Dutch Tool Chest in Spain - Part II

I feel lucky to have been able to spend some good time today on my chest. The next bit that needs doing are the sticks for the locks, as well as the cutouts for them on the chest.

I decided to cut them a bit over length, and wait to trim them to final length once the chest is together and I can see how they are supposed to work. Since the wood I bought was sold in a metric measurement, my chest is actually an inch or two taller than Christopher Schwarz' plan.

Cutting these notches is pretty simple, even without a router. The trick is being accurate in marking out. The first cut is to saw the sidewalls of the notch.

Sidewalls sawed - check.

I also cut some relief cuts to prevent any disasters. Next, I rough out the notch with a chisel and mallet.

Roughed out - check.

Then it is just a matter of paring down to the line with a chisel.

Pared to the line, check.

Only a little more complicated are the notches in the bottom board, which are stopped. I approached it in the same way.

Starting the stopped cut.

In no time that part was done.

Locks fit.

The next challenge was the back. Christopher Schwarz recommends tongue and groove joints for the back boards, but those sound awfully fussy without any proper joinery planes. I think it can be done, but there are a lot of them, and I think the time spent isn't worth the end result. My opinion is that ship lap joints should do just fine.

I could make these rabbets with a chisel and a saw, but once again, there are a lot of rabbets to make, so the best way is with a rabbet plane, which I didn't have until I made one out of scrap wood yesterday.

First action shot.

The way it was, it seemed to work. It soon became apparent, however, that all was not well in Rabbetville. Every swipe I took led the plane a little farther inboard, and soon I had a big mess.

I'm not sure what the problem was, as I can make a rabbet like that just fine with my vintage rabbet plane that is safely in my tool chest in Munich.

I decided another piece of scrap and a couple nails should fix the problem.

I nailed on a fence.

It did. Once I had the fence on, I was making perfect rabbets in a hurry.

Action shot.

This worked just fine for this project. I'm pretty sure this plane won't last long, but I'm done with it for this project. If I need another one someday, I know I can whip one out in a hurry.

This rabbet is just fine for a ship lap.

Once this was done, I just had to nail the top piece on after squaring the carcase up the best I could. It was out 3mm on the diagonal, so a small push in that direction squared it up a little better.

Back pieces starting to go on.

I continued using Roman nails to attach the back. I really like these nails. They hold like crazy.

I spaced the ship lap boards the width of a 1 Euro coin to allow the boards to expand and contract with the humidity.

These nails are tapered, so I drilled pilot holes to prevent splitting.

This whole process took a bit longer than it would if you had a table saw and a powered shaper, but I also have all my fingers and hearing intact.

And, I did it in my home office. No table saw in here!

Next up is the front panel, the drop front and the lid. Plus hardware and paint, and who-knows-what I forgot. Like the guts for the upper compartment.

As a follow up to a previous post, my wife bought me a Spanish woodworking book that was recommended by a reader. This looks like a great book for learning woodworking Spanish. Thanks for the recommendation, António!

My birthday present from my wife.