Small projects

**Lplates** · 1st June 2015, 10:50 AM

Hi All,

Been a while since i shared anything on the forums so I thought that it might be nice to post some pictures of my latest little project. I've been running out of things to make since the house is covered in wood furniture now but then i noticed that our medicine box is a crappy ikea cardboard job so a new project was started. I got my hands on some nice redgum with the idea to resaw it on the bandy. Little did i realise the trouble this would be later. Anyway the 170x40 was resawn to 170 x 12(ish)....all good until i realised that what was previously a perfectly square piece of wood was holding some radial tension that resulted in some convex 170x12 boards. It wasn't too drastic so i just pushed on with the view that i would account for that when gluing. It was also at that stage that i realised that redgum doesn't plane very nicely, even with a freshly sharpened blade (to 8000g) and a very shallow cut. The alternating grain was a pain so out came the belt sander. As you can imagine the result was not pretty with some decent variance in thickness, not ideal but again i pushed on.

Anyway i managed to use my Mathias Wandel like finger joint jig on my router table to get some fairly tight 1/4in fingers for the corners and then butchered my way to fit the top into a 5mm rabbet also done on the router table (i don't have a table saw which would have been really handy for that). The result was a so so fit and a lot more time than it should have taken but i'm reasonably happy with the result. Oh and the insert was just a bit of fun with the chisels, note the tearout from the ever frustrating redgum again. The sanding was down to 360g and the finish is a couple of coats of F&W Scandinavian Oil.

Cheers
Mat

IMG_20150530_083148[1].jpg IMG_20150523_135738[1].jpg IMG_20150530_083059[1].jpg IMG_20150530_083112[1].jpg IMG_20150530_083120[1].jpg

**spokeshave** · 2nd June 2015, 07:39 PM

Considering the drama you had, it's come out pretty good.

The tear-out would be frustrating, but all up a pretty flash medicine box. Better than cardboard or plastic.

**Blackforester** · 3rd June 2015, 10:05 AM

It appears that you glued a solid piece on top for the lid. Don't you anticipate any expansion/contraction for such a large piece. Normally solid lids and bottoms are incorporated into a box as floating panels.
Nice box though!
BF

**Lplates** · 3rd June 2015, 11:42 AM

Originally Posted by Blackforester

It appears that you glued a solid piece on top for the lid. Don't you anticipate any expansion/contraction for such a large piece. Normally solid lids and bottoms are incorporated into a box as floating panels.
Nice box though!
BF

Yes it is solid (two boards butt jointed). If i'm being honest I have to admit that i didn't even consider expansion when i made this. I haven't found it to be an issue in the past with other things i've made so I don't really consider it. Having said that it may or may not be an issue, time will tell and I will take something away from that if necessary. How much movement would you expect in a piece of redgum 300x400x12 where temperature fluctuates between 10-25 Celsius, assuming humidity is relatively stable?

The base is made from 12mm hardwood faced pine ply that's been stained black, not sure if mentioned that earlier.

Thanks for the response.
Cheers
Mat

**double.d** · 3rd June 2015, 12:53 PM

That's a nice piece Mat. I have used a lot of Gum over the years and have found it very stable, even when gluing multiple boards together.

**Blackforester** · 6th June 2015, 10:37 AM

Hi Mat,

I don't know how much red gum would expand and contract through the seasons. Seasonal changes are more determined by humidity than temperature and if the timber is flat sawn or quarter sawn. Also the effectiveness of the moisture barrier of the finish plays a big part. I was often tempted to do what you did but was never game. I hope you will let us know how your box will behave. I guess a lot will also depend in what sort of environment the box will be kept.
I wish you the best of luck!
BF

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