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Cherry side table

3K views 10 replies 4 participants last post by  Wintergreen78 
#1 ·
Almost done

This is my second side table. It is cherry with a drawer. The first was red oak without a drawer. It is close to finished - I just need to finish the drawer, fit it, then attach the top.

I was surprised about how much more challenging the tenons were to fit. I think part of it was the grain in the cherry. It wasn't as straight as the oak. Also, because the skirt had to be deeper to have room for the drawer, they were just bigger. I did the fine tuning with a chisel. I'm thinking about getting a router plane to help with the tenons on the next thing I make.

A few of the joints aren't perfectly tight, but I think it will look decent from 5 feet away.

I'm planning to just finish it with shellac.

Wood Floor Saw Flooring Tool


Wood Shelf Shelving Wood stain Hardwood


Furniture Shelf Table Wood Rectangle
 

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#2 ·
Almost done

This is my second side table. It is cherry with a drawer. The first was red oak without a drawer. It is close to finished - I just need to finish the drawer, fit it, then attach the top.

I was surprised about how much more challenging the tenons were to fit. I think part of it was the grain in the cherry. It wasn't as straight as the oak. Also, because the skirt had to be deeper to have room for the drawer, they were just bigger. I did the fine tuning with a chisel. I'm thinking about getting a router plane to help with the tenons on the next thing I make.

A few of the joints aren't perfectly tight, but I think it will look decent from 5 feet away.

I'm planning to just finish it with shellac.

Wood Floor Saw Flooring Tool


Wood Shelf Shelving Wood stain Hardwood


Furniture Shelf Table Wood Rectangle
Nice wood and clean lines. Brave man clamping such lovely work without a caul.
 

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#3 ·
Almost done

This is my second side table. It is cherry with a drawer. The first was red oak without a drawer. It is close to finished - I just need to finish the drawer, fit it, then attach the top.

I was surprised about how much more challenging the tenons were to fit. I think part of it was the grain in the cherry. It wasn't as straight as the oak. Also, because the skirt had to be deeper to have room for the drawer, they were just bigger. I did the fine tuning with a chisel. I'm thinking about getting a router plane to help with the tenons on the next thing I make.

A few of the joints aren't perfectly tight, but I think it will look decent from 5 feet away.

I'm planning to just finish it with shellac.

Wood Floor Saw Flooring Tool


Wood Shelf Shelving Wood stain Hardwood


Furniture Shelf Table Wood Rectangle
Good point - I've gone back and forth about using scrap blocks under clamps. These have soft plastic pads and pretty large surface area. Especially on harder wood they don't seem to leave a mark.
 

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#4 ·
Almost done

This is my second side table. It is cherry with a drawer. The first was red oak without a drawer. It is close to finished - I just need to finish the drawer, fit it, then attach the top.

I was surprised about how much more challenging the tenons were to fit. I think part of it was the grain in the cherry. It wasn't as straight as the oak. Also, because the skirt had to be deeper to have room for the drawer, they were just bigger. I did the fine tuning with a chisel. I'm thinking about getting a router plane to help with the tenons on the next thing I make.

A few of the joints aren't perfectly tight, but I think it will look decent from 5 feet away.

I'm planning to just finish it with shellac.

Wood Floor Saw Flooring Tool


Wood Shelf Shelving Wood stain Hardwood


Furniture Shelf Table Wood Rectangle
Seems like I find clamp marks and such after the finish is applied and the light hits it just right. The table has a clean Shaker look to it.
 

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#5 ·
Almost done

This is my second side table. It is cherry with a drawer. The first was red oak without a drawer. It is close to finished - I just need to finish the drawer, fit it, then attach the top.

I was surprised about how much more challenging the tenons were to fit. I think part of it was the grain in the cherry. It wasn't as straight as the oak. Also, because the skirt had to be deeper to have room for the drawer, they were just bigger. I did the fine tuning with a chisel. I'm thinking about getting a router plane to help with the tenons on the next thing I make.

A few of the joints aren't perfectly tight, but I think it will look decent from 5 feet away.

I'm planning to just finish it with shellac.

Wood Floor Saw Flooring Tool


Wood Shelf Shelving Wood stain Hardwood


Furniture Shelf Table Wood Rectangle
Good point - I've gone back and forth about using scrap blocks under clamps. These have soft plastic pads and pretty large surface area. Especially on harder wood they don't seem to leave a mark.

- Wintergreen78
Well, it also depends on how much pressure you have to put on it. I have been burned too many times!
 

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#6 ·
Almost done

This is my second side table. It is cherry with a drawer. The first was red oak without a drawer. It is close to finished - I just need to finish the drawer, fit it, then attach the top.

I was surprised about how much more challenging the tenons were to fit. I think part of it was the grain in the cherry. It wasn't as straight as the oak. Also, because the skirt had to be deeper to have room for the drawer, they were just bigger. I did the fine tuning with a chisel. I'm thinking about getting a router plane to help with the tenons on the next thing I make.

A few of the joints aren't perfectly tight, but I think it will look decent from 5 feet away.

I'm planning to just finish it with shellac.

Wood Floor Saw Flooring Tool


Wood Shelf Shelving Wood stain Hardwood


Furniture Shelf Table Wood Rectangle
Nice wood and clean lines. Brave man clamping such lovely work without a caul.

- BlueRidgeDog
I find since most of my projects end up in the burn pile that it makes it easier to not worry about cauls and clamp marks! I'm off to buy another $65 sheet of maple ply.
 

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#7 ·
Almost done

This is my second side table. It is cherry with a drawer. The first was red oak without a drawer. It is close to finished - I just need to finish the drawer, fit it, then attach the top.

I was surprised about how much more challenging the tenons were to fit. I think part of it was the grain in the cherry. It wasn't as straight as the oak. Also, because the skirt had to be deeper to have room for the drawer, they were just bigger. I did the fine tuning with a chisel. I'm thinking about getting a router plane to help with the tenons on the next thing I make.

A few of the joints aren't perfectly tight, but I think it will look decent from 5 feet away.

I'm planning to just finish it with shellac.

Wood Floor Saw Flooring Tool


Wood Shelf Shelving Wood stain Hardwood


Furniture Shelf Table Wood Rectangle
I went over everything with a smoothing plane and card scrapers before glue-up. I'll check everything closely under good light before putting the top on. If there are any marks, I can still clean them up since the clamps were all on outside faces.
 

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#8 ·
Little side project

So I've ordered a plow plane to cut the dados for the drawer bottom. Since it won't be here for a few more days I decided to knock up a little tool tray to hold marking and layout tools. I've made several of these to hold odds and ends around the garage, and I think they make pretty good dovetail practice. The one I'm using now is a little too narrow for my square to fit in properly. So, this one will be wide enough to just fit in the well at the back of my bench. It is as long as the scrap of 1/4 oak I had laying around for the bottom. It is half the height of the poplar I ripped for the sides and ends. I decided to make a few little slots for tools to stand in, so everything doesn't end up jumbled in the bottom.

If I stay away from my lines and do a good bit of fitting, I can get dovetails to turn out pretty well. I'm trying to get better at cutting right to the line so they go together right off the saw. I got a little inconsistent with the angles on my tails, but these took only a little bit of fine tuning as I test fit them, and I think they will be pretty good once everything is glued up. I'm using a hardened Japanese saw, and I think the blade is getting dull. So, I'll be getting a new blade pretty soon and hope that helps with my results too.

The dividers are gluing up now, I figure I'll go down this evening and glue up the box.

Wood Creative arts Tool Hardwood Art


Table Product Rectangle Wood Flooring
 

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#9 ·
Little side project

So I've ordered a plow plane to cut the dados for the drawer bottom. Since it won't be here for a few more days I decided to knock up a little tool tray to hold marking and layout tools. I've made several of these to hold odds and ends around the garage, and I think they make pretty good dovetail practice. The one I'm using now is a little too narrow for my square to fit in properly. So, this one will be wide enough to just fit in the well at the back of my bench. It is as long as the scrap of 1/4 oak I had laying around for the bottom. It is half the height of the poplar I ripped for the sides and ends. I decided to make a few little slots for tools to stand in, so everything doesn't end up jumbled in the bottom.

If I stay away from my lines and do a good bit of fitting, I can get dovetails to turn out pretty well. I'm trying to get better at cutting right to the line so they go together right off the saw. I got a little inconsistent with the angles on my tails, but these took only a little bit of fine tuning as I test fit them, and I think they will be pretty good once everything is glued up. I'm using a hardened Japanese saw, and I think the blade is getting dull. So, I'll be getting a new blade pretty soon and hope that helps with my results too.

The dividers are gluing up now, I figure I'll go down this evening and glue up the box.

Wood Creative arts Tool Hardwood Art


Table Product Rectangle Wood Flooring
That will work pretty well for something that got knocked out in a couple hours of work. It is a tight enough fit in the tool well that I'll also be able to use it as a stop when I'm working on that end of the bench.
Wood Wood stain Hardwood Flooring Rectangle
 

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#11 ·
Things to do on a rainy day.

This had been sitting for a couple of weeks while I waited on my new plow plane to arrive. Once the plane arrived, it was missing a bolt, so this sat for a little longer while Lee Valley shipped one to me.

Yesterday I got the dados for the drawer bottom cut and glued up the drawer. Today was cleaning up the drawer, fitting the drawer, trimming the drawer bottom to size. Then I got to spend a little time with the jack plane thinning the drawer bottom.

After all that was done I put the top on, leveled the legs, and put on the drawer pull.

I still need to do a final sanding, do a little more tuning to the drawer fit, then finish with shellac and wax.

I'm making this for a friend. As it was in progress I realized I had enough cherry for another set of legs and a top, and enough maple for aprons. So while this one was on hold I started on a other. The base and the top for that are glued up, and since that one is much simpler, i'll probably end up finishing both at about the same time.

It's really striking to me how much the size of a mortise and tenon affects the time it takes me to cut and fit them. On the table with a drawer, I really had to work to get a good fit. The simpler table has much shorter aprons, so therefore the tenons aren't as tall. Cutting and fitting them went a lot smoother.

Cutting the half-lap dovetails and fitting the drawer was another first for me. I've made a couple of sliding trays for my toolbox, but with the drawers you need to get the width and the height right. It wasn't difficult, but there was a lot of back and forth test fitting and planing. The dovetails are a little scruffy, so I may cut some little scraps and try to plug a couple of gaps. Or I may leave them as-is and just try to do better next time. I haven't decided yet.

Wood Hardwood Wood stain Plank Lumber


Wood Hardwood Wood stain Plank Lumber


Wood Shelving Rectangle Stairs Shelf


Wood Table Wood stain Flooring Floor
 

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