Thread: Best way of fitting base to box tray?

Hi Dengy,
An easy accurate way to cut such a small rebate is to use the table saw (without guard) and have the blade just 3mm above the table. Set the fence 27 mm from the saw and make the cut.If the saw blade kerf is less than 3 mm then you may need to start at say 28 mm and then adjust. I would normally do this to long strips before I made the dovetails or mitres and cut the sides to length. Use a feed block to push the strips through the saw.
Make the ply insert then fit the final size.
Try this out on some scrap wood first.
You can also cut the middle rebates in a similar manner, preferably with a sliding sled where you can tape the pieces down square and crosscut the rebates in pairs so you get the cut exactly the same on both sides.

Also, the router will do a fine job.

thanks for this reply, Ruddy. You method will work for mitred joints, but not for dovetailed joints, as there will be a 3 x3 mm piece of the dovetails missing at each of the corners , when viewed from outside the tray - been there, done that

Ok, then looks like the router table with stops is the way to go on those sides where you need the stop end. Alternatively, make a 3mm x 3 mm piece and glue it into the square hole after the base has been set in.

A router and jig.

The rebate for the tray bottom is simple, this is just a long stopped groove that you should be able to cut by eye before it goes through the tails. Router and a fence.

The stopped rebates for the dividers can be made with a simple one-off throw away jig, using the router base as a guide. Take a 300 X 300mm off cut of MDF,chipboard, or whatever and lay your tray side in the middle. Cut two wide strips of 6mm thick MDF the same length as the tray sides and nail them into the base; trapping the tray side between them. Then lay two more strips going across the others with the gap between them the same width as your router base; this will now let you rout trenches across the tray side. To make them stopped joints you just nail two more little bits of MDF to trap the router and stop it from going too far back and forth. The tray side can be slid in and out of the jig from either side and may need to be clamped at one end; you can also lay yet another small strip of MDF across one end so the tray side can only be pushed in so far.

Originally Posted by Ruddy

Ok, then looks like the router table with stops is the way to go on those sides where you need the stop end. Alternatively, make a 3mm x 3 mm piece and glue it into the square hole after the base has been set in.

Both ways work. I usually do them on the router table

Cutting the dadoes for dividers I usually do by hand. Mark the sides with the marking knife, drill out some of the waste, then chisel out just inside the lines, pare back to the lines and clear up.

Following the above advice, I used the router table with stops and a 1/4" spiral downcut router bit to give sharply cut edges of a 3 x 3 mm rebate around the inside edges of the 6mm thick tray sides, and it worked out well, with only minute pieces to be cut away to square off each corner as shown below. There were lots of test cuts on identical sized pieces before the final cuts on the tray sides were done.

Cutting the dadoes was not a success on the router table. I had a large square pushblock against the fence, and the router bit was set the exact right distance from the fence so it cut in the middle of the tray side, and a stop block was placed on the fence to make sure the dado was the correct length. Unfortunately, for some unknown reason, the router bit cut the dado such that it was off line. I would welcome any suggestions as to any possible causes of this.

Many thanks to all who contributed and helped with this solution to what I saw was a very difficult problem


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