Media Cabinet - Cherry

Superb!

Tax time cut into a lot of my shop time but, I managed to cut the movable shelf to size, put the profile on the front edge and cut the 'lift' for the cable easements. The shelf is wide at 35"+ so I have it at a fat 7/8" in thickness. With a square edge profile this looks quite thick and would kind of jump in your face when you opened the doors.



I put a 3/16" round over on the top and a 3/8" round over on the bottom. This eases the thickness visually by leaving me a "thinner" flat face on the front between the rounded profiles.

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It is hard to look at with some parts pre-finished and some not; some are even still just roughed in but, you get the drift of the cable access areas at the rear.

inside view


outside view

I was working from home today but, one of the groups ran into trouble and had to go offline for a few hours so . . .

I used a router to cut the long tenons for the breadboard ends.



After hogging off the bulk of the material with my low angle jack, my bevel up smoother did a good job of finishing up the raise on the breadboard ends, I use a flat top grind blade and cut the grooves with the top against the fence and then the bottom against the fence which centers the cut.

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And it starts to look like so . . .

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As shown in the drawing, there will be a mortise cut at the front T&G joints where the top meets the breadboard to accept a decorative/functional spline. Similar to my Greene and Greene stuff,



the spline attaches to the top but, floats in the breadboard. Although the breadboard will be hard pinned at the front and allowed to float towards the back, the spline hides any unexpected movement from the casual observer.

Looks great Glenn. I love this part of the build, seeing it all come together.

well thought out glenn i like the hidden detail of the top edge of the front shelf openings

I really like the profile of the bread board ends

Love it!

I'm still working on my "Next" workbench built back in 2007 so I don't have a dead man or a leg system that is flush with the rear vise face and all those things that I have learned would be quite nice in the way that I work. Fortunately when the time comes, this bench will convert to a tablesaw outfeed with vises and storage quite nicely . .. or so I keep telling myself. My solution to holding the top panel is a shop made vise anti-rack doo-whopper (that's an industry term) and a small handscrew with leather lined jaws. This gets my material in position for the breadboard spline mortises. The breadboards will be 'no show' pinned from below so a pipe clamp comes in handy to hold everything in position while I work on it.

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I use the Mortise Pal for the mortise and square it up with a chisel. You may notice the large landing field I have on the breadboard tongue to which the spline gets glued. It does not get glued to the breadboard but, (theoretically) moves within it as the seasons change. The spline blank gets hand planed to a bit of a wedge profile. I want the spline to seat firmly a bit like a cork but, not so tight that I could split the receiving area during movement.

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The rough blank sit about 3/32" proud which will give me what I want once I have pillowed the profile.



The surfaces are still rough so you'll notice rough bits and odds and ends here and there but, the splines end up about here.

so the only thing holding in the walnut plug is tension? or do you have it glued to the top but not the breadboard end glenn

larry merlau said:

. . . or do you have it glued to the top but not the breadboard end glenn

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Correct. The spline glues to the top and moves within the mortise on the breadboard. The tongue on the top is 1-1/4" long so there is a lot of glue surface but, it is not attached to the breadboard. Here's a pic with things a little more cleaned up.

Murphy has been in rare form the last week but, I am bound and determined to make some sort of progress on this piece each week . Drawers, door screens, feet / base to go.
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If anyone ever bothers to look they will find contrasting walnut dowels holding the breadboards on. I also got the hinges on and the doors fitted.

glenn bradley said:

If anyone ever bothers to look they will find contrasting walnut dowels holding the breadboards on.

Click to expand...

I looked and I can not tell from the pictures. Of course, if I am ever at your house, it will be FIRST thing I will look for.

Bill Satko said:

I looked and I can not tell from the pictures. Of course, if I am ever at your house, it will be FIRST thing I will look for.

Click to expand...

dont let murphy win glenn, if he can beat you the rest of us dont have a chance

You sir are way too critical of your own work. What a nice piece it sure is great following one of your threads.

Oh and if you are not happy with the piece because of the differing contrast in the dowels I would be more than happy to pay the shipping and take that piece off your hands such that you are never bothered by the distraction of contrasting dowels again.

It's really coming along Glenn.
As for the contrasting dowels.
If you have someone over and they are flat on the floor, I would think they have had too much to drink and my bet is they won't notice them....

once again, you are turning out an outstanding piece of furniture.
you are a true craftsman.

Thanks all. I presented the contrasting dowels poorly. I used the walnut on purpose (matches the handles and the breadboard splines) to provide a little surprise for someone down the road who might happen to notice them . . . I know, I have a twisted sense of humor .

Man has it been busy at work. I feel like I live there lately . Time to fit the lower front apron (stretcher?). This one is a little interesting as it is thicker than you might expect to contribute invisible strength to the very thin front rail. This apron carries the dovetail detail that is just kind of my way of saying "Hey, I made this" . I clamp the feet to the carcass to assure a proper length measurement. I cut the shoulders on the tablesaw and cut the cheeks on the bandsaw.

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This gives me a broad surface of contact. I mark out the dovetail and cut away most of the waste freehand on the bandsaw. I use chisels to clean things up. I use this tail to layout the socket on the foot. I waste most of the material away with a small router and straight bit.

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I chisel out the socket for a nice fit and it looks something like this (the pics look weird because I flipped them as the carcass is standing on its head right now):

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Gratuitous close up .

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Even though I aim for a tight fit, I will exaggerate this dovetail joint by slightly easing a few edges on the tail and the socket to get a look sort of like this.