Sliding Trays – Part 6
2012.02.14
I crosscut the pieces for the middle tray and laid out the dovetails. I also drilled the finger hole. The bottom tray has a 1″ hole, and I considered a 3/4″ hole for the middle tray, since that was the next size of forstner bit in my set. But it seemed too much of a jump. So I used a 7/8″ spade bit instead.
2012.02.19
Today I sawed and chiseled dovetails for the middle tray.
Then I applied glue and clamped the four sides together. While that was drying, I started preparing a board to resaw to make the floor boards of the tray. I experimented with a new (to me) toothed blade in my jointer plane. The toothed cutting edge is supposed to reduce tearout going against the grain. The skinny shavings are like confetti, and do not clear the mouth on their own as well as regular shavings, so I had to pull them out by hand a lot. I haven’t decided for sure if I like the toothed blade better. I think it will be useful for some situations.
2012.02.20
I started resawing the first floor board today.
2012.02.25
Unfortunately my saw wandered off-course about 1/8″ in the midst of resawing this board. Operator error, naturally. Even after cleanup with a handplane it is pretty uneven. That will definitely be the bottom side.
2012.02.26
So after planing down the remainder of the 8/4 board to a flat reference surface again, I tried a new technique. After marking the line with my marking gauge and darkening it with a pencil as usual, I used my rip tenon saw to create a shallow kerf all along the line… all the way around the board.
This really seemed to help me stay on the line as I used a handsaw to resaw the board. It’s not as consistent as a bandsaw by any means, but better than the previous round for sure.
Sliding Trays V