Bent Plywood

Dave Richards

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The other day I was poking around on one of the design blogs I like to follow and they showed a small stand made out of sheet metal. It is designed to hold a computer bag or similar. I thought it might be interesting to do something similar in wood and I was looking for a practice SketchUp project anyway. (Someday, I swear, I'm going to master it. Hasn't happened yet, though.)



So let's make the top part out of a few layers of bending ply and veneer the outside faces. Maybe 1/4 inch thick altogether. The legs are 1/2" thick Baltic Birch. How would you attach the top to the legs with no visible fasteners? My thought is to use a couple of dowels, one on each surface and kind of snap the top into place on them.

What's your approach?

By the way, I'm not sold on the feet or the arch on the stretcher. They were just put in for the idea.
 
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Charles, that would be interesting. Do you think a guy could get away with sliding dovetail sockets cut into 1/4 in. thick plywood?

I would think that a 3/16" x 3/16" DT would be stronger than dowels into the thin stock. You may want to consider laminating a thicker piece of stock to the underside of the "seat" for the legs to DT slide into as I agree that sliding DT's would be the strongest "hidden" joinery for that stress-point. Making it may prove problematic as I just noticed the back support portion of the leg pieces. Doh!

OK, let's see. I will change my vote to dowels but, use epoxy to attach the "seat" to the "legs", dowels and all.
 
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I would agree with the sliding dove tail but would say on the back and a dado for the curve and bottom. Epoxy or plastic resin glue, slide it into place and clamp it till it's set. not going to go anywhere. If you are planning on making it as thin as that no mechanical fastener or dowel is going to improve the strength, if anything it may weaken it. The stretcher will take up any lateral movement so racking will not be an issue.

Looks like a cool project! Are you going to use a vacuum press or a bending mold?
 
Thankee gentlemen.

So I did a quick sketch with sliding dovetails up the back and a shallow mortise on the bottom. It could work although i'm not sure how i would cut the sliding dovetail sockets on the back. i have a tiny little dovetail bit that might work fine and it would be pretty easy to set up on the Router Boss.

As to bending it, I don't know. Vacuum bagging seems like a reasonable idea. When is another question. It's on my list.

 
you would have to make a sled for your router, route the dovetail as far as you can on each side then finish with a chisel or if you have a rabbet plane finish up the last bit. The same would go for the back of the chair as far as the router is concerned. where the bit enters the back is where you would have the sliding part, the rest would just be a straight dado. Really all the dovetail is going to serve is just to square it up and index, the epoxy is what will do the real work.
 
It is. I have one of those little boxes with the dividers in it to keep the various parts that aren't being used. It's the "go to" machine in my shop.
 
Charles, that would be interesting. Do you think a guy could get away with sliding dovetail sockets cut into 1/4 in. thick plywood?

Why bother? For this purpose wouldn't simply gluing it work? I'd try a rubbery glue - Goop even - after a bit of careful sanding to make a decent adhesion surface. If your really feel the need for a mechanical extra connection perhaps a couple of short pins from your 23guage pneumatic pinner?

Scaled up this would make an interesting porch or hallway bench. Then you might want more robust joints….

For some interesting furniture of that style, take a look at
http://www.untothislast.co.uk/
 
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