| Project by FlWoodRat | posted 1337 days ago | 2650 views | 8 times favorited | 14 comments |  |
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First off, I want to send a big THANK YOU to Rick Waters at The Sawdust Chronicles for two things… #1. Encouraging woodworkers to build something that benefits our communities, and #2. Hosting the 60 Day Build Challenge. I also want to thank Tommy McDonald at Major Leauge Wood Working , (MLWWoodworking.com) for his encouragement and technical guidance.
Now for the story…....
Late this summer I saw a reference to Rick’s TSDC 60 Day Build on Tommy’s website and I thought… woohoo, a chance to win a set of Rockler’s “Bench Cookies” and do something good for my community. I contacted Rick and got the details of the contest, then submitted my entry. I managed to get it built a couple of weeks early and on time for my work’s United Way Fund Raising Campaign. I gave them a few pictures and they ran with it. Monday they gave me ONE THOUSAND raffle tickets to sell at $5 each and 30 days to get them sold. My goal is to sell them all in two weeks.
Ok, so here is how it was built:
Constructino Materials:
Post/Rails/Muntins/Lid/Panels are hard maple (8/4 for the leg posts and 6/4 for everything else)
The bottom is a plywood sandwich (3/4 Maple faced, poplar cored and 1/4” aromatic cedar)
Finish Materials
Boiled Linseed oil with Japan Dryer added (3 coats)
Hock, Blonde De-Waxed Shellac (3 coats of 1# cut, 1 coat of 1/2” cut)
General Finishes Arm-R-Seal (2 coats)
The Process
All frame joints are Doweled Mortise and Tenon
After rough cutting, all the stock was machine jointed and planed and allowed to aclimate. Then I hand planed the stock to final thickness. Following that I used card scrapers to smooth out any mill marks.
I used my home made tenon jig to cut all the tenons and to rough cut the raised panels. The final 1/8” was cut off the bevel faces with an old Stanley #78 hand plane. That too was followed by smoothing with a card scraper.
After a few test assemblies with multiple panel arrangements, I settled on the final layout. With the case apart, I prepared the stock for finishing by wetting it all with Demineralized water followed by 320 wet/dry sanding. This was done 3 times to remove all the grain fuzz.
Next I applied 2 coats of BLO to the panels, rubbed them out and allowed them to dry. After the assembly was glued up I applied a total of 3 coats of BLO to all the interior and exterior surfaces. This was followed by the multiple coats of shellac and Arm-R-Seal. All in all, I have about 150 to 200 hours of work in it.
Thanks for your view and your comments.
FlWoodRat
-- I love the smell of sawdust in the morning....
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14 comments so far
Woodbutchery
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229 posts in 1783 days
#1 posted 1337 days ago
Great chest. The finish compliments the wood.
-- Making scrap with zen-like precision - Woodbutchery
Karson
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34396 posts in 2598 days
#2 posted 1337 days ago
Beautiful Good luck on selling all of the tickets. There will be one happy winner and the United way will come out ahead because of your generosity.
-- I've been blessed with a father who liked to tinker in wood, and a wife who lets me tinker in wood. Southern Delaware karson_morrison@bigfoot.com †
woodchic
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823 posts in 1555 days
#3 posted 1337 days ago
Hey Rat! I like…............you made the look all your own. I like the raised panels and the finish looks great!
Robin Renee’
AKA…..........woodchic
-- Robin Renee'
woodworm
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14105 posts in 1788 days
#4 posted 1337 days ago
Really great chest.
-- masrol, kuala lumpur, MY.
a1Jim
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89117 posts in 1775 days
#5 posted 1337 days ago
Looks great Rat
-- W James Brokenbourgh Custom furniture maker http://artisticwoodstudio.com/
SwedishIron
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142 posts in 1838 days
#6 posted 1337 days ago
Rat,
Great job w/ your Blanket Chest project, not just to the fact that it turned out amazing.. hats off to donating it and giving back to the community! This world needs many more people like you sir! :D
-- Scott, Colorado
patron
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12172 posts in 1538 days
#7 posted 1337 days ago
great work ,
and a worthy cause !
-- david - only thru kindness can this world be whole . If we don't succeed we run the risk of failure. Dan Quayle
FlWoodRat
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732 posts in 2107 days
#8 posted 1337 days ago
Thanks for the comments folks. Swede, I am not sure the world needs more folks like me. What we need is more folks like Rick Waters getting other folks involved
-- I love the smell of sawdust in the morning....
SplinteredBoard
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59 posts in 1804 days
#9 posted 1337 days ago
Rat,
Thanks for getting involved in the contest, and thanks for a great explanation of the build!
When developing the idea for the contest, I never imagined that it would bring such a potentially large donation. But I sure hope you are able to sell all of the raffle tickets.
For those that don’t know, Rat and I spoke on the phone last night and I told him that several people online (via Twitter) were interested in buying some of the raffle tickets. Unfortunately, the shipping expenses would make this an unreasonable circumstance. The chest weighs 80-100lbs.
Thanks again for getting involved, and for the great article.
Rick
-- Splintered Board Podcast - Woodworker Un-extraordinaire
FlWoodRat
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732 posts in 2107 days
#10 posted 1337 days ago
Rick,
You are most welcome. It was a fun way to spend a few weeks of my late summer/ early fall vacation. And on the up side, I lost almost 8 lbs during the process. It took me 3 and a half days to hand plane the stock to final dimensions. That lid kicked my butt! The entire time, my mid day shop temp was 95F or higher with 95% humidity. Free Saunas are one of the benefits of being a woodworker in Florida.
-- I love the smell of sawdust in the morning....
paplou
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314 posts in 1541 days
#11 posted 1337 days ago
very nice, hope who ever wins it will take care of it. i did about the same thing, i built a high chair ( i have a pic. of it on this site) and none of my kids had babys on the way so i gave it to be raffled off for cancer at the doctor both my wife and i went to for our treatment. good luck on all your future projects.
-- PAPLOU
Bob Kollman
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1779 posts in 1388 days
#12 posted 1334 days ago
At first I thought i was looking at a desk front, the raised panels are great. Nice chest.
bob
-- Bob Kenosha Wi.
Jesse
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66 posts in 1416 days
#13 posted 941 days ago
This is great! My wife wants one of these.
-- Jesse, Hopewell Jct., NY
deborelli
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75 posts in 430 days
#14 posted 424 days ago
Thank you for all the details for us newbies.
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