A Blast from the Past

I had an opportunity to revisit and photograph one of my old favorites this week! This Red Oak Coffer was made about three years ago, in my pre-table saw, pre-Lumberjocks Era. I used to mill all the thin panel pieces by screwing the object piece to a good sized piece of plywood and with a fence and circular saw, slicing off 1/4” strips. Then moving the piece, re-screwing, re-sawing, repeating…VERY time consuming! The sides of the trays I cut by halving the 3/4” stock that I had available with the scroll saw.
Though it’s not easy to see, the lid widens towards the front (one of the “finger” widths) so if allowed to drop, it closes with a thunderous BANG!
The sort of paper/picture/envelope holder under the lid panel was an idea that I had pondered, but was not an intentional feature on this box, resulting from not moving one of the setups for the panel slots :-O I had planned on trying that idea, just not that day! But it worked out for the best…
The partition in the top tray I made with through finger tenons, which worked out well. In the old construction pictures I tried to photograph the “funny” business that was used to make the lid wider in front and also have complete wood lengths meeting one another, front and back; I’m not sure how clearly that shows.
To keep the lid from falling backwards I just used some ribbon and brass thumbtacks.
This was my fourth or fifth effort at box making and one I’m still pleased with! :) Michael C.

-- Mike in Concord, NH---Unpleasant tasks are simply worthy challenges to improve skills.