Thread: Madrone burr jewellery box - work in progress

Part 9. Fitting the hinges

For these boxes I’m using Andrew Crawford’s smartHinge. They are expensive but beautiful. Precise accurate sizing, a fully rounded knuckle and flawlessly finished.

These are side rail hinges with a stop at 93 degrees - that is to say the box lid will open fractionally past vertical then stop. No need for chains, cords, folding arms etc. The hinges are fitted by making four passes with the router on the router table then simply drilling and screwing them on.

To achieve the necessary accuracy I set the stop block on the router using a spacer specific to these hinges (shown below next to the hinge).


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Note the low router fence (15mm) and the thin stop blocks - everything designed to minimise the amount of contact with the box itself to keep all cuts as accurate as possible.

Note also the piece of scrap on the right. No matter how confident I am of the setup I ALWAYS make test cuts. No exceptions. Ever.

The object of the exercise is to cut the rebates so that the dead centre of the knuckle pin is level with the back of the box and a hair above the surface into which the hinge is being sunk:

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Stop set up for the two right to left cuts - right side of lid and left side of the base:

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The stop is then moved to the right of the cutter for the two right to left cuts:

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BEWARE. Table routers are designed to make cuts moving the workpiece from right to left; this way the action of the cutter pushes the piece back towards the users hand and in towards the fence.

Cuts moving the workpiece from left to right act very differently and potentially dangerously. The rotation of the cutter is now pushing the workpiece AWAY from the fence and pulling it out of the hands of the operator. The results can be devastating both in terms of a workpiece flying out of control potentially causing serious injury and also in terms of rapidly turning your carefully made box into matchwood. The workpiece must be held extremely firmly, pushing against the fence and holding both ends of the box/lid to stop it becoming a runaway missile

I strongly recommend newcomers to the table router get a demonstration from an experienced hand before attempting these left-to-right cuts (known as climb cuts). Also to get some supervised practise on scrap wood before trying these cuts on your box.

The final result should look like this:

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The alignment of hinges can easily be thrown out if the hinges move even slightly due to minor misplacement of screws. To minimise the risk I use a self-centring spring loaded Vix-type bit which has a reverse countersink shape on its tip which fits the countersink in the hinge wing and automatically centres to drill bit to the hole:

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For these particular hinges which use #3 screws I drill the first part of the hole with the 2mm Vix bit then the balance of the hole with an ordinary 1.5mm bit. The depth of both parts depends on the length of screws being used, of course.

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My preference is to pre-thread the holes using a steel screw before fitting the final brass screws. I rub the brass screws against an old wax candle to provide some lubrication and prevent them from snapping off.
Once the hinges are in place and you're happy with the way the box opens and closes you'll need to remove the hinges to cut the mortices for the lock and striking plate . That's our next job.

That's it for today, folks. By my calculation we're 4,600 words and 63 photos into this build. If you've been reading from the beginning congratulations on making it this far!

More tomorrow......

Regards,

Brian

Very nice result so far.
I prefer not to make climbing cuts. Instead, I lower the box onto the cutter as I move the box slowly, then make a second pass lowering it directly onto the cutter. I've found that a climbing cut tends to push the workpiece away from the fence, while a normal cut pulls it toward the fence. It's only a very small difference, but on that quality of work you might be able to feel it.

Also, I make small cuts on the back of the base and lid with a razor saw where the hinge will go, to avoid any tear out from the router.

Thanks for the tip, Alex. Makes a lot of sense - I’ll try that next time for sure.

Yes, I forgot to mention that I make two or three small cuts out of the back of where the hinge recess will go, just to reduce the risk of the router clipping off the 2mm outside edge. I use a micro Japanese saw with an extremely narrow kerf:

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Best regards,

Brian

One of the benefits of using quality hinges is you can use those spacer blocks and know that the length of your mortice will match the hinge. Because the cheap hinges vary in length, you always have to fiddle around to get the lid to line up with the base. Such a pain
Nice to follow this tutorial and see some things I do are also done by you. Makes me feel a bit better about my work, there's hope yet.

Hi Dallas,

Hope for us both

I don't think anyone who can produce work like your Sydney Bluegum and Spalted Poplar box should feel anything other than very proud of their work!

Its seems to me that the joy of woodworking is that there is always something to improve on. I'm reminded of something D H Lawrence said:

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What a glorious legacy that would be - to make something that would go on glowing for many years after we are long forgotten.

Best regards,

Brian

Not sure if you've ever actually seen a madrone tree. Here are a couple of pics of a branch and burl, seen on an island near Vancouver a few years ago.

Part 10. Fitting the lock and escutcheon

If you fitted a pair of side rail hinges OK then this part shouldn’t give you any problems. Just remember to always make test cuts on scrap first.

Here we’re fitting a smartLock from Andrew Crawford. It’s a full mortice lock which means the body of the lock fits entirely inside the front wall of the box.

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First we rout the shallow recesses for the top plates of the lock and striking plate - the parts you see when the box is open. Again I’ve used the table router for this and set the depth of cut at a hair under 3mm (the thickness of the plate).

The distance from fence to the centre of the cutter is half the thickness of the wall of the box. In this case the box wall is 13mm and the cutter is 8mm so the fence is set 6.5 mm from the centre of the cutter or 2.5mm from the outside edge of the cutter blade.

I use pre-prepared setup blocks to set the fence distance then do a test cut on a piece of scrap the same thickness as the box wall to make sure I’ve got it right.

Next we calculate the position of the router table stops so we get the mortice exactly where we need it - centred front to back and side to side.

The spacer used to set the position of the stops either side of the cutter will obviously depend on the length of your box, the length of the lock and the size of your router bit, but the general formula is:

Spacer = (Length of the box + length of the lock) divided by 2, less the diameter of the router bit.

In this case, the box is 302.5mm, the length of the lock is 80mm and the diameter of the router bit is 8mm so the spacer required to set the stops is 183.25mm from the stop to the outside edge of the router bit. You can see the spacer sitting on the router fence in the picture below.

Last thing before we make a cut on the box itself is a final test cut. I cut a piece of scrap exactly the length of the box and the same width as the box front - if the rebate is perfect I’ll go ahead and make the cuts on the box and lid (see below):

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Once the plate rebates are cut we can remove the waste for the body of the lock. Draw a line exactly along the centre of the lock rebate and mark out the width of the body of the lock using the lock itself as a guide:

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Using the lines as a guide, drill out the waste using a brad point bit, preferably in a drill press, overlapping the holes a small amount. Then clean up the mortice with a sharp chisel. I use a small mortice chisel for this.



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With the lock mortice now finished we measure and mark on the front of the box where the hole needs to go for the centre of the escutcheon (the keyhole plate) then drill a hole around 4mm diameter which should line up exactly with the key-locating pin inside the keyhole of the lock. The lower part of the keyhole can be shaped to suit using small files or a scalpel. Apologies - I forgot to take photos of this part.


Simply cutting or filing a hole in the front of the box may not give the best look for the finished box so we’ll fit a keyhole plate, known as an escutcheon. This not only looks better but is usually made of something which will give better resistance than bare wood to wear and tear (of the key being inserted and removed).


All sorts of plain and fancy escutcheons can be bought from box hardware suppliers, but many are too large for my taste or have holes drilled in them for fixing nails/pins. Mostly I make my own. For this box I chose a faux ivory material I bought in the UK. Using a fine Japanese saw I cut a diamond shape then fashioned the keyhole itself using diamond burrs in the drill press followed by some careful filing with diamond files.


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The next challenge is to mortice the escutcheon into the face of the box. The faux ivory I used is around 1.5mm thick. Placing the escutcheon carefully so the hole lined up perfectly with the lock I used a small drop of superglue to hold it in place while I scribed around the outside with a scalpel, angling the scalpel blade inwards so the cut was not larger than the escutcheon. Once the cuts have been made the escutcheon can be removed by placing a small block of wood alongside it and tapping with a hammer. The CA glue doesn’t have a great shear strength if you’re only using a tiny drop.


I then set the depth of my smallest router using the escutcheon to get a perfectly level fit but you can do this using just a chisel or small router plane. There are always different ways to do things.


Because I mostly make boxes I have a Proxxon tool and miniature carbide bit permanently installed on a Microfence precision router base fitted with a clear base. Micro Fence


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I route the rebate then clean up the edges with a very sharp chisel:

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then fix in the escutcheon using CA glue.

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The next part will be installing the feet on the box. Absolutely no need for feet, and I don’t use them much but they were part of the requirement for this project.


Thanks for reading!


Regards,




Brian

Coming along nicely and enjoying the journey. Journey is well explained

Part 12. Fitting the feet.


Finding feet to suit boxes is something I find difficult. Most box feet seem to be traditionally styled e.g. lion’s paw or ornate circular design. Brusso in New York has one style of foot which is more modern. Shown here is the underside of the feet. As you’ll see, the curved corner of the foot goes towards the centre of the box.

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The feet get recessed into the bottom of the box like this:

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Yes, it’s a test fit on a piece of scrap!


Brusso makes a template specifically for these feet. The template is clamped to the box:

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then the appropriate router bit and inlay collar are fitted to the router before following the template and cutting the correct recess.

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Sounds easy. However the Brusso templates are made to eye-watering tolerances and it’s easy to miss a good fit if the router bit or inlay collar are not absolutely the correct size or if the bit is not perfectly centred in the inlay collar (the collars often have a little bit of play before they are tightened).


See, for example, the picture of the test piece above. You’ll see the outer edges of the foot are slightly proud of the timber. This despite using the correct router collar and bit. Investigation showed that the router bit (new and supposedly good quality) was in fact a gnat’s kneecap out. I replaced the bit and all was well.

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The box can finally stand on it’s own two feet. OK, four feet.


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The end is in sight! Next we’ll tackle the lining.


Best regards,




Brian

I was asked by my neighbor to make a box to hold some special cards or something and he asked if I could put a lock in it. I said I haven't done one before and was concerned I might mess the whole thing up so eventually talked him out of it. After your tutorial I can see I need to have a go at one as you make it look not too hard as long as you are precise and take a lot of care. Fingers crossed.

Hi Dallas,

it’s easier than fitting hinges as it’s really just the two slots in exactly the same spot top and bottom. If you make a test piece the same length and thickness as the box it really takes the stress out of the final cut. For me I know that when I’m stressed about something it is guaranteed to go wrong

Anton Gerner has some inexpensive mortice locks I’ve been meaning to try. They’re under $20 Catches & Locks - Box Locks - Gerner Hinges

Best regards,

Brian

I do all my lock morticing on the router table. Just do a test piece for the length and set the stops then raise the bit a few mm per time until the required depth is achieved. There is no clean up to be done with a chisel.

Still got it i see Brian. That's another beaut.

Hiya Richard,

Good to hear from you (and thanks!). I'd noticed you'd not been around much recently - hope all is OK with you?

I'm nearing the end of the WIP report for this box now thank goodness. It's taken much longer to write the thread than to make the box!!

Best regards,

Brian