Newbie: looking for hand tool box-making advice

An old Stanley 5 1/2 makes a good inexpensive shooting board plane as well. If you can find a Record 043 it is a good small plow plane…

-- We must guard our enthusiasm as we would our life - James Krenov

I say go for it. It seems you have thought about all the angles on this project so as you develop into it your plans might change a bit but I am sure you will have no problems working through it. Don’t know how much you are into hand tools but if you are really new with them you really will gain a lot from this project and learning to sharpen/tune your planes and chisels especially if you work with pine.

best

I’m a hand tool guy myself and it sounds like you’ve given this some solid thought. I get excited just hearing about the tools you’re planning to use. I can’t say I’ve ever cut a finger joint with hand tools. I’m interested to see how that turns out. I’d echo the above comments. A router plane is kind of a luxury. I think a plow plane would be more versatile for future projects. The old Stanley 45 keeps surprising me with its ability. I would agree to use a larger plane on the shooting board. The fatties (1/2 sizes) are a good bet. I’m impressed that you’re starting off this way!

-- My dad and I built a 65 chev pick up.I killed trannys in that thing for some reason-Hog

Great feedback so far – thanks for the encouragement and great advice! I’m wondering now if I should be looking for a plow instead of a router plane. But it seems like the grooves will need to be stopped if I go for finger joints. Is this possible with a plow plane on such small panels?

I eventually went for a very simple project to start – a small pencil holder with finger jointed sides and the bottom just glued on. I used a shooting board with a Veritas low-angle block plane to true up the sides, and this worked very well. My joinery needs practice though, to say the least, and i ended up plugging the gaps with sawdust/glue mixture and painting the sanded finished product.

It was a start at least, and my daughter is happily storing her pens and pencils in it on her desk.

I’ve decided to spend some time practicing dovetail joints now – though they’re challenging for a beginner, they don’t seem to be more difficult for hand tool work than finger joints. And I’m surprised at how strong even beginner-quality dovetail joints are!

Thanks for the encouragement and suggestions!

Thanks Anji – I will definitely try the splined miter joint box. Adrian’s boxes look amazing. For now, though, I’m obsessed with getting dovetails right (and having fun in the process) so my goal is to put together a dovetailed box before moving on to the next project.

I may take a photo of the pencil holder tonight. If nothing else, it’ll hopefully remind me of how far I’ve come – when I actually do get somewhere!

Finally finished the pencil holder and a first dovetail box atempt. Apparently there isn’t as much time in a day as I had originally thought…

I like your approach, grego, and I think you’re in for a great journey. I share your obvious love for Japanese hand tools, and the last thing I want to do is discourage you in the slightest, but I think someone needs to say it—starting your woodworking journey with Japanese hand tools is a bit like learning to ride a bike… by starting with a unicycle.

Don’t take that the wrong way… I encourage you to stay the course. But be sure you cut yourself a LOT of slack.

When I started with Japanese hand tools, I began by cutting scraps of various hardwoods into fairly small strips, squares, rectangles, and triangles using Dozuki, Ryoba and Kataha. I then tried to find a way to piece them all together to create a small cutting board, chiseling away small bits here and there as needed. Once it was glued up (clamping was its own challenge), I had a lot of planing to do – on all 6 sides. The end result was very unusual – and a great learning experience.

-- Founding member of the (un)Official LumberJock's Frugal Woodworking Society - http://lumberjocks.com/topics/29451

Here are a couple of books that might interest you…

http://www.amazon.com/New-Traditional-Woodworker-Tool-Skill/dp/1440304289/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1310271066&sr=1-1

http://www.amazon.com/Made-Hand-Furniture-Projects-Unplugged/dp/1558708952/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1310271165&sr=1-1

-- We must guard our enthusiasm as we would our life - James Krenov