Bedside Cabinet: Episode 3
Posted 29 November 2017
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With the frames made, the panels can be prepared. They are glued up, then planed and cut to size. Then the panel can be rebated using the saw, chisel, router and rebate plane.
Enjoyed video very much. Particularly found Paul`s comments about reading the grain very helpful.
Paul,
The cross grain rebate is very impressive. In your experience, would a skew rabbet plane (such as the Veritas) result in a smooth rebate?
With curly maple it’s really impossible to know if it’ll work or not. Better to be on a safe side as Paul showed. It’s just too beautiful piece of a wood to ruin it.
Cheers
Just in the process of cutting the rabets for these panels. I was trying Paul’s method of putting down a knife wall and sawing a kerf, then chisel away at the end grain. Works very nicely but then when I tried it on the long grain sides, chiseling was very dangerous if there was difficult grain! (Working in cherry) I made a fair number of other beginners mistakes. For one, the corners often don’t meet smoothly and I noticed Paul cleaning them up with a paring chisel. I had saw marks on one corner and didn’t pay much attention to it. If you don’t clean them up, they really show in the final panel!
Turns out, I also have an old fillister plane I had restored. It has a skew cutter and a fence and depth stop and a spur cutter for cross grain planing. I tried this on the second panel and what a difference! Even planing against the grain, it worked very,very well. The only similar modern tool I know of is the skew rabbet plane by Veritas. If you have the bucks (€, £), I would consider that. The wood fillister planes come up quite often on eBay and aren’t that hard to restore.
Interesting what you said about compressing or expanding the end grain; it had never occurred to me and explains a lot about the way I am tending to work.
Thanks for the half hour video. It worked out perfectly with my evening break while the contact cement is getting ready for application.
While watching this, an idea came in mind (probably it’s because I’m in need of one)
I think it would be good to have an apprentice working with Paul on an adjacent bench and let Paul do one task and let the apprentice copy that on a another workpiece. Let’s see what the differences are and if more explaining can be done from it.
Cheers
I agree Jake, making mistakes is how we learn, but sometimes we dont even realise we have made a mistake until too late. Having a student trying to emulate what Paul is achieving and Paul showing and explaining where faults are occurring would give us all a more depth of knowledge. I know that my skills have been tremendously enhanced with Pauls teaching and I really appreciate this.
Cheers
Paul,
You mentioned that your rebate plane could only plane one way. Would there be any other rebate plane that could allow you to plane either direction to accommodate grain anomalies? I was wondering about a Stanley 45 or even Stanley 51? Perhaps a fillister plane?
The plane Paul is using in the video is a fillister, being purposed as a rebate plane. Most rebate planes are designed for one side to always be the inside wall of the rebate … and are predominately right handed. If one could find a left-handed rebate plane, that would allow easier cutting in the other direction.
Next best would be a very simple wooden rebate plane with straight (not skewed) blade. If the outer side of such plane is true and square, one might be able to position the blade for left-handed (left to right cutting) use.
BTW, the Stanley 45 is a plow / plough plane; not at all useful for rebates. Stanley 51? That’s a spokeshave. Maybe you meant something else?
The 151 is the spokeshave. 51 is the shooting board plane. He probably is thinking of the 46 or 47.
I think Paul was using Stanley N° 78 rebate plane with a fence. I’m thinking that it would be possible to remove the fence and clamp down a straight edge on top of the wood, leaving 1/16 or more extra from the cutline then chop that off with a chisel. I think that Paul’s method was the fastest method, since clamping down a straight edge then would bring more obstacles—issues with sitting on the bench top or if it’s clamped in vice, issue will be being lefty or righty. In my opinion at the end of the day it’s up to the Woodworker’s comfort really. Doesn’t matter how it was made, as long as it was made with a lot of care.
I forgot to add that Paul constantly shows care in his work. I think that’s the most important lessons we all learn by watching his work ethics.
I like watching the way Paul works and how he keeps his work surface clean, I still have a lot to learn on working in an ordered fashion as I can quickly get in a muddle.
My old craftsman knock-off of the Stanley 78 can accept the fence on either side of the body, not the depth stop but that’s not as big a deal.
The #45 is more than adequate at cutting rebates, either with or across the grain as it has “nickers on both sides of the plane body and the fence can be set to slide under the body of the plane to control the depth.
when you talk about compressing the end grain and stretching it while planning , are you referring to planeing into the vise jaw as apposed to planeing away from the jaw? it was a little confusing to me in the video..
Hello Dean, that is indeed what is being referred to.
It appeared to me Paul is sizing the panel to fit the groove exactly, without any room for wood expansion. I thought the advantage of frame and panel construction was that it could accommodate seasonal wood expansion/contraction because the panel is floating in the frame. Where I live, the eastern seaboard of US, we have wild seasonal swings in humidity. If I don’t leave any room for the panel to expand and contract, I’m afraid the panel will swell and possibly buckle or force apart the frame.
Could you address wood movement? How much would a similarly sized panel of sycamore or maple expand and contract in a years time?? Thanks for the great video.
Paul said that any expansion is contained by the joinery. In this context, there is only a small amount of expansion in width possible, and the joinery is strong enough to contain it, so you shouldn’t have a problem.