G&G Inspired Chest of Drawers - Build Thread

glenn bradley

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Those of you who have followed in the past know I can really milk a project. Hopefully, the sharing here will help me keep the tempo up. I have been struggling with a design for a G&G chest of drawers for my bedroom set and finally got the proportions, mechanics and design elements I want, to all live in harmony.

The top drawers and several small details are missing from this drawing but, here is basically where I plan to end up. Walnut with ebony details using maple for secondary parts like the web frames and back panels. The pulls will be hand made but, the jury is still out on the final design.

CoD-1-2011-09-05-final-2D.jpg

The web frames will have dust panels so they must be grooved before I cut the half laps and glue them up. The router table makes this easy; the start and end marks will work for the long and short arms of the web frame so it is just a matter of going through the motions. I will do the lap joints and cut out the panels tomorrow as I think I may need to pick up some more ply . . .
 

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Glenn, please stop. I'm 60 years old and don't expect to live long enough to catch up to where you are now. If you build this piece I will have to live to 100 to create anything as nice. Have pity.:eek:

Rennie,
According to your logic, I am going to have to live to be 175 years old. I don't think FWW can put up with that.

Enjoy,
Jim
 
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glenn how deep of a cut on those mortise's and was it in one pass?

3/8" deep in three passes with 1/4" straight bit.

Glenn, please stop. I'm 60 years old and don't expect to live long enough to catch up to where you are now. If you build this piece I will have to live to 100 to create anything as nice. Have pity.:eek:

And to think I was going to make a smarmy remark about how I cannot match the Rennie / Allen pace and beg folks to take it easy on me :D

Gary, All of those beautiful drawers. You are a man after my own heart. Wow!

THREADJACK!!! - First Warning!!!

Psst, I am hoping Gary will do a nice post on his shop cabinets. They are really something to see.
 
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A lap joint at every web frame corner turns into a lot of joints. I took some scrap plywood and made up one of these.

CoD Parts lap joint 1.jpg

The opening's width dimension is taken from your stock width plus your template guide offset plus a bit to take you off the edge of the material and give you a nice clean shoulder.

CoD Parts lap joint 2.jpg

The opening's length dimension is taken from your stock width (its a lap joint ;)) plus your template guide offset. I attached a stop block to assure repeated registration. Clamp it to your bench and route your little heart out.

CoD Parts lap joint 3.jpg CoD Parts lap joint 4.jpg

Granted it is a one trick pony and freehand routing makes a bit of a mess but, it is quick and consistent.

CoD Parts lap joint 5.jpg

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guess i missed something glenn.. the first photo of your jig shows maybe a 1/4" of opening yet you show a 3/4" board going in there to route.. are you a magician or did miss something:huh:
 
guess i missed something glenn.. the first photo of your jig shows maybe a 1/4" of opening yet you show a 3/4" board going in there to route.. are you a magician or did miss something:huh:

I noticed that. Poor demonstration on my part. The first shot shows the stop block. The other end has a top only so there is a skinny 3/4" between the underside and the table. My bad . . . .
 

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Nice little trick with the jig Glenn...
I am getting cloer to making a whole mess of half lad joints and I usually do them on my table saw.
I'm thinking it would be worth the time to steal this jig idea.;)
 
Alright, I was wrong on that one. The jig is sweet for when the board is too big to run on the saw comfortably. Like the long stretchers of a dining table or a new bench, it is sometimes safer to take the cutter to the material instead of vice-versa. The long arms of the web frames ares only about 32" so I change to the tablesaw with a dado stack. The dust collection on the tablesaw turned the tide. The two pieces of scrap clamped to the sled are a stop block for position and a hold down to keep the end of the part from rising.
 

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Still inching along . . . It has been hot here in the basin so LOML and I took off for San Diego for a few days.

Got back and glued up some web frames. To keep some space to work while gluing up larger parts like this, I assemble and clamp them on a known flat surface. After 30 minutes for the glue to set up, I carefully move them to the floor somewhere out of the way and clamp up the next set.
 

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glenn i see you have some triangles that you use for square checking,, how did you make sure they were square. measurment?? and if so what was the size you made them? looks like something that would help out many of us on panel glue ups to make sure they are right before they are set up in the clamps:)
 
Glenn I am glad you returned to the table saw because i thought thats how i would do it and i dont see the merits of the jig.

However you made me remember the guy in the UK Steve Maskery and his ultimate bandsaw tenon jig.

His website is here but i find no mention of a half lap.:huh:

I was thinking is this not one of those joints that would do well on the bandsaw.

He and his jig cut perfect tenons and i figure what is a half lap other than a tennon with only one shoulder.

At some point i would like to get his plans and try the jig he has for tennons.

When one thinks about it, either half lap or tenon joints when they occur in a piece there tends to be several so it would pay to have an efficient method thats repeatable.

When one looks at the dado ts method it still is open to many erros and very time consuming when you look at the number of cuts if there are several pieces.

On the BS this would be 4 cuts for each half lap. That would seem to me to be very efficient. And once set up the repeatability should be a sinch no?

What say you and the rest.

I do like the way you work.:thumb:
 
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