Step-back Cupboard Build #18: Cupboard backboards

After a burger and fries for lunch I decided to keep working on the cupboard. The knob and latch needs a turning billet so I can go to the lathe and make chips. And the back boards need milling and rabbets. So while the glue up for the billet dries, its time to make shavings.

The back of the cupboard will be 1/2” boards of slightly varying widths. The boards will be ship-lapped and rest in a rabbet on the back of the case. Cut nails along the top, bottom and the fixed shelf will hold them in place.

Step one, mill down the board to 1/2”. Decided to just use the power planer for this. Noisy but pretty quick work. Didn’t bother with pictures here.

Next the boards are ripped to width. The widths are all between 4” and 5-1/2” and side by each it is about 28-1/2”. In the end I’ll need 24” to fill the back. Good to go.

Time to get out the rabbeting plane. I could have done this with the table saw and a dado head, or with my router handheld or in the table and a straight bit. But I recently picked up a Chinese copy of a Stanley 78 ($0.99 on eBay but about $12 in shipping, argh!). I’ve honed the blade and done some preliminary fettling of the plane. It needs a little more work but its OK for now.

Here’s the plane showing the depth stop, nicker (retracted) and fence:

And here we see the other side with the fence support rod and depth adjuster (such as it is).

And from the top you can see the cap iron and screw and both the “regular” frog and the bull-nose frog at the front of the plane.

For $13 its a pretty decent worker. I decided to take a risk on what might be a bad casting (it isn’t terrible but does need work) because all the other 78’s on eBay seem to be missing the fence, depthstop or both!

Once again, a three finger grip on the right hand, index finger pointing along the plane for balance. My left hand is riding with my thumb and index finger riding on the nose of the plane and the rest of my fingers are wrapped around the fence post. The depth is set kinda deep but since this is a long grain cut it works fine.

Here are the ends of finished boards.

You can see a little bit about what I mean when I say the plane needs a little more fettling. The fence is not 100% perpendicular to the body. This combined with running along the narrow edge and my limited experience with the plane produces some out of square rabbets. However since this is for ship lap and the joints will be left a little slack anyway, no big deal.

And the coolest part of using a rabbeting plane, the shavings! (Size US11 for scale…)

Once the boards are assembled side by side, the final width is about 26”. Since I needed 24” this is great. I’ll just rip about 1” off each of the two outside boards and I’m good to go. But that will wait until after a quick dry-fit to confirm.

Playing with the rabbet plane took most of the afternoon and now its dinner time. Perhaps some hossenfeffer…

-- Don't sweat the petty things and don't pet the sweaty things.