Thread: Elliptical NG Rosewood Keepsake Box - WIP

Originally Posted by AlexS

PM sent.

And back. Thanks, Alex.

Sunshine today, so I'm back in business on this one. Got the base sanded to rough thickness.
Just running it through the (high-tech) final thicknesser now, (pic below), then I can chamfer and round the edge ready for assembly.
Finally I can see the light at the end of the tunnel with this project.

Got the base finished and all of the bits sanded last night and this morning.
All set for assembly. Next up is gluing the body to the base. Gotta do some other stuff first, so that will be tonight or in the morning.

A few pics of the final dry assembly below. The last shows the grain inside the end of the box. Too good to cover with cheap felt lining, so I'm planning to leave it bare inside. I'd like to make a tray or trays, but it might be too tricky to make them fit well. I'll have to give it some thought. Any suggestions are very welcome.

Overall, it's not looking too bad. Beginning to look a little like a box. It'll look better when the body starts to darken again. It's still pale because I only just finished sanding it. It colours up pretty quickly in the air.

I've been thinking, too, (dangerous, I know). It might pay me to fit the hinge before gluing the two pieces of the lid together. Much better access. Then, once I have the hinge fitting properly, I can remove it and assemble the lid.

Fantastic stuff Steve, really enjoy your work, keep it up

James

Originally Posted by Irvs

Fantastic stuff Steve, really enjoy your work, keep it up

James

Thanks for the kind words, James.

I can glue up soon. It's pretty tricky to get the ellipses perfectly aligned for gluing, especially allowing for slippage, so I'm looking at setting up a temporary jig so I don't stuff up. I'd hate to get things misaligned now and it's pretty hard to use tape for this part.

Slippage is a problem, I think its a process of the glue setting, it changes from a liquid to a solid mass and that creates movement which must happen.

In the old days of animal glue I believe they used to scratch the surface of parts to be glued. Perhaps that allows the mixture to settle in those grooves and provides an escape route.

Box is looking really nice.

Originally Posted by jow104

Slippage is a problem, I think its a process of the glue setting, it changes from a liquid to a solid mass and that creates movement which must happen.

In the old days of animal glue I believe they used to scratch the surface of parts to be glued. Perhaps that allows the mixture to settle in those grooves and provides an escape route.

I usually give the surface a bit of a scuff with PVA, but even so often the stuff acts more like a lubricant than an adhesive. I'm always nervous at this stage. (Fitting the single hinge accurately to this one will be fun, too.)

Box is looking really nice.

Thanks John. Almost there.

Edit: Just bought a Dremel Multi-Max, so sanding, cutting etc will be a bit easier and quicker now, (when it arrives in a few days). Still need a random orbital sander when the budget allows. Looks like Bosch have a pretty good balance of price/quality.

I set up a jig that should work, (I hope), for body alignment during gluing. It clamps the base solidly, then leaves just enough room for the body, a firm fit, to push down onto it, then a pair of large HD clamps to pull the body down. The body doesn't rotate at all, before the HD clamps are positioned, so should stay in place.
I knew there was a good reason I was buying so many clamps. This is every clamp larger than 6" that I have. That little 'Y' clamp is great for my inlays.
A quick feed, and I'll glue it up.

That third picture made me think for a while.

Originally Posted by jow104

That third picture made me think for a while.

A bit of an odd angle. Those red clamp handles are large, but not that large.

Hi,
I might be a bit late with this. Knock a few brads into the one surface to be glued and cut them off at an angel with side cutters so that there is just enough sticking out to dig into the other surface when you clamp them together. No sliding they act lik studs in snow tyres.
Hope that can be useful, if not for this then in the future.
Regards

Originally Posted by A Duke

Hi,
I might be a bit late with this. Knock a few brads into the one surface to be glued and cut them off at an angel with side cutters so that there is just enough sticking out to dig into the other surface when you clamp them together. No sliding they act lik studs in snow tyres.
Hope that can be useful, if not for this then in the future.
Regards

What a top idea. Sure beats all of the stuffing around that I just did.
Just a tad too late for this one - I just finished clamping up. Doesn't look like it moved.

This will most definitely be useful in the future. In fact, I'll be going through a similar process in a couple of weeks with my heart-shaped box.

Thanks Hugh. You've just solved one of my worst pains-in-the-donkey.

As soon as the glue began to dry, I removed the locating clamps and used two of them to help pull the middle down for a better joint.
Gave me good clearance to clean up squeeze-out, too.

I committed sacrilege and painted the barley twist for a change, rather than using a clear finish. (It is only balsa.) Still not sure what I'll do with it.

Just unclamped it. Looks fine and needs very little glue cleanup, just some light sanding.

While it was clamped, I decided to use my home-made hinge after all. I have a 3mm hand reamer on order, but it won't be here for weeks, so I decided to do it by hand with a 3mm drill bit to suit the pin in the third pic below. Bad decision. I broke the hinge.
You can see the damage in the pic. It's dead.

Anyway, on to hinge fitting next, a nice solid brass hinge.