Thread: raised sculpted drawer pulls

That'll take a fair effort to reproduce that and waste a lot of wood, looks to be done by machine to remove the most then finished by hand tools.
Not a job for a beginner, do you have much WW experience and tools?

Looks like a job for a CNC router . Looks neat though .

Rhino, I live in Margaret River, down the road from you. I'm guessing you've seen the draw fronts / pull you describe (and maybe the pic also) in Rob Monkmans furniture studio (Dunsborough)?

I spoke with Rob about how he created these draw fronts - they're very effective & organic looking. He says they start with double thickness material and remove most of the excess with a router & jig. So you'll need to factor in considerable waste and making yourself a router jig that allows the router to carve out all the waste except for the handle pull. Then chisel out the finger holds. I would've loved to ask to see the jig, but felt that would be a bit much. But maybe you could get a look at it. If you do and figure out how to make a copy - PLEASE POST A PICTURE IN THE FORUM!

Good luck,

Richard

You could probarly bandsaw out the most of it would be quicker than routering it, its the final shaping that'll be the hard/time comsuming bit a combination of handplanes/spokeshaves/chisels and sanding/scraping would achive it... getting several drawer fronts the identical is another story!(beond my capabilitys)

Rhino, here are a few pics of the ones i used to do. As mentioned their is waste, but you use that waste in apropriate ways.The larger Jarrah framed doors with the pull`s excess waste was used as the door rails. On smaller pulls like the Jarrah book stand the waste is minimal. The other pic is an old drawer front i still have with me and it shows how to do it.

When you are ripping your drawer front (make it 8mm oversize to acommadate the saw kerfs) , rip it into three sections, and the top and bottom peice are then ripped to the desired drawer front thickness. The mid section is then bandsawn to that thickness and sculptered out in the middle for the pull. Roughly shape it and then glue the three back together for a seamless board. Its easier than it first apears and the results are fantastic

Thanks for the input people. I am a fine furniture maker by trade but have never had to make anything like this before. A client has asked me to include them on an entertainment unit I am making for them and since there is a number of drawers and doors I was hoping someone may have had details for a jig for this. Looks like it is going to be time consuming designing and making a router jig, then hand tools... and in Jarrah! If the boys from Dunsborough Woodworks are reading this and feeling generous maybe they would post a pic of their jig??? Oh well there goes the weekend boating...

Rhino you dont need a router jig. A template with a flush trim bit will do if you want, but its as simple as i said. Just rip a 50mm thick board into three and rip and thicknes the top peice and bottom peice to 17 or 18mm and then bandsaw the middle section to the same thickness sculpting the pull in the middle. Its a simple process.

Lignum, ripping it into three was my first idea when I saw the handles on the clients current furniture. Upon closer inspection the drawer pulls in queston have not been done in that way, they are in fact one whole piece of timber... now having said that perhaps ripping and regluing IS the best way to tack;e this particular job. With some Garret Wade 202GF glue to mask the glue line in the jarrah it should be invisible and will certainly make the shaping much quicker.

Ripping and regluing is one peice of timber. Its impossible to tell if you do it right. As shown in the pics, iv done quiet a few of these pulls and when planed and sanded back you cannot tell. The rough drawer in the pic is a good example. It looks ordinary their but the ones that were finished were seamless

Lignum, your method of ripping into 3 then re-gluing after shaping the middle piece (or which-ever piece is shaped for the pull) to achieve the "single piece" look is very clever. Like Rhino, I originally couldn't figure out how these amazing pulls were constructed.

The furniture maker at Dunsborough Galleries (Rob Monkman) uses this type of pull on just about all his furniture (cabinet doors, draws etc. Rhino, if you havn't seen his work, it's well worth a visit). As Rhino says, they are not re-glues but sculpted from a single piece without ripping etc. I've looked VERY closely, and in feature backsawn Jarrah or Marri you would be able to pick out a rip & re-glue. The amount of work that goes into it looks amazing. If you had a cabinet piece with, say, 3-4 draws and 3-4 doors - then to construct this organic type "built-in" pull for 6-8 different faces would involve a fair amount of ripping & re-gluing. So I'm wondering if a dedicated router jig wouldn't work out quicker & easier in the long run if you were using this design technique on all your work? I don't know the answer to that. But from my conversation with the Dunsborough guy, he went the router jig route.

As you say, either method involves a fair amount of waste!

Richard

Richard Not having seen Rob Monkmans pulls, with mine i use urea to re glue, and you carnt tell that it has been ripped. And i use a simple template screwed under the bandsawn peice with a flush trim in the router table to smooth and shape the center bit. I love handles like this. With the waste, the large Jarrah doors in the pic was one peice 1.5 x .150 x .50 and it was ripped in half, then each half had the top and bottom section ripped out. When they were layed out the waste became the top and bottom rails, so in a door like that their is no waste