Built-in Bookshelf Progress

[lincmercguy]

I've made a good amount of progress on my built-in bookshelf over the last month.  This will be replacing an ugly 70's railing next to some stairs.

This is the first large project where I've used my Domino throughout.  Here are the tenons for the carcass.

These are my modified track clamps.  I bought some cheap ones and welded bolt heads on them to make them work with this track.  The concept works well, but the clamps don't have too much force to them.  It still works for stuff like this.

   

The plywood carcass pieces assembled.  One end just has a plywood end since that end will mainly be against the wall.

   

Using dominos and a router table to assemble the panel pieces.  Much faster than dowels or M&T.

   

   

Rough mock-up, but it lets you start to see how it will look.

   

   

Going a little nuts with the dominos on the front face frame.  But it will help everything stay square.  Using the height gauge to offset parts of it worked pretty well.  I just had to buy a metric ruler.

   

Mock-up with the dominos. I'm not gluing them yet.  I'm going to install the carcasses, use the face frame to get everything lined up, install the back, then install the face frame.  Clamping that will be fun.

This is just primer at this point.  The final color will be GF Antique white with oak accents.

   

I had to get a little creative clamping the back since I didn't have clamps this long.  I could have made two separate frames, but I didn't want the seam.  I suppose I could use dominos for that too.  

   

The entirety of my Festool collection.  I've been using the extractor with my Bosch sanders as well.  It works well for that, but the cords aren't the same, of course.

   

[lincmercguy]

Here is the rendering of what it will look like in the end.  I'm also going to put oak panels on the bottom.  I didn't want to make the whole thing out of oak since the floors are also wood (or at least wood-look laminate).

   

   

[lincmercguy]

I had a woodpecker try to make himself the shop bird.  That was fun to chase him out at night.  I had to remove the top two sections of one of the doors to get him to fly out.  With the doors only open, he kept flying above them.

   

[JohnnyEgo]

Looks great! Dominoes do make it faster to get to the 80% point, and I do like them for face frames. So I take it you are getting along with your DF500. Great looking start!

[lincmercguy]

Thanks! Much faster than a doweling jig for sure on the face frames. I could have done the face frame attachment with a biscuit jointer. I ended up selling my biscuit jointer, so I'm committed now.


I'm happy with my purchase so far. I'm glad I bought different sizes as I've been using them all except 10mm. I didn't buy the kit since the Domino came with the 5mm cutter and I'm not big into the systainer thing. I'm sure some would have a hard time with the $10 Home Depot container I use to store my dominos.

When I was debating getting the Domino, some complained about the cost of the dominos themselves. While biscuits are cheap, I end up tossing some of the cheap biscuits because they're too thin and I was buying the nice fluted oak dowels from Lowes, which were more expensive anyway.

I could survive without it, but I'm glad I got it.

[Stwood_]

Looking very nice!

About that paint on the back of the face frame. Is that coming off where you need to glue.

[lincmercguy]

It will primarily be the dominos and pocket screws holding it together. There's only two real spots where I would have a parallel grain edge glue up, most of it will butt up to plywood.

[Stwood_]

Attaching strength will be in the glue, not the pocket screws.

[lincmercguy]

I thought glue to a plywood edge didn't provide that much strength. FWIW, that is primer only.

[FS7]

Looks good. Though it was incredibly expensive, I find the Domino also incredibly useful. Overall very much worth it. But how did you do dry fitting? Storing the loose tenons in the shop, I still have problems fitting them into the smallest mortise. I have had a little more luck microwaving them first, but there's no way I would be able to do an easy dry fit. 

It seems like this is a common problem as well.