Thread: Brushbox TV cabinet

Hi all,

I've designed a basic TV cabinet and need some help/advice. The design is for the most part relatively simple, but I'd like to do something interesting on the corner joints. The idea is an elongated cube with a middle shelf. For the corners, I'd like to do three 20mm finger joints. The timber is 280x40mm thick brushbox.

Here is the plan - note: the mock up of the corner joints on page 3 is not accurate - I've changed the design to have uneven spaces since I drew that.

Attachment 190723

I'm an amateur, but I thought that with enough planning and patience I could eventually pull it off. I have marked out one set of pins and sockets to see how I'd go - not well. I clamped steel rulers on both sides of the timber and cut with a tenon and coping saw. The flaw in this was that in trying to stick hard to the straight edges, the saws have cut into the steel and left wiggly cuts. I persevered with rasps, files and sand paper and got reasonably close to a decent result on the pins, but the sockets were a disaster. Trying to cut the perpendicular bases - particularly the corners - was very difficult with my basic tools and the amount of rasping/filing/sanding required is considerable as the brushbox is very hard to shift. I thought I'd keep going and I got to the point where the two pieces came together, but what I thought was a reasonable effort was exposed as very ordinary once I joined the pieces, even though they were out by a fraction of a mm - refer to the pic.

Attachment 190724

The easy thing to do would be to cut off the butchered parts and do lap joints, but I'm wondering if anybody could give me some advice on how I could get a better result using a better technique or finding the right type of professional who could assist? I've seen other pieces in furniture shops with these corners that look fantastic and I'm keen to emulate it if I can.

I've called a couple of cabinet makers who have CNC equipment but they have said that they cannot work with this material - I assume that this is correct, even though the ones that I have spoken to seem reluctant to want to help me. Can somebody confirm/deny this is the case? As mentioned, it's 40mm x 280mm brushbox in just over 1m lengths.

The other option I thought may be a goer is a chain mortiser. Would this be accurate enough? How long would it take a pro to make my four corners (just the cutting - I would do the gluing and finishing) and what would be a reasonable price to pay for such a job?

Any advice would be gratefully appreciated.

Cheers.