The following are some image links to one of my pic sites; this one in particular has a bit of wood working on it from the past… including some bigger pics of my DVD cabinet still raw and unfinished. The grip handle is one of many I’ve made to be sold attached to the plumbing manfold you see the wood affixed to… It bears noting that the hole in the picture of the hole in the wood, measures slightly over 1 1/2” and that is the entry hole; the board thickness was, if I remember correctly, before impact 5/8”, seasoned and hard, nailed up for the shot…from 80’ http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2416/2317468621_2222b2a2f0_m.jpg
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couldn’t figure out how to get the gallery thingy to worky, so I’m being a post hog and putting three more here for anybody’s perusal . A view of the other side of the door-arch clearance, this is the only way the arch wood close in itself…my wife likens it to “spanish mission” type of a look. And a view of one of the hinge area’s, cut in by hand, measured, no templates, routers, etc. Also, a shot of the vines wrapping around the top corner, same-same on the other side, except more leaf, less vine.

I built this DVD cabinet a few years back- about a year after having a truss decide it didn’t like me anymore, one day at work. I fell upside down, hitting my L. side of my head and my left shoulder on a concrete footing, at the acromian process. I worked another 6 months before I went and filed a claim on it. By then I could no longer lift even a cup with my left arm.—it’d be another two years before getting my titanium-cobalt replacement hardware. In the meantime, I was smack dab in the middle of a major remodel of our house; two pallets of Armstrong laminate flooring sat and collected dust in the shop,along with the K. cabinets(the base and counters and the double custom 8 & 10” ss sink with two faucets (one dedicated hot) had already been installed), a brand-new floor sink for the laundry room, 15 sheets of 1/4” finish grade Burch plywood, wainscoting to match, linoleum, carpet & on &on &on… Well, the store bought Sauder dvd cabinet gave out one day when we were trying to move furniture; it was a mess and a catastrophe since at that point my family of 8 mouths to feed and take care of was living on slightly less than 60 % of my wages when I was working. Being on L&I (Labor and industries injured worker disability) was causing our worked to fall down around our ankles slowly. I still couldn’t wash my right arm pit, nor wash my hair with both hands, and it sounds crude, I know, but I had to learn to wipe my rear with my right hand(embarrassing to admit, but it is one of those things we take for granted and don’t even consider), I couldn’t sleep on my left or near it at all, some days breathing hurt my shoulder,too… Yeah, they gave me pain-killers, but they made me so damn dopey- & sick! The flip side to it was a handful of hydro 10’s and some St. Brendan’s irish cream in my coffee and I was not only bullet proof, again, but I could use my left arm! That is where this DVD cabinet comes into play…
The shop was packed full of stuff for the romod’, all of my tools for work were right at the front roll-door,and everything else had gotten buried by well-meaning family and friends after we discovered the rude reality of the screaming halt to the work on our house that two of our children had been born in. All I had to work with was a cordless drll, a worm-drive skillsaw, my framing hammer, the three rough chisels in my bags, a tape, a speed square a BIG pad sander, a late 60’s model craftsman 1/4”router, and my 1952 Delta-Homecraft Contractor’s model Table saw(I used to carry it by myself) w/ the bent/twisted fence, and the pipe clamps that were thankfully still leaned up in the corner by the big door. The weather was just out of winter, so firing up the furnace would’ve been helpful, but it, too, was buried. I had an area of about 10’ x 6’ to work in…right at my tire changer that was bolted to the floor- it later became part of my assembly bench. I used one of those Mr. Heater propane tank heaters to keep my fingers from freezing while I worked out there. I designed this thing as I went more-or-less as I did have a bit of an idea as to what I wanted. I did have to make some sketches along the way( and they look pretty rough),—the arches were totally freehand as there was no practical way to lay them down and do them since the top of my T- saw was also my work bench. I used materials I’d set aside to make dressers and other furniture for my family; as well as a nice, heavy butcher block cutting board, that was going to be in an island in the kitchen, for the base of this thing. ( Yeah, that’s right, I cut it up)- hey, remember, I was REALLY loaded; it was the only way I could use my left to do the damn job… my teenage son couldn’t ever be bothered to hang around and learn a thing or two…my 4 younger ones, though, they all want to be in on everything I do. Anyways, I used the Kreg pocket jig to put the thing together. Yeah, I had/have the plugs, but they weren’t a big concern so much as having boxes and boxes of movies everywhere in the house, as well as movies just scattered hither and yon.And , to me putting them in amounted to getting the cabinet done later rather than sooner…and since they’re hidden, so what. The glue is Locktite, I prefer it over Titebond. Yes, I’ve used both on different projects and came to my own conclusion that the Locktite glue tacks up better, faster, stronger and lasts longer and holds a joint better. Just my educated opinion. If the store is out of it, I’ll buy the other stuff…and it’ll end up sitting on a shelf after I get the new bottle of Locktite somewhere else, later. The shelf standards are from a warehouse remod I did a long time ago- there were solid, medium, med wide, wide, wider, OLD wood shelving everywhere. The owner just wanted to rip it all out and throw it away! Not!, I painstakingly dismantled 7 pickup loads and two trailer loads of shelving, and those metal-slotted standards and their brackets were on built in shelf/file cabinets in an office in the basement…somebody once upon a time long long ago spent a lot of time putting all that stuff together by hand…. Anyways, I’ve used up a lot of it and sold some here and there, cheap to friends. All the hardware is brassy from Homedepot. The inner lights are from an old headboard somebody had taken to the dump (long tube type, like a fish tank light, w/ aluminum shrouds and an “L” bracket mount,W/ a turn knob on the end). The doors are held closed with magnets. The top trim is base that I cut to fit the line of the vine congruently around the corners. For the life of me, I can’t honestly remember what I coated it with, or how many coats, though my wife says I used two, quart cans on it and she wasn’t sure if I’d been dopey from the pills or from the fumes when she’d gone out to see me when I was spraying the clear coats on it. All the same, she and everyone else who see it are all impressed with it and either wants me to make them one, or thinks I should make and sell them because,”people will buy that, it’s made out of real wood.” As opposed to artificial wood? Wood that be cloned wood? Certainly not plastic wood because plastic wood wood be plastic, not wood…woodn’t you agree? The date/time stamps are current on the pictures, I realize, but though there are a few pic’s of it when it was raw (like my thumbnail), they’re packed away somewhere, here and there; and it was just easier to take new pictures…my 9 year-old son was two-ish when I made this cabinet. I’ve seen way better stuff here on Lj’s as well as elsewhere, but for being as whacked as I was and the tools and conditions I had to work in, and the permanent disablement of one appendage(the final repair was less than optimal, but at least I can wash & wipe now, left handed, again) I’ve only been repaired for two years), the cabinet turned out pretty fair…unfortunately, my Virgo-Scorpio eye tends to pick at every little flaw every time someone compliments it… that is where learning to show humbleness to my children has aided me in schooling my own mouth and nit-picking my own work, in spite of myself. I went through the tag listings and wasn’t real sure what to make of the style, what is your opinion,”gimp-craftsman”? I have a bunch of other pic’s I’ll try to load here somewhere.