simple - 3/4" backer board, two 3/8" cuts with a dado blade and some 3/8" keys to help space everything out consistently.

This was one of the spots where I had to hit the pause button. The jig called for a 3/8" wide by 3/4" high cut using the table saw and a dado blade. When I bought my old craftsmen tablesaw at a garage sale it came with a brand new wobble dado blade - never used. After fiddling with the contraption for a little while - and some quick reading on the internet and LJ forums I decided a replacement was in order. From what I gathered, the wobble dado blades work…but they're hard on the table saw arbor, and to be honest the thing kind of scared me. A quick (relatively) trip to Midwest Woodworkers and I was back in business.

Automotive tire Wood Bumper Gas Font


This is where the lessons from the book started paying off. I tend to have a 'give er hell' attitude when I build things like jigs or set-up cuts. Sometimes it works out - most times I end up having to re-cut pieces and add to my "cutting board pieces" box. Norm recommended running some test cuts on some scrap stock to get the spacing on the fingers dialed in. Too much or too little space between the blade and the pin and your fingers don't fit.

I cut my test pieces and beamed with pride at their beauty and perfection…until I tried to fit them together. Hand pressure didn't do the trick…out came the mallet…and I beat the poor thing into submission.

Wood Wooden block Varnish Hardwood Plank


After some fiddling with the jig and cutting my slots and key the second set came together MUCH better.

Wood Flooring Beige Rectangle Hardwood


With the finger joint jig dialed in, I was ready to take the plunge and start cutting the finger joints into my case pieces.

This part was fairly quick and uneventful….line up the first piece with a spacer, cut, move over to the key, stack it's mate on top, cut, move to key, repeat. Although this was pretty routine and quick, it did offer up a "duh" moment. A smear of paste wax on the key made moving the fingers on and off MUCH easier.

Brown Wood Floor Flooring Hardwood
Wood Hardwood Wood stain Flooring Door


After it was all said and done, the dry fit…

Wood Rectangle Wood stain Hardwood Gas


To be honest, it turned out better than I had anticipated. I was VERY happy with the results and the jig. I took it apart, attached all the pieces and hung the jig on the wall for future box making adventures.

In the next blog I'll show you the next steps I took, drilling the shelf pins, cleaning up the pieces, assembling the case and milling the pieces for the face frame and door.
Looking good so far!
 

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#15 ·
Medicine Cabinet - Part 2

After dry fitting up the case to ensure the finger joints had a good fit I needed to pull it back apart and take care of a few details that would be difficult or impossible once assembled.

First, I needed to drill out the shelf pin holes in each of the sides. In the New Yankee Workshop (NYW) Norm uses a drill press and a specially marked fence to quickly and accurately drill out the shelf pin holes. Unfortunately I don't own a drill press yet, so I had to improvise a little. Following Norm's direction I marked out the first set of holes 5" from the bottom of the case and 1.25" away from each edge. Each set of holes needed to be 1" higher than the last set. I noticed that the rule on my combo square was 1" wide, so I used it to set my spacing, marking out lines for each hole. To set my depth I used blue painters tape to give me a 3/8" hole using a 1/4 brad point bit.

Wood Floor Flooring Hardwood Wood stain


Overall it worked pretty well. A few of the holes got a little squirrely, but they will be covered by a shelf so it won't matter too much.

After drilling out the shelf pins it was time for a quick sanding before assembly. I REALLY wanted to avoid using the sander and just use planes and my card scraper. For some reason I could not get my planes to work well with the oak. I'm not sure if it was because the lumber had already been surfaced at some point, or my blade was too dull..but it just wouldn't cut like I wanted. The card scraper did a little better, but still didn't get me the results I was after. Eventually I gave in and used the random orbit sander on the inside faces of all the boards moving from 120 through 220. I don't really want to hassle with trying to sand the inside faces once the cabinet is all glued up and put together. The outside faces also got a quick run through with 120. I didn't want to bother with high grits at this point, knowing there would be some squeeze and fine tuning of the finger joints.

No pictures of the sanding process - it was boring and dirty - like always.

With the sanding taken care of it was time for assembly. I always have to slow myself down when it comes to assembly. I always get excited when a project starts looking like a piece of furniture and so I try to rush through assembly and glue up so I can show it off to my wife. I tried to channel a little Norm and slow myself down, making sure to use my speed square to get everything as square as possible. Each set of fingers got a little smear of glue and then fit together with a little tap from the mallet to get it seated.

I grabbed a few pine cut offs for cauls, slapped some packing tape on them to get the squeeze out from making them a permanent part of the project and clamped it down. The top cauls were made out of melamine cutoffs I had laying around from another project. These really worked well - no packing tape necessary, and they were nice and flat.

Wood Gas Machine Computer hardware Hardwood


At this point I walked away from the case to let it dry and moved on to milling up the parts for the face frame and glass door.

The face frame was up first. Norm makes a point in the book to explain that the vertical frame members are "stiles" and the horizontal members are "rails" I am trying to commit this to memory because I can never remember which is which. I had to rip down some 4/4 boards in 2 inch wide strips to make up the stiles and rails for the frame and door. Since all of the rails are the same dimensions and the stiles are all the same dimensions, it made sense to cut them all to size at the same time. This worked out well, it gave me an opportunity to pick the pieces with the best grain for the door (the most visible part) and the more defect looking pieces for the face frame which would be hidden most of the time.

Wood Adhesive Flooring Floor Wood stain


The picture only shows 1 set, but there are two, and they look identical. The stiles are 25" and the rails are 20" long.

The face frame is joined together using lap joints. Even though this is a simple joint, it was brand new to me. This is one of the reasons why I started this mission in the first place. I've cut mortise and tenon joints, made frame and panel on the table saw, etc. but never have I cut a lap joint. In the book Norm recommends a radial arm saw with a dado head…I don't have a RAS, but I do have a table saw with a sweet new dado stack.

For the lap joints to work the dado blade needs to be raised high enough to remove exactly half the stock of each rail and stile - equal to width of each piece. Sorry if that sounds screwy…the picture is easier to follow than my explanation here.

The first picture shows the lap joints cut - half the thickness (3/8") removed.

Wood Finger Wood stain Hardwood Flooring


The second picture shows the joints overlapping - the cut is equal to the width of each piece

Wood Rectangle Wood stain Plank Hardwood


Making sure to keep everything square, the lap joints are glued and screwed together using #6, 1/2" wood screws. I'm personally not a huge fan of using screws or nails in my projects, but I am trying to say as true to the approach laid out in the book as I can. So glue and screws it was!

Wood Wood stain Ruler Gas Table


The idea is, the screws are supposed to act like clamps, holding the piece together so you can continue working while the glue sets. And that's exactly what it did.

After assembly I noticed some overhang on some of the lap joints. I used the bench top belt sander to knock them down quickly - not a big deal - but an example of not cutting close enough to my line - measure twice cut once!

Wood Office ruler Rectangle Wood stain Hardwood


With the face frame completed I left the shop for a bit to take care of a few things and let the glue on the case finish setting up. When I came back I pulled the clamps off of the case and was very happy with how it came out.

Wood Rectangle Table Wood stain Natural material


I gave the fingers a quick sand/scrape to get them flush with with the sides.

Although I was happy with how they came out, I did notice some small gaps on one set of fingers. I think this was due to clamping and gluing it up while it was standing up instead of laying on it's side. Not a huge deal, but something I'll keep in mind the next time I do a glue up like this.

With the fingers flush and the face frame glue up ready to go, it was time to attach the two. From the pictures in the book it looks like Norm attaches the face with brads or finish nails, but there wasn't any instruction to support this - so I made an executive decision and decided to use finish nails.

The face was attached with an 1/8 overlap on the inside of the bottom to give it a little lip, and the top edge of the face frame is proud of the top of the box by about the same. I imagine this is to allow for wood movement - things that start out flush rarely stay that way.

Pneumatic tool Handheld power drill Drill Hammer drill Wood


With the face frame attached it was time to call it a night.

The next steps for the project involve creating the door and insetting the mirror, routing out a rabbet in the back of the case to accept a piece of 1/4" oak ply, attaching the door with a piano hinge, and finishing the whole thing.
 

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#16 ·
Medicine Cabinet - Part 2

After dry fitting up the case to ensure the finger joints had a good fit I needed to pull it back apart and take care of a few details that would be difficult or impossible once assembled.

First, I needed to drill out the shelf pin holes in each of the sides. In the New Yankee Workshop (NYW) Norm uses a drill press and a specially marked fence to quickly and accurately drill out the shelf pin holes. Unfortunately I don't own a drill press yet, so I had to improvise a little. Following Norm's direction I marked out the first set of holes 5" from the bottom of the case and 1.25" away from each edge. Each set of holes needed to be 1" higher than the last set. I noticed that the rule on my combo square was 1" wide, so I used it to set my spacing, marking out lines for each hole. To set my depth I used blue painters tape to give me a 3/8" hole using a 1/4 brad point bit.

Wood Floor Flooring Hardwood Wood stain


Overall it worked pretty well. A few of the holes got a little squirrely, but they will be covered by a shelf so it won't matter too much.

After drilling out the shelf pins it was time for a quick sanding before assembly. I REALLY wanted to avoid using the sander and just use planes and my card scraper. For some reason I could not get my planes to work well with the oak. I'm not sure if it was because the lumber had already been surfaced at some point, or my blade was too dull..but it just wouldn't cut like I wanted. The card scraper did a little better, but still didn't get me the results I was after. Eventually I gave in and used the random orbit sander on the inside faces of all the boards moving from 120 through 220. I don't really want to hassle with trying to sand the inside faces once the cabinet is all glued up and put together. The outside faces also got a quick run through with 120. I didn't want to bother with high grits at this point, knowing there would be some squeeze and fine tuning of the finger joints.

No pictures of the sanding process - it was boring and dirty - like always.

With the sanding taken care of it was time for assembly. I always have to slow myself down when it comes to assembly. I always get excited when a project starts looking like a piece of furniture and so I try to rush through assembly and glue up so I can show it off to my wife. I tried to channel a little Norm and slow myself down, making sure to use my speed square to get everything as square as possible. Each set of fingers got a little smear of glue and then fit together with a little tap from the mallet to get it seated.

I grabbed a few pine cut offs for cauls, slapped some packing tape on them to get the squeeze out from making them a permanent part of the project and clamped it down. The top cauls were made out of melamine cutoffs I had laying around from another project. These really worked well - no packing tape necessary, and they were nice and flat.

Wood Gas Machine Computer hardware Hardwood


At this point I walked away from the case to let it dry and moved on to milling up the parts for the face frame and glass door.

The face frame was up first. Norm makes a point in the book to explain that the vertical frame members are "stiles" and the horizontal members are "rails" I am trying to commit this to memory because I can never remember which is which. I had to rip down some 4/4 boards in 2 inch wide strips to make up the stiles and rails for the frame and door. Since all of the rails are the same dimensions and the stiles are all the same dimensions, it made sense to cut them all to size at the same time. This worked out well, it gave me an opportunity to pick the pieces with the best grain for the door (the most visible part) and the more defect looking pieces for the face frame which would be hidden most of the time.

Wood Adhesive Flooring Floor Wood stain


The picture only shows 1 set, but there are two, and they look identical. The stiles are 25" and the rails are 20" long.

The face frame is joined together using lap joints. Even though this is a simple joint, it was brand new to me. This is one of the reasons why I started this mission in the first place. I've cut mortise and tenon joints, made frame and panel on the table saw, etc. but never have I cut a lap joint. In the book Norm recommends a radial arm saw with a dado head…I don't have a RAS, but I do have a table saw with a sweet new dado stack.

For the lap joints to work the dado blade needs to be raised high enough to remove exactly half the stock of each rail and stile - equal to width of each piece. Sorry if that sounds screwy…the picture is easier to follow than my explanation here.

The first picture shows the lap joints cut - half the thickness (3/8") removed.

Wood Finger Wood stain Hardwood Flooring


The second picture shows the joints overlapping - the cut is equal to the width of each piece

Wood Rectangle Wood stain Plank Hardwood


Making sure to keep everything square, the lap joints are glued and screwed together using #6, 1/2" wood screws. I'm personally not a huge fan of using screws or nails in my projects, but I am trying to say as true to the approach laid out in the book as I can. So glue and screws it was!

Wood Wood stain Ruler Gas Table


The idea is, the screws are supposed to act like clamps, holding the piece together so you can continue working while the glue sets. And that's exactly what it did.

After assembly I noticed some overhang on some of the lap joints. I used the bench top belt sander to knock them down quickly - not a big deal - but an example of not cutting close enough to my line - measure twice cut once!

Wood Office ruler Rectangle Wood stain Hardwood


With the face frame completed I left the shop for a bit to take care of a few things and let the glue on the case finish setting up. When I came back I pulled the clamps off of the case and was very happy with how it came out.

Wood Rectangle Table Wood stain Natural material


I gave the fingers a quick sand/scrape to get them flush with with the sides.

Although I was happy with how they came out, I did notice some small gaps on one set of fingers. I think this was due to clamping and gluing it up while it was standing up instead of laying on it's side. Not a huge deal, but something I'll keep in mind the next time I do a glue up like this.

With the fingers flush and the face frame glue up ready to go, it was time to attach the two. From the pictures in the book it looks like Norm attaches the face with brads or finish nails, but there wasn't any instruction to support this - so I made an executive decision and decided to use finish nails.

The face was attached with an 1/8 overlap on the inside of the bottom to give it a little lip, and the top edge of the face frame is proud of the top of the box by about the same. I imagine this is to allow for wood movement - things that start out flush rarely stay that way.

Pneumatic tool Handheld power drill Drill Hammer drill Wood


With the face frame attached it was time to call it a night.

The next steps for the project involve creating the door and insetting the mirror, routing out a rabbet in the back of the case to accept a piece of 1/4" oak ply, attaching the door with a piano hinge, and finishing the whole thing.
Awesome work!
 

Attachments

#18 ·
Medicine Cabinet - Part 3 The Door

With the case constructed and the face frame attached, it was time to turn my attention to the door. The rails and stiles for the door were cut to size at the same time as the face frame.

Wood Flooring Rectangle Wood stain Beige


The door frame is joined using through mortise and tenons that are pinned with wooden dowels.
Up to this point I have tried to follow Norm's techniques as closely as possible, but I had to deviate slightly for the first few cuts here.

In the book, norm recommends starting with cutting the mortises out of the ends of the stiles. To do this he sets up the tablesaw with a standard blade, raised 1.5" above the table, and positions the fence 1/4'' away from the blade. Then he runs the stile along the fence, on end, to make one cut, and then repeats the cut on the opposite face. I'm sure it works perfectly fine, and it's probably safe 90% of the time, but it scares the hell out of me. So, I used my ShopFox Tenoning Jig to make the cuts instead.

Wood Floor Flooring Composite material Hardwood


I think the end result was pretty much the same, I ended up with a slot, and all 10 fingers still attached.
I repeated the process on both ends of both stiles.

Next up I needed to mill the slots that would accept the mirror. Although I had deviated and used my tenoning jig, I decided to go back to following the instructions in the book. This is where things started going wrong.

The book had me change to my dado blade, and set it to make a 1/4" wide cut, with the blade 1/2" above the table, and the fence 1/4" away from the blade. The idea here is that this setup will center the blade in the stock, giving you a 1/4" groove down the middle. I'm not sure if it was because it was getting late, I was getting excited, or I was trying to follow the directions too closely without critically thinking about it, but I broke one of the rules I learned earlier in the project, and didn't bother to make a test cut in scrap stock first.

I ran the first stile through the saw, set it aside, ran the next stile through the saw, and noticed that my "centered" groove didn't line up with my "centered" mortise(s) that I cut using my tenoning jig. As far as I could tell, my two cuts with the 1/8"(ish) blade for the mortises didn't result in a full 1/4" slot. I had about 1/16" worth of material on the inside of each. I decided to go ahead and cut the slots on the rails with the dado head still installed, and then figure out how to deal with the extra material afterward.

Not the end of the world, just an opportunity to get a little creative….at least that's what I thought.

As I stood at the tablesaw contemplating my next steps, I decided that I would make up for the extra material on the tenons…I could take slightly more material off of one cheek (the one facing the extra material) and everything would be corrected.

Sounded simple enough in my head.

For cutting the tenons I decided to stick to the method described in the book. It wasn't as scary as the first cut, and I'd already ended up in trouble by doing things "my way" once.

To cut the tenons Norm suggested clamping one of the stiles to the fence to act as a spacer or stop block to get consistent cuts on the shoulders on all of the tenons.

It looked like this…

Wood Rectangle Flooring Floor Wood stain


The blade was set to 1/4" above the table, still at 1/4" cut. I suppose I could have added all of the other pieces to the dado stack to get the maximum width of cut, but I decided to leave it as it was and just nibble away the rest of the material. Even with the dado at maximum, it still wouldn't have been quite wide enough, so I decided not to mess with it.

This worked pretty well, make a cut using the spacer to set the distance, flip the rail over, space it out and make the same cut. Then it was just a matter of nibbling away at all of the remaining material until I had a tenon.

Wood Flooring Floor Wood stain Publication


In the picture you can see the extra material in the mortise.

Because of the extra material, the next step was to nibble away enough material from one cheek in order to get everything to fit nice and tight. Easier said than done.

I set up the cut using the same method of the spacer and nibbling away material. Raising the blade a little at a time, I'd cut, test fit, and cut some more. This worked relatively well at first. Somewhere along the way pieces must have ended up mixed up (should have marked them) and one rail ended up with both tenons cut too thin. Again, not the end of the world, but frustrating none the less.

The end result…

Wood Wood stain Table Flooring Hardwood


This is the set that fit tight, the other set I didn't photograph, but it had about 1/32" worth of between the cheeks and the mortise walls. I ended up shimming it with thinly sliced pieces of oak from one of the cutoffs, ended up working out ok, not terribly noticeable, but I know it's there.

With all of the joinery cut and the grooves milled, it was time to drill out the holes for the wooden dowels that would help hold the joinery together. This was fairly straight forward and uneventful.

First had to get everything lined up and squared up.

Wood Floor Rectangle Hardwood Wood stain


Then I used my combo square to measure and mark the location of each hole so that they were all in the same spot all the way around. Then I used a 1/4" brad point bit to drill all the way through.

Table Wood Flooring Floor Wood stain


The holes drilled out the next step was to break all of the edges. Following the instructions in the book, I used a 1/4" round over bit in the router. I'm not exactly sure how this was supposed to work, since the guide bushing would essentially drop into the groove I cut for the mirror, but I thought I'd give it a shot anyway. It didn't work out so well.

Brown Table Wood Flooring Wood stain


For the most part it went alright, but there were a few spots where the bit gouged the wood and ate out more than I intended. You can see it in the picture above. If the sloppy fitting mortise and tenon irritated me, this pissed me off. It was late and I was getting tired so I decided to finish the assembly and sleep on how to proceed next. I brushed glue onto the cheeks of one of the rails, assembled, and then smeared a little glue on the 1/4" dowels that would hold it together and assembled it, leaving it to dry over night.

As I write this I'm still not sure how I want to proceed. Part of me thinks I can hand sand the router gouges out, at least make them less noticeable. And another part of me (the perfectionist) wants to remake the entire door to get the joinery more precise and the round over a little cleaner.

I have the lumber, but am not really crazy about the idea of using it.

With all of that being said, I am definitely glad that I decided to do the project and feel like I am learning a lot of things in the process. Both from the book and through trial and error.

I plan to finish the build tomorrow (Saturday), but still have a a little ways to go. I still need to route out the rabbet in the back to accept the 1/4" backer panel, mortise the piano hinge into the door and cabinet frame (a first for me), and attach the top shelf to the top of the cabinet case. I also have to make a decision about finishing the project. The finishing chapter isn't until the very end of the book, so if I choose to go chronologically, I may end up with a shop full of unfinished projects (not the end of the world).

As a preview, Chapter 2 is all about building a low cost workbench, which I am VERY excited about. If anyone knows where I can pick up a decently priced bench screw, I'd appreciate the input. I don't want to spend a ton on one, but want to get something that works well.
 

Attachments

#19 ·
Medicine Cabinet - Part 3 The Door

With the case constructed and the face frame attached, it was time to turn my attention to the door. The rails and stiles for the door were cut to size at the same time as the face frame.

Wood Flooring Rectangle Wood stain Beige


The door frame is joined using through mortise and tenons that are pinned with wooden dowels.
Up to this point I have tried to follow Norm's techniques as closely as possible, but I had to deviate slightly for the first few cuts here.

In the book, norm recommends starting with cutting the mortises out of the ends of the stiles. To do this he sets up the tablesaw with a standard blade, raised 1.5" above the table, and positions the fence 1/4'' away from the blade. Then he runs the stile along the fence, on end, to make one cut, and then repeats the cut on the opposite face. I'm sure it works perfectly fine, and it's probably safe 90% of the time, but it scares the hell out of me. So, I used my ShopFox Tenoning Jig to make the cuts instead.

Wood Floor Flooring Composite material Hardwood


I think the end result was pretty much the same, I ended up with a slot, and all 10 fingers still attached.
I repeated the process on both ends of both stiles.

Next up I needed to mill the slots that would accept the mirror. Although I had deviated and used my tenoning jig, I decided to go back to following the instructions in the book. This is where things started going wrong.

The book had me change to my dado blade, and set it to make a 1/4" wide cut, with the blade 1/2" above the table, and the fence 1/4" away from the blade. The idea here is that this setup will center the blade in the stock, giving you a 1/4" groove down the middle. I'm not sure if it was because it was getting late, I was getting excited, or I was trying to follow the directions too closely without critically thinking about it, but I broke one of the rules I learned earlier in the project, and didn't bother to make a test cut in scrap stock first.

I ran the first stile through the saw, set it aside, ran the next stile through the saw, and noticed that my "centered" groove didn't line up with my "centered" mortise(s) that I cut using my tenoning jig. As far as I could tell, my two cuts with the 1/8"(ish) blade for the mortises didn't result in a full 1/4" slot. I had about 1/16" worth of material on the inside of each. I decided to go ahead and cut the slots on the rails with the dado head still installed, and then figure out how to deal with the extra material afterward.

Not the end of the world, just an opportunity to get a little creative….at least that's what I thought.

As I stood at the tablesaw contemplating my next steps, I decided that I would make up for the extra material on the tenons…I could take slightly more material off of one cheek (the one facing the extra material) and everything would be corrected.

Sounded simple enough in my head.

For cutting the tenons I decided to stick to the method described in the book. It wasn't as scary as the first cut, and I'd already ended up in trouble by doing things "my way" once.

To cut the tenons Norm suggested clamping one of the stiles to the fence to act as a spacer or stop block to get consistent cuts on the shoulders on all of the tenons.

It looked like this…

Wood Rectangle Flooring Floor Wood stain


The blade was set to 1/4" above the table, still at 1/4" cut. I suppose I could have added all of the other pieces to the dado stack to get the maximum width of cut, but I decided to leave it as it was and just nibble away the rest of the material. Even with the dado at maximum, it still wouldn't have been quite wide enough, so I decided not to mess with it.

This worked pretty well, make a cut using the spacer to set the distance, flip the rail over, space it out and make the same cut. Then it was just a matter of nibbling away at all of the remaining material until I had a tenon.

Wood Flooring Floor Wood stain Publication


In the picture you can see the extra material in the mortise.

Because of the extra material, the next step was to nibble away enough material from one cheek in order to get everything to fit nice and tight. Easier said than done.

I set up the cut using the same method of the spacer and nibbling away material. Raising the blade a little at a time, I'd cut, test fit, and cut some more. This worked relatively well at first. Somewhere along the way pieces must have ended up mixed up (should have marked them) and one rail ended up with both tenons cut too thin. Again, not the end of the world, but frustrating none the less.

The end result…

Wood Wood stain Table Flooring Hardwood


This is the set that fit tight, the other set I didn't photograph, but it had about 1/32" worth of between the cheeks and the mortise walls. I ended up shimming it with thinly sliced pieces of oak from one of the cutoffs, ended up working out ok, not terribly noticeable, but I know it's there.

With all of the joinery cut and the grooves milled, it was time to drill out the holes for the wooden dowels that would help hold the joinery together. This was fairly straight forward and uneventful.

First had to get everything lined up and squared up.

Wood Floor Rectangle Hardwood Wood stain


Then I used my combo square to measure and mark the location of each hole so that they were all in the same spot all the way around. Then I used a 1/4" brad point bit to drill all the way through.

Table Wood Flooring Floor Wood stain


The holes drilled out the next step was to break all of the edges. Following the instructions in the book, I used a 1/4" round over bit in the router. I'm not exactly sure how this was supposed to work, since the guide bushing would essentially drop into the groove I cut for the mirror, but I thought I'd give it a shot anyway. It didn't work out so well.

Brown Table Wood Flooring Wood stain


For the most part it went alright, but there were a few spots where the bit gouged the wood and ate out more than I intended. You can see it in the picture above. If the sloppy fitting mortise and tenon irritated me, this pissed me off. It was late and I was getting tired so I decided to finish the assembly and sleep on how to proceed next. I brushed glue onto the cheeks of one of the rails, assembled, and then smeared a little glue on the 1/4" dowels that would hold it together and assembled it, leaving it to dry over night.

As I write this I'm still not sure how I want to proceed. Part of me thinks I can hand sand the router gouges out, at least make them less noticeable. And another part of me (the perfectionist) wants to remake the entire door to get the joinery more precise and the round over a little cleaner.

I have the lumber, but am not really crazy about the idea of using it.

With all of that being said, I am definitely glad that I decided to do the project and feel like I am learning a lot of things in the process. Both from the book and through trial and error.

I plan to finish the build tomorrow (Saturday), but still have a a little ways to go. I still need to route out the rabbet in the back to accept the 1/4" backer panel, mortise the piano hinge into the door and cabinet frame (a first for me), and attach the top shelf to the top of the cabinet case. I also have to make a decision about finishing the project. The finishing chapter isn't until the very end of the book, so if I choose to go chronologically, I may end up with a shop full of unfinished projects (not the end of the world).

As a preview, Chapter 2 is all about building a low cost workbench, which I am VERY excited about. If anyone knows where I can pick up a decently priced bench screw, I'd appreciate the input. I don't want to spend a ton on one, but want to get something that works well.
Excellent ! Thank you for the good ideas!
 

Attachments

#24 ·
Finishing up the first project - and overall lessons learned

Sorry about the delay in posting this, life got away from me and it's been hard to find time in the shop.

The last blog left off by starting to assemble the door and dealing with some minor frustrations from the roundover bit I used. If you were wondering, I decided not to rebuild the frame for the door. Instead I sanded most of the imperfections out, starting at 120 to remove as much as I could without completely sanding through everything, and then moving up through the grits to 220.

Overall it worked out ok, I'm sure most people won't notice it, but I do every time I look at it.

Once I had the door sanded out decently I decided to finish up the assembly before moving on to other parts of the cabinet. The plans in the book call for a mirror backed with a piece of 1/4" plywood. At first I thought a little mirror cabinet would be nice for my daughter to use in her room, but my wife veto'ed me on that and asked if we could put a piece of clear glass in it. She wants to hang it over her craft table and use it to store some of her materials.

Ask and ye shall receive.

I made a quick trip to the local hardware shop and picked up a piece of window glass. They only had 1/8" and I didn't feel like making an extra trip to the glass shop. Back home I inserted the glass into the grooves in the door frame, slid in the top rail and glued everything up. Because the groove was cut to accept a 1/4" thick mirror I had to shim the glass in the corners using thin pieces of oak cut offs. It seemed to work relatively well, holding the glass tight in the frame.

Rectangle Wood Table Flooring Gas


With the door done, I set it aside to let the glue dry and turned my attention to routing out the back of the cabinet to accept the back panel.

Using a 5/8" rabbeting bit, I set the depth for a little deeper than 1/4" to accept an 1/8" thick panel. I wanted the cabinet frame to sit a little proud of the back panel so that the cabinet would hang flush to the wall.

Wood Natural material Wood stain Hardwood Plank


The first pass got a little squirrely, not a big deal since it will be hidden against the wall. Next time I think I will set up some kind of auxilary board that the router can ride on to get a little more stability.

As you can see in the picture, the router bit left rounded corners. I used my chisels to square off each corner. Up to this point I'd used power tools for everything. Using the chisel I get first hand experience with the density of the oak. Not only was it slow going for the chopping, but I found that the oak had a tendency to break instead of cutting clean. I actually broke one of the finger joints off while I was chopping. I thought my chisels were pretty damn sharp, but I guess they weren't sharp enough.

Wood Tool Tableware Wood stain Hardwood


With the chiseling done, I decided to give the back panel a quick sand down before inserting it. 120-220 to clean it up. I used Baltic birch, mainly because it was what I had on hand.

Hat Fedora Cap Sun hat Wood


Speaking of using what I had on hand….

The plans in the book call for using a 24" piano hinge, mortised into the cabinet face frame and the door. I didn't have any on hand, and when I went to Home depot to pick a piano hinge up nearly all of the employees looked at me like I had an extra head growing out of my shoulder.

Rather than driving around town looking for piano hinges I decided to use a set of small brass hinges that I had at home. I bought them for a different project once upon a time and decided I didn't like the color.

No mortises required for these, simply marked them up, drilled pilot holes and attached them. I stripped a few of the brass screws out and had to drill the pilot holes larger. Oak is pretty tough stuff!

Attaching the door to the frame was pretty uneventful, but exciting because it started to feel like I was in the home stretch.

Brown Wood Fixture Wood stain Hardwood


Wood Hardwood Wood stain Plywood Flooring


If you look in the picture above you can see the glass is cracked. I took the cabinet upstairs into the house to hold it up and see how it would look on the wall. While I was grabbing a coffee refill the cat jump onto the table and climbed on top of the glass door. The cold glass couldn't hold him and cracked. Because the door is glued up I can't pull the glass out and replace without routing out the back side of the frame. Down the road I will probable replace it with 1/4" glass, but for now I decided to leave it as it is.

Back in the shop I pulled the door off, drill out the hole for the knob, did a quick test fit, and then took all of the hardware off so that I could apply the finish.

I had initially gone back and forth about whether I wanted to wait and save all the finish work until the appropriate chapter in the book, but decided that I would finish as I go and pick one project along the way to save.

For finishing, everything got a quick sand down with 220 to knock down any splintery stuff and any bumpy nubs. I also cut a few 1/4" thick pieces that would act as shelves inside the cabinet.

I chose a finish I've fallen in love with recently. It's a three part oil based finish consisting of equal parts Boiled Linseed Oil, Satin Polyurethane and Mineral Spirits. I liberally apply it to all parts with a soft cloth, let it soak in for 20-45 minutes and then wipe all excess off with paper towels. Then I let it dry for 36-48 hours, and give everything a rub down with #0000 steel wool to knock down any nubs. I repeat 3-4 times depending on the level of finish I want to build. For this project I stopped at 3 coats since it won't be beat on like a table or other piece of furniture.

Brown Wood Flooring Wood stain Hardwood


After the finish was dry I reattached the door and handle hardware and inserted all of the shelf pins. I had to drill out some of the holes a little deeper so that the pins would sit flush.

Brown Wood Wood stain Flooring Hardwood


With the pins in I added the shelves and took a final picture.

Shelving Wood Window Wood stain Hardwood


As a quick summary here are some of the overall lessons I learned from the first project in the series:

Measure everything - even when following plans. The accuracy of all of my joinery could have been better if I would have taken a little more time marking and double checking all my measurements.

The Finger joint jig is awesome! I had been putting off building one for a while. I'm definitely glad I finally did. I already have plans to use it for some of my own designs in the future. Now that I understand the basic premise behind it, I feel like I can scale it up and down to get a large variety of finger joints.

Clamp your frame/finger joints on a flat surface with equal pressure

Stop blocks/set up blocks on the table saw fence increase accuracy and speed of setup I had seen this done before but never used it. Always thought it seemed kind of silly, since I could just measure and layout each cut. Now that I've used stop blocks on the table saw fence I don't think I can go back to not using one. They made it possible to get extremely consistent/accurate cuts when there was a lot of repetition.

You can create accurate shelf pins without a drill press Up until this point I have avoided projects that I didn't have the "right" tool for or rushed out to buy a tool just because an article or plan says I should use it. It might seem silly, but it was a good lesson to do the layout by hand and see that if I just took my time and thought things through, I could get similar results without the "right" tool.

Use backer blocks when cutting oak - especially dados I had to fix splinter blown out/tear out on some of the lap joints because the dado blade beat it up on the exit cut. Afterward I thought about it and I'm pretty sure it could have been avoided if I had put another piece of wood behind it - similar to the way you can minimize tear out when drilling through a piece.

Finally, Cold glass + fat cat = angry wood worker.

Overall I'm very glad that I decided to start this New Yankee Workshop project. Just from the first build I feel like I picked up some new things, even though I didn't follow the project to the letter.

I've already started on chapter 2 - the Workbench build. I will work to get the blog posted sometime soon.

Thanks for following!
 

Attachments

#25 ·
Finishing up the first project - and overall lessons learned

Sorry about the delay in posting this, life got away from me and it's been hard to find time in the shop.

The last blog left off by starting to assemble the door and dealing with some minor frustrations from the roundover bit I used. If you were wondering, I decided not to rebuild the frame for the door. Instead I sanded most of the imperfections out, starting at 120 to remove as much as I could without completely sanding through everything, and then moving up through the grits to 220.

Overall it worked out ok, I'm sure most people won't notice it, but I do every time I look at it.

Once I had the door sanded out decently I decided to finish up the assembly before moving on to other parts of the cabinet. The plans in the book call for a mirror backed with a piece of 1/4" plywood. At first I thought a little mirror cabinet would be nice for my daughter to use in her room, but my wife veto'ed me on that and asked if we could put a piece of clear glass in it. She wants to hang it over her craft table and use it to store some of her materials.

Ask and ye shall receive.

I made a quick trip to the local hardware shop and picked up a piece of window glass. They only had 1/8" and I didn't feel like making an extra trip to the glass shop. Back home I inserted the glass into the grooves in the door frame, slid in the top rail and glued everything up. Because the groove was cut to accept a 1/4" thick mirror I had to shim the glass in the corners using thin pieces of oak cut offs. It seemed to work relatively well, holding the glass tight in the frame.

Rectangle Wood Table Flooring Gas


With the door done, I set it aside to let the glue dry and turned my attention to routing out the back of the cabinet to accept the back panel.

Using a 5/8" rabbeting bit, I set the depth for a little deeper than 1/4" to accept an 1/8" thick panel. I wanted the cabinet frame to sit a little proud of the back panel so that the cabinet would hang flush to the wall.

Wood Natural material Wood stain Hardwood Plank


The first pass got a little squirrely, not a big deal since it will be hidden against the wall. Next time I think I will set up some kind of auxilary board that the router can ride on to get a little more stability.

As you can see in the picture, the router bit left rounded corners. I used my chisels to square off each corner. Up to this point I'd used power tools for everything. Using the chisel I get first hand experience with the density of the oak. Not only was it slow going for the chopping, but I found that the oak had a tendency to break instead of cutting clean. I actually broke one of the finger joints off while I was chopping. I thought my chisels were pretty damn sharp, but I guess they weren't sharp enough.

Wood Tool Tableware Wood stain Hardwood


With the chiseling done, I decided to give the back panel a quick sand down before inserting it. 120-220 to clean it up. I used Baltic birch, mainly because it was what I had on hand.

Hat Fedora Cap Sun hat Wood


Speaking of using what I had on hand….

The plans in the book call for using a 24" piano hinge, mortised into the cabinet face frame and the door. I didn't have any on hand, and when I went to Home depot to pick a piano hinge up nearly all of the employees looked at me like I had an extra head growing out of my shoulder.

Rather than driving around town looking for piano hinges I decided to use a set of small brass hinges that I had at home. I bought them for a different project once upon a time and decided I didn't like the color.

No mortises required for these, simply marked them up, drilled pilot holes and attached them. I stripped a few of the brass screws out and had to drill the pilot holes larger. Oak is pretty tough stuff!

Attaching the door to the frame was pretty uneventful, but exciting because it started to feel like I was in the home stretch.

Brown Wood Fixture Wood stain Hardwood


Wood Hardwood Wood stain Plywood Flooring


If you look in the picture above you can see the glass is cracked. I took the cabinet upstairs into the house to hold it up and see how it would look on the wall. While I was grabbing a coffee refill the cat jump onto the table and climbed on top of the glass door. The cold glass couldn't hold him and cracked. Because the door is glued up I can't pull the glass out and replace without routing out the back side of the frame. Down the road I will probable replace it with 1/4" glass, but for now I decided to leave it as it is.

Back in the shop I pulled the door off, drill out the hole for the knob, did a quick test fit, and then took all of the hardware off so that I could apply the finish.

I had initially gone back and forth about whether I wanted to wait and save all the finish work until the appropriate chapter in the book, but decided that I would finish as I go and pick one project along the way to save.

For finishing, everything got a quick sand down with 220 to knock down any splintery stuff and any bumpy nubs. I also cut a few 1/4" thick pieces that would act as shelves inside the cabinet.

I chose a finish I've fallen in love with recently. It's a three part oil based finish consisting of equal parts Boiled Linseed Oil, Satin Polyurethane and Mineral Spirits. I liberally apply it to all parts with a soft cloth, let it soak in for 20-45 minutes and then wipe all excess off with paper towels. Then I let it dry for 36-48 hours, and give everything a rub down with #0000 steel wool to knock down any nubs. I repeat 3-4 times depending on the level of finish I want to build. For this project I stopped at 3 coats since it won't be beat on like a table or other piece of furniture.

Brown Wood Flooring Wood stain Hardwood


After the finish was dry I reattached the door and handle hardware and inserted all of the shelf pins. I had to drill out some of the holes a little deeper so that the pins would sit flush.

Brown Wood Wood stain Flooring Hardwood


With the pins in I added the shelves and took a final picture.

Shelving Wood Window Wood stain Hardwood


As a quick summary here are some of the overall lessons I learned from the first project in the series:

Measure everything - even when following plans. The accuracy of all of my joinery could have been better if I would have taken a little more time marking and double checking all my measurements.

The Finger joint jig is awesome! I had been putting off building one for a while. I'm definitely glad I finally did. I already have plans to use it for some of my own designs in the future. Now that I understand the basic premise behind it, I feel like I can scale it up and down to get a large variety of finger joints.

Clamp your frame/finger joints on a flat surface with equal pressure

Stop blocks/set up blocks on the table saw fence increase accuracy and speed of setup I had seen this done before but never used it. Always thought it seemed kind of silly, since I could just measure and layout each cut. Now that I've used stop blocks on the table saw fence I don't think I can go back to not using one. They made it possible to get extremely consistent/accurate cuts when there was a lot of repetition.

You can create accurate shelf pins without a drill press Up until this point I have avoided projects that I didn't have the "right" tool for or rushed out to buy a tool just because an article or plan says I should use it. It might seem silly, but it was a good lesson to do the layout by hand and see that if I just took my time and thought things through, I could get similar results without the "right" tool.

Use backer blocks when cutting oak - especially dados I had to fix splinter blown out/tear out on some of the lap joints because the dado blade beat it up on the exit cut. Afterward I thought about it and I'm pretty sure it could have been avoided if I had put another piece of wood behind it - similar to the way you can minimize tear out when drilling through a piece.

Finally, Cold glass + fat cat = angry wood worker.

Overall I'm very glad that I decided to start this New Yankee Workshop project. Just from the first build I feel like I picked up some new things, even though I didn't follow the project to the letter.

I've already started on chapter 2 - the Workbench build. I will work to get the blog posted sometime soon.

Thanks for following!
Looks like a good first project from the book. Looking forward to the next entry.

Here is a little hint on the brass screws. After drilling the pilot hole, drive a regular steel screw the same size and thread into the hole before trying to screw in the brass screw. This will tap threads into the hole and keep you from messing up your nice brass screws that come with the hinge.
 

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