02-03-2016, 09:44 PM
I intend this to be a build along. I'll try to show most of the steps in building these projects and some reasons why I chose to do things a certain way. You may learn something, I may learn something from your input and comments, or we may learn nothing. You take your chances by reading further.
Some may remember this make-up vanity I recently built and installed:
I no sooner finished it than the owner asked me to build a companion cabinet to hold cleaning supplies and towels. There isn't much room in the bath, so we decided on a cabinet about 44" H x 18" W x 13"D with a door, a drawer, and a couple of open shelves. As I drew it up it became obvious to me that a door was the wrong approach so I designed the cabinet with a deep drawer instead. The drawer pulls will line up now, too. The owner liked it so that's what I'm building, as shown in this model.
Both pieces will be painted so I'm using some less than pretty ambrosia maple I milled last spring with maple plywood.
Here are all the pieces for the side and face frames, milled to their final dimensions.
The side panels will have 1/2" plywood recessed panels glued in from the back. I cut 3/4" W x 1/2" D rabbets in all those frame members using the dado blade and a sacrificial fence on the TS. I took two passes, each about 1/4" deep to get there.
With that done I left the fence exactly like it was but lowered the blade then cut rabbets on the ends of the face side of the rails. The depth was set to exactly equal the thickness of the "flange". I used the miter gage to hold the parts and a backer board to prevent tearout.
I glued and clamped the frame parts, then drove a couple of pin nails into each joint.
I used my horizontal router mortiser to cut mortises in the face frame components for loose tenon joinery. I sometimes use the Kreg jig, but loose tenons are nearly as fast and a whole lot stronger. There's also no chance of the rails slipping out of alignment as sometimes happens when you drive the Kreg screws. Here I'm cutting a 1/4" mortise 3/4" deep in the end of a rail:
And here I'm cutting a matching mortise in one of the stiles.
I'd like to point out that once the mortise width is set you can cut as many mortises as you want by just indexing the piece into place. With the rails no thought is required other than to remember to keep a common face down on the X table. Just clamp the part against the hold down fence and mill away. With the rails you just have to align a center mark on the work piece with one on the X table, clamp the part, and mill. I milled the 10 mortises required for this face frame in just a couple of minutes.
Of course you need tenons and I make my own from project scrap. A drum sander is a great help in getting them to fit perfectly but I've done it with just a planer by very carefully sneaking up on the correct thickness. I cut the width about 1/16" less than the mortise width. That gives you the ability to adjust the rail/stile position in case one or the other wasn't milled exactly perfect. Then I rounded the edges with a 1/8" round over router bit and then cut them to length. The length was 1-1/2", about 1/16" less than the combined depth of the mating mortises to give any excess glue someplace to go. With that done, all the parts were ready for glue up.
Before I glued up the frame I finish sanded the inner edges of all the parts. A lot easier now than afterwards To glue it up I first glued the tenons into one end of each rail, then glued the rails into their respective mortises in the stile, then repeated the process on the other side.
I adjusted any joint that needed it until their match marks aligned using a mallet against a block of wood so I didn't dent the frame, then clamped across every rail.
I had other things going on today, so that was as far as I got.
John
Some may remember this make-up vanity I recently built and installed:
I no sooner finished it than the owner asked me to build a companion cabinet to hold cleaning supplies and towels. There isn't much room in the bath, so we decided on a cabinet about 44" H x 18" W x 13"D with a door, a drawer, and a couple of open shelves. As I drew it up it became obvious to me that a door was the wrong approach so I designed the cabinet with a deep drawer instead. The drawer pulls will line up now, too. The owner liked it so that's what I'm building, as shown in this model.
Both pieces will be painted so I'm using some less than pretty ambrosia maple I milled last spring with maple plywood.
Here are all the pieces for the side and face frames, milled to their final dimensions.
The side panels will have 1/2" plywood recessed panels glued in from the back. I cut 3/4" W x 1/2" D rabbets in all those frame members using the dado blade and a sacrificial fence on the TS. I took two passes, each about 1/4" deep to get there.
With that done I left the fence exactly like it was but lowered the blade then cut rabbets on the ends of the face side of the rails. The depth was set to exactly equal the thickness of the "flange". I used the miter gage to hold the parts and a backer board to prevent tearout.
I glued and clamped the frame parts, then drove a couple of pin nails into each joint.
I used my horizontal router mortiser to cut mortises in the face frame components for loose tenon joinery. I sometimes use the Kreg jig, but loose tenons are nearly as fast and a whole lot stronger. There's also no chance of the rails slipping out of alignment as sometimes happens when you drive the Kreg screws. Here I'm cutting a 1/4" mortise 3/4" deep in the end of a rail:
And here I'm cutting a matching mortise in one of the stiles.
I'd like to point out that once the mortise width is set you can cut as many mortises as you want by just indexing the piece into place. With the rails no thought is required other than to remember to keep a common face down on the X table. Just clamp the part against the hold down fence and mill away. With the rails you just have to align a center mark on the work piece with one on the X table, clamp the part, and mill. I milled the 10 mortises required for this face frame in just a couple of minutes.
Of course you need tenons and I make my own from project scrap. A drum sander is a great help in getting them to fit perfectly but I've done it with just a planer by very carefully sneaking up on the correct thickness. I cut the width about 1/16" less than the mortise width. That gives you the ability to adjust the rail/stile position in case one or the other wasn't milled exactly perfect. Then I rounded the edges with a 1/8" round over router bit and then cut them to length. The length was 1-1/2", about 1/16" less than the combined depth of the mating mortises to give any excess glue someplace to go. With that done, all the parts were ready for glue up.
Before I glued up the frame I finish sanded the inner edges of all the parts. A lot easier now than afterwards To glue it up I first glued the tenons into one end of each rail, then glued the rails into their respective mortises in the stile, then repeated the process on the other side.
I adjusted any joint that needed it until their match marks aligned using a mallet against a block of wood so I didn't dent the frame, then clamped across every rail.
I had other things going on today, so that was as far as I got.
John
