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cputnam said:
Well done Reed. Appears as though you have plenty of room to stuff in more tools. I get in step with the Schwarz a lot - but not on the tool box thing. I don't expect to ever travel with my tools and my back really does not like bending. Aside from which, I have more tools than will fit in the chest. I don't care - I like them and I'm going to keep them - and may get more, but not until I get the existing project list cut down.
Anyway, I really like your chest. Hope you will report back, in a few months, how you like traveling with it and working from it.
I hear you on the bending over. That and the footprint are probably the best arguments against doing a chest like this. I'd previously stored these tools in graduated drawers under a counter in the corner of my shop nearest my bench and while the smallest among them did not require bending over to get into the drawer, all the planes did. So not much has changed. Certainly a wall cabinet puts everything "up", but unless you build a real monster of a cabinet, it would be hard to fit as much stuff into it as you can fit into a chest. The funny thing is, I really did not make the decision to build this chest with any consideration of it's merits for traveling with it or moving it around the shop. There was a time when I was just going to outfit the bottom with four 3x3 HDPE plastic pads on the bottom to act as skids since I didn't anticipate moving it around much at all. I was (and am) fully bought in to the chest as a working staging area vs. a place to store tools when not in use. In that vain, I'm also planning on making a small sliding tray for the top till that would give me another small horizontal surface on which to stage tools in use that I don't want on my bench (as things do tend to collect there). As for the portability of the chest, I hadn't initially planned on having it completed in time for this Heritage class - rather I'd planned on building a small boarded crate of maybe 28x16x8 within which to take a small collection of tools to the class. It wasn't until my wife decided we were going to sell our house and move that I decided I wanted to get this chest built so I'd have a good way to move and store my handtools during the move. And since the prep for the selling o the house corresponded with the run up to the class - well, might as well have it done and take most of my tools with me instead of a select few  We will indeed see how I like it long term. I would still love to build a slightly larger version of below, but there are man projects on the horizon that need to be made first and I want to see if I like this chest in use as much as I like it in theory!  (linked from Jeff Burks' site - hopefully he doesn't mind since it's already been posted here elsewhere).
You don't need a parachute to go skydiving unless you want to do it more than once. . .
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LOVE the tool rack.
I may have to redo the inside of mine to look like that.
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Beautiful chest!
1) Do you worry about cutting yourself on the chisels when you reach down into the bottom?
2) I really like your tool rack.
3) How did you cut the chamfers on the curved part of the handles?
You continue to post outstanding workmanship!
...Naval Aviators, that had balz made of brass and the size of bowling balls, getting shot off the deck at night, in heavy seas, hoping that when they leave the deck that the ship is pointed towards the sky and not the water.
AD1 T. O. Cronkhite
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Very  ! Did I see a couple Norse Woodsmith saws tucked away in there?
"One should respect public opinion insofar as is necessary to avoid starvation and keep out of prison, but anything that goes beyond this is voluntary submission to an unnecessary tyrany, and is likely to interfere with happiness in all kinds of ways."
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Martin S. said:
Beautiful chest!
1) Do you worry about cutting yourself on the chisels when you reach down into the bottom?
2) I really like your tool rack.
3) How did you cut the chamfers on the curved part of the handles?
You continue to post outstanding workmanship!
Big Dave said:
Very !
Did I see a couple Norse Woodsmith saws tucked away in there?
Thanks for the kind words guys. Martin, I don't worry about cutting my hand on the chisels for a couple of reasons, one being I still keep the rubber protectors on them, and two being I keep my should planes against that near wall and getting them out necessitates an "away and up" swoop to get around the tool rack anyway, so you're not really near the edges if they were exposed. Actually, my biggest fear would be a an exposed blade dropping down into the handle of a bench plane. Not a worry when bound to the shop, as the chisels are held by their socket/bolster and not by the removable handle. When taking the chest on the road as I did last night to drive down to this class at Homestead Heritage, I put the exposed blades in a till with the blade to one wall to keep them from getting jostled out of the rack by a bump in the road. The curved chamfer on the handles is cut with a router. I tried shaping them by hand with a rasp, but didn't do enough layout thinking I could eyeball it the way I can with a plane when chamfering a straight edge. Yeah, I'm not nearly good enough to pull that off. So we fired up the old router table. Dave, No Norse Woodsmith Saws in there. The backsaws are: LN thinplate DT saw with Coco Handle LN 14" tapered carcase saw with apple handles Blackburn Tools DT saw (quilted maple handle) The panel saw in the lid is a Disston restored by Daryl. Can't remember the model. Reed
You don't need a parachute to go skydiving unless you want to do it more than once. . .
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Nice job.
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Looks great -- love the tools you've got, too.
I'd suggest fitting in a few dedicated compartments for items that you don't want banging around with the others. (marking knife would be one of the key ones for me)
Matt
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Thanks for the info, Reed.
Which class are you taking at Homestead?
...Naval Aviators, that had balz made of brass and the size of bowling balls, getting shot off the deck at night, in heavy seas, hoping that when they leave the deck that the ship is pointed towards the sky and not the water.
AD1 T. O. Cronkhite
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Martin- It's the 6-day foundational joinery course, which is basically joinery 1, 2, &3 combined. It's been great
You don't need a parachute to go skydiving unless you want to do it more than once. . .
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Bump
...Naval Aviators, that had balz made of brass and the size of bowling balls, getting shot off the deck at night, in heavy seas, hoping that when they leave the deck that the ship is pointed towards the sky and not the water.
AD1 T. O. Cronkhite
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