Thread: Vege & Fruit shelf (First project)

Nice little first project, it looks like radiarta pine(we call it "crapiarta" here ), the dark streaks are blue stain(a fungal in the wood, dont worry its harmless to us).
So whats the next project?

thanks for the reply

radiata pine hey? Yeah i'd heard of that blue stain, they looked more like a grey stain to me.

next project, either a coffee table (got the wood ready to make it) or a corner shelf for the bedroom (most likely because we need a shelf in the bedroom more). It should be similar style, but a lot higher.

Will probably be making a thread soon on how to make the coffee table from the slab I've got....

Hey John,

Well done on the stand mate - good effort for your first project. It does the job doesn't it? And that's the idea of a practical project. It's far better then my first project that's for sure! haha.

In terms of things I'd do differently for your particular design - The main thing would be to do the joints differently so that you didn't have to nail it, only glue it. Building a project which is held together with just glue and no mechanical fasteners is greatly rewarding!! I know I felt so good when I did my first project like that & it actually stayed together and didn't fall apart

What sort of tablesaw did you pick yourself up John? Do you have any other machinery?

Keep up the good work and keep on posting; there's plenty to learn here that's for sure

Cheers,

WILL

Thanks Will

I picked up a cheap triton mk3 tablesaw. I dont think it does depth adjustment (i could be wrong).
I have a sliding compound mitre saw
electric plane
hand planes


Thats about it from the top of my head

I would have liked to do differnt joinery. The back leg, i wanted to cut each piece at 45 degrees lengthways so each side had a 45 degree edge, so when you join them they are square - and thus not showing any end grain. I don't know the name of the join. However I couldn't get that perfectly at 45 degrees (how would you usually do that) I can't tilt my triton saw at 45 degrees unless I get a different tabletop.

And for all the legs, I wanted to cut/chisel a channel in them so that the shelves could slot into them (holding them up) and use only glue, no nails. But since I couldn't adjust the depth of the saw, i couldn't cut only 10mm deep for example, and chiselling the pine just caused it to be very rough, they're not the sharpest chisels either.. ....... how else would you usually get channels in the wood like that? again i dont know the name..

Is what what you were thinking, ............. please tell me more!!!

thanks again

John,

Dirt cheap and nasty commercial woodwork often consist of radiata pine because it keeps the price low. What makes these items cheap and nasty is not so much the choice of timber but the basic designs, cheap finish and most importantly the joinery or lack of!

Radiata is not the easiest of timbers to get top results from but I feel it has it's place. There have been lots of wonderful pieces made using radiata pine and conversely there have been some terrible pieces made from expensive timbers.

The ultimate is perhaps good design, sound joinery, good finishing and good timber.

Suggestions for your next projects might be:

• Work on the joinery (as earlier suggested)
  
• Work on your design a bit to make it a bit more visually exciting such as using curves and thinner sections whilst maintaining strength.
  
• Try some better finishes than polyurethane such as oils or waxes. Try the UBeaut waxes, they give an excellent finish if you follow all of Neil's instructions.

As a first project, you should be happy with the results and as mentioned earlier, don't be embarrassed using radiata pine (crapiata).

Originally Posted by johnjohnmulley

Thanks Will

I picked up a cheap triton mk3 tablesaw. I dont think it does depth adjustment (i could be wrong).
I have a sliding compound mitre saw
electric plane
hand planes


Thats about it from the top of my head

I would have liked to do differnt joinery. The back leg, i wanted to cut each piece at 45 degrees lengthways so each side had a 45 degree edge, so when you join them they are square - and thus not showing any end grain. I don't know the name of the join. However I couldn't get that perfectly at 45 degrees (how would you usually do that) I can't tilt my triton saw at 45 degrees unless I get a different tabletop.

And for all the legs, I wanted to cut/chisel a channel in them so that the shelves could slot into them (holding them up) and use only glue, no nails. But since I couldn't adjust the depth of the saw, i couldn't cut only 10mm deep for example, and chiselling the pine just caused it to be very rough, they're not the sharpest chisels either.. ....... how else would you usually get channels in the wood like that? again i dont know the name..

Is what what you were thinking, ............. please tell me more!!!

thanks again

You can do plenty with those tools you have already. I don't know anything about the Triton range of work centres (MK3, 2000, etc) but I'm sure they'd do height adjustment of the blade, even if you adjusted it direct on the circular saw. Another tool I found very useful once I picked it up was a thicknesser. Basically allows you to take rough timber and plane it down to size. Very handy. A jointer goes hand it hand with the thicknesser as well, but you can get away with just using the thicknesser for quite a while.

The joint you are talking about is a mitre joint (when two pieces of timber are joined at 45 deg on the end grain). However mitre joints can be quite weak due to end grain gluing to end grain. They can be strengthened with splines or something similar. A straight forward mitre joint is often fine without strengthening if it doesn't have any load on it. Though, some timbers more then others expand and contract with changes in the environment and may pull apart of the mitre joint. To answer your question, if I was to cut a mitre joint for your back leg in your project, I would tilt my tablesaw blade to 45 degrees and run it down the fence to get the 45 deg cut length ways.

The other joint or slot you are talking about for the legs is usually called a dado. These can be cut via a few methods; hand chisels as you have mentioned, router with a straight bit, or my favourite, a dado saw blade set which attaches onto the table saw and allows you to cut dados to various widths. If you don't have a router, I highly recommend you pick one up. The router allows a lot of flexibility and would be able to do those dado joints easily on future projects with a straight edge to guide the router.

Keeping asking questions mate, best way to learn mate. Oh and practicing as well of course haha

Cheers,

WILL

Forgot a bit; yes, I dare say I would have used some sort of dado to attach the shelves to the legs.

Originally Posted by Wood Borer

John,

Suggestions for your next projects might be:

• Work on your design a bit to make it a bit more visually exciting such as using curves and thinner sections whilst maintaining strength.
• Try some better finishes than polyurethane such as oils or waxes. Try the UBeaut waxes, they give an excellent finish if you follow all of Neil's instructions.

Thanks for the feedback and suggestions wood borer

I guess your second point (first in my quote) is somewhat subjective but it definitely is a bit part of a project - planning.

The finish for the shelf, I was going to use a stain and top coat with polyurethane but at the time I didn't have money to go buy a stain, and because it was pine I would probably need a sealer underneath, and that would have tripled the cost of the finish than just using polyurethane. However, for bigger and more important projects I'll look into it more.

What exactly do you mean by 'oils'? What sort of oils. Oil based stains? Or just straight oils like tung and linseed etc etc. I've tried to read a bit about finishing but everyone's got their own opinion and then when it comes to soft woods like pine, there's people saying its a lot harder to finish.

Can I ask - what would you have finished it with?

Hi John,
Really like the shelves!

Just a word about the potatoes
You may know this already and just have them there to show off your handiwork, but potatoes need to be kept in the dark, otherwise they go green.
And green potatoes are a little on the poisonous side.
Just being a worried mum, sorry.

Good luck with your next project.

Originally Posted by Mollywood

Hi John,

You may know this already and just have them there to show off your handiwork, but potatoes need to be kept in the dark, otherwise they go green.

thanks,
I didnt know that, but i will move them. learn something new every day... i learnt too much new today

Originally Posted by johnjohnmulley

Can I ask - what would you have finished it with?

John,

You can get a reasonable finish on radiata with oils such as Organoil Hard Burnishing Oil. The rumour is that Organoil are no longer trading but there are similar Tung Oil based oils available.

A wax finish I would also have considered.

I rarely use stains especially on radiata because radiata does not absorb the stains consistently and ends up looking a bit ordinary. I mainly use stains only on restoration type work when I am attempting to match the colour of the original timber.

I don't think you took my comments as "knocking your work", but just in case, my comments were meant to be constructive probably based on my own journey with woodwork.