JKM Woodworking

This project is loosely adapted from Chris Schwarz’ White Water Shaker Bench. I used to find the article online, but for now was only able to find it in the book “Classic American Furniture” by Schwarz & the Editors of Woodworking Magazine which I got from the library.

nine months gestation

Part of the appeal of the project is supposed to be its simplicity. There are only three pieces of flair: a cutout curve on the bottom of the legs, angled ends to the aprons, and notches at the top of the legs for the aprons to set into. I should have stuck with that, but had the wise idea to add grooves/rabbets/dados to lock all the pieces together. That was unnecessary and added a lot of effort and time.

more like ‘three board bench’

It is made from white oak, my first time using oak. I started with a 10″ wide board and two 2 1/2″ wide boards. The narrow boards were 48-50″ long and I just left them at that length for the aprons. The 10″ wide board was eight feet long, so after cutting off the checking and two 17″ legs it ended up about 60″.

legs about 16-17″ long, crosscut with handsaw

To make rabbets on the underside of the bench I used a plow plane with a wide blade. I had to make two overlapping courses to get to a 7/8″ width.

groove for apron to set into top

For the legs I drew ogees with a compass. I drew similar ogees at the ends of the front apron. All of these curves were cut with the bandsaw. With a wide bandsaw blade some parts were more nibbling than smooth. I later cleaned these up (a little) with a file.

drawing ogee with compass

bandsawn curves

With the aprons and top almost done, I was ready to mark the locations of the legs.

i plan to make a dado under this leg

dados marked on underside of top and insides of aprons

I traced the legs and carried the marks across the inside of the aprons. I thought I could saw out the walls of these dadoes while all three pieces were clamped together, but that was not ergonomic. I sawed and chiseled out the dadoes individually.

Before notching the legs to fit inside the aprons, I decided to glue and nail the aprons to the top.

I was under the impression that regular fasteners may leave stains or discoloration on the oak, though now that I type this I’m not sure if it’s true. I considered nails from copper, stainless steel, or wood, and went with copper.

8g and 10g copper rose head nails

Fairwind Fasteners sells them by the piece. I got some 8 and 10 gauge sizes to try. The 8 gauge nails needed 3/16″ pilot holes, and the 10 gauge nails used 5/32″.

don’t use 1/8 pilot hole. it’s too small.

I glued the aprons into their grooves with liquid hide glue and let it set overnight or longer before nailing. Once the aprons were glued and nailed, I worked on fitting the legs. The notches were marked with a marking gauge and a saddle square. They were cut easily or even too loose. The top of the legs that fit into the dados were a bit tight and some of their edges had to be planed.

transferring measurements to leg

underside view

Unlike the aprons which I let sit for a while, I wanted to get the legs square and nailed up quickly. I drilled the first part of the pilot holes first. After glue was applied and the legs were positioned I drilled the rest of the pilot holes and hammered in the nails.

make sure your nails don’t hit each other inside the wood

8g nails into legs, 10g nails into aprons

I did not think of finishing until I was almost done. “No finish” was a strong contender, but I also would like to bring out some of the contrast or color. I made test boards of sealcoat shellac and refined linseed oil and chose the shellac.

sealcoat shellac vs unfinished vs refined linseed oil

By this time the project was nailed together which would limit any sanding or scraping, so I’ll have to live with the imperfections. I applied 4-5 coats on the top and front apron and 2-3 on the legs and back. I applied the shellac with a rag. Later I rub it with a brown paper bag which reduces some of the shine.

shellacked

For now it will live in the garage. I even found a boot tray that fits between the legs.

angled view

front view

I rough cut the rails and drawer front together in the hopes of having the grain match. I spent a lot of effort on that and don’t think it was worth it. Each piece lost material with planing, and then more when fitting the drawer.

fitted side-to-side, still need to plane top

For the drawer sides I wanted a light colored wood so the dovetails would contrast with the cherry. Choices were poplar, soft maple, and basswood. I went with basswood as I thought the softness might help jamming the dovetails into their sockets. I ripped a long piece to match the width/height of the front and then plowed grooves.

1/4″ deep groove, 1/4″ wide, 1/4″ from bottom. roughly.

the front is 3/4″ thick and the sides are 1/2″ thick. roughly.

There’s a lot of info and gurus about cutting dovetails. I don’t have a set routine. But I know when I cut the tails with a japanese saw, I can’t cut the waste out with a coping saw. The coping saw blade is too thick to fit in the kerf. I have to use a fretsaw.

plow the groove before cutting the tail to make sure it stays hidden

The sockets I chisel out with a mortise chisel for the open areas and smaller skew chisels for the corners.

test fit

I ease the underside of the tails to help get them started quicker. I think I learned that from Rob Cosman’s videos. All of these edges will be covered. If they were through dovetails you’d have to leave the exposed ends alone.

eased inned edges of tails

I made a mistake I didn’t notice until gluing up the drawer box. I had cut the drawer back to fit between the sides by using the front to gauge the distance. But I dadoed the sides which means the back should have been that much wider.

also note the cherry plywood drawer bottom

dados for the back to fit between the sides

Discovering an error at glue-up didn’t leave much time for problem solving. I could have cut a new piece, but once I realized the cause I moved it forward a little to where the dado wasn’t.

such a shame

I planned to pin the back with skewers but did not. I did glue some scrap into those dados which I hope will act like corner blocking.

At this stage I had to solve the problem of fitting drawer guides into the already glued carcase. The plans call for gluing them to the sides. I wanted to do extra as this table would be a Christmas gift. I didn’t trust glue alone to be secure long term and I wouldn’t be around to repair it. Another reason is that the unseen inner sides were not planed as well as the outside, so it might not be a flat glue surface.

I lost several days trying to think of screw-free ways to install the supports. Things got easier when I resigned myself to just using screws. I used poplar and ash for the guides as I had scrap close to the proper dimensions.

screws and screw holes

The runners and kickers are notched to fit. Each has a screw into the front rail and the back leg. They are also glued along the side apron. The picture also shows the screw holes for mounting the tabletop, circles for the front and back and elongated on the sides.

ready for final shaping

I returned to the table top whiich I had glued up oversized. I put the tabletop upside down with the frame on top and decided where to crosscut it. I also traced the corners of the legs to know where to stop chamfering.

about 1 3/4″ overhang on the front and back. a skosh more on the sides.

To chamfer I eyeballed half of the thickness, ran a marking gauge around the edge, and filled it in with a mechanical pencil. The bulk of the waste was removed with a #5 plane and a #7 was used when closer to the line. I like watching the line in the corner develop. Oddly satisfying.

plane the end grain sides first

diagonal line on corner gets straighter with each swipe

good enough for me

I scraped and hand sanded to 220 grit. I drilled pilot holes but did not attach the tabletop until after finishing.

For finishing I sprayed shellac. I did one coat of garnet shellac (all I had left) and then 3-5 coats of sealcoat. The drawer knob I supported by poking the screw in cardboard with the threads wrapped in tape.

harbor freight purple spray gun

knob with upside down table in distance

After finishing I put the drawer bottom in, screwed in the knob, and screwed the top to the table. I waxed the business end of the drawer and runners.

underside of drawer with wax

might as well throw in a picture of the drawer inside

I made this as a Christmas present and delivered it 650 miles away on January 2nd.

It is about 24″ high with a 16″ square top. The legs are 1 1/8″ square at the top and 5/8″ at the bottom. The aprons are 4 1/2″ wide and 11 1/4″ long.

front view

top view

drawer open

My next project is a cherry end table. This is based off the Popular Woodworking plans by Chris Schwarz. I have made two similar tables in the past.

His plans called for a table 27″ high with a top 18″ square. I checked that against tables in my house and thought it would be too tall. I adjusted the dimensions to 24″ high and 16″ square.

For stock I bought a 6/4 cherry board 11″ wide and 8-9 feet long. My goal was to get all of the pieces out of 1/2 of the board, leaving a large offcut.

crosscut board in half

two strips for four legs

The edges of the board are good for the legs, as the grain is diagonal. After that, I had to decide which order to crosscut, rip, and resaw the pieces. The drawer front and its rails were cut out and set aside first. Then the larger section was resawn for the top and aprons.

pieces with waste removed

These will be all the easily visible parts of the table. They were run through the planer enough to freshen up the show sides.

One piece I did not plan on making was the drawer knob. I spent a lot of time searching for shaker knobs, but the only *cherry* ones I could find were wide and bulbous. So I tried a maple knob with a smaller shape. Since it would be different color than the cherry front, I decided to ebonize it.

Lee Valley Smooth Maple Knob Item 02G1415

I applied two coats of Speedball India Ink with a cheap foam brush and it took well. The extra knob is for backup if things go horribly wrong.

ebonized maple vs raw

two pieces to make the top

These are my two top pieces. In the past I’ve had some of these joints come apart a little at the ends. So I focused on getting a cleaner joint. In addition to setting the boards on each other to see how they fit, I usually try to have a light behind them. In this case I used a flashlight for demonstration.

too much of a gap, I think

It’s a lot of back and forth trying to make a spring joint without having too much of a gap.

glued up top. will be trimmed later.

The legs started a full 6/4 thickness and I planed them to 1 1/8″ as suggested in the plans.

leg stock

I laid an apron on the top of the legs and marked a little lower to begin the taper. I try to orient the tapers to cut off the sapwood and minimize grain run-out. They taper to 5/8″ at the bottom.

start the taper below the aprons

tapers penciled in

I cut close to the line on the bandsaw and then clean up with a plane. I tried planing in the moxon vise since it was already setup. It was slower and not any better than my older method of having the legs loosely held on the workbench.

also when loosening the vise one of the legs fell on the concrete floor

All of the joinery for the aprons-to-legs were dominos, except for the top rail. I felt better keeping this a dovetail joint.

removing waste with chisel

oops. we’ll have to glue that down and set it aside…

The domino joints were easier. I squared up the ends and marked to have the aprons set back 1/8″ from the legs.

Before glue up I scraped and hand sanded the pieces to 220 grit.

The two sides were glued up first and the next day the back and front rails were added to make a little table assembly.

glued up assembly

I went ahead and finished the panels before working on the rest. Of the four boards making the two panels, one had a lot of tearout. I tried planing with a jointer or smoother, scraping, hand sanding, etc. and had to settle for not getting it all.

tearout

sanding dust collects in defects showing where to keep scraping

Maybe ‘finished’ isn’t the right word. I oiled them. In this case I used some refined linseed oil meant for artists, my first time using it. I applied two coats over a few minutes and then wiped off what little was left 10-15 minutes later. It had several days to cure while I worked on the rest.

oiled vs raw panel

I think this will serve the purpose of not having an unfinished line showing as the panel expands and contracts. Later I will spray the entire carcase with shellac or lacquer.

Jumping ahead in time to show the oiled side against the unfinished legs and rails:

oiled panel in unfinished frame

Most of the rest of the carcase will be secondary wood. The most important dimension is their thickness which I planed to fit into the already made dados.

poplar stock for drawer dividers

fitting drawer guides

These pieces are dominoed and glued to make U-shaped pieces. The front ends are trapped in the stopped dados and will only be glued. The backends will be glued and screwed to the leg. The curve is made to allow using shorter screws.

fitting drawer guides, back view

I marked the legs to taper to 1/2 their thickness at the bottom. The bulk was removed with the bandsaw.

waste from tapering legs

cut well outside the line

At this point I decided to fill the grooves on the sides housing the panels. I knew they would be present and thought that with the taper of the legs and the angle you’re looking at the piece they wouldn’t be noticeable. But I decided it was better to fill them now than regret not filling them later.

grooves at bottom that need filling?

So I found some strips of walnut, planed them to fit, and glued them in place. I could have saved a step or two and done this before bandsawing the feet in the first place.

filler strips glued in place

After this I cleaned up the feet by planing to the line and cleaning up any tearout with a card scraper.

filler not visible from 10 feet away

With the feet made, I glued up the sides with the panels first. This wouldn’t interfere with any fitting of the drawer guides and rails.

With the drawer supports made I had four more rails to fit. Top and bottom front rails will be visible and made of walnut. Two back rails are scrap butternut. Joinery for these rails are either pocket screws or dominos, whatever worked out easiest.

In the following picture you can see the bottom rail is a strip of walnut glued to the front of the lowest drawer divider:

almost ready for assembly

I glued up with titebond liquid hide glue. I fastened all the screws loosely and then tightened them after clamping. Here we are glued and clamped:

glued up

The front is pointed toward the ceiling. You can see how the walnut top and bottom rails extend out about 3/4″ past the poplar guides. The goal is to have the guides hidden and have only drawer fronts visible between the top and bottom rail.

It’s hard to assess how square everything is with all of the clamps in the way. If anything is seriously out of square I can soften the joints and wrench it into shape later. For now the front where the drawers goes seems ok. I put the top on to make sure it fits and see how much overhang I have to work with:

case with top

The next steps are to make the drawers one at a time. The drawer sides may be basswood or poplar and the bottoms will probably be plywood. I have butternut drawer fronts ready.

butternut drawer fronts

What makes it a printer stand? I guess having a printer on top is the only requirement. Also I plan on the drawers being wide and deep enough for stacks of paper.

The plan is to have walnut frame with buttenut drawer fronts. The drawers will be graduated in size and not have visible rails between them. The sides will be frame and panel.

printer stand drawing

I started this project at least three years ago. The height was limited by the length of 8/4 thick walnut I had at the time – about 53-54 inches which I cut in half. I also rough cut some 4/4 walnut for the top and 4/4 butternut for the drawer fronts. Then the project went into suspended animation for years. Here are the parts from yesteryear:

walnut legs 26 3/4″ long, 1 3/4″ square(ish)

walnut boards for top, about 27″ wide and 22″ deep

butternut for drawer fronts, about 6″ wide and 22″ long

I had to fight the urge to replace it all with stock that is a little taller or wider or better looking. In the end I only replaced two pieces of butternut that had pith.

I glued up the top first. After it came out about 27″ wide and 21″ deep I could finalize dimensions for the front and sides.

gluing up top

Next the legs were squared up and oriented. The sides get grooves for panels, and the back gets a rabbet. I’m not sure what kind of back it’ll have, but there’s a 3/8″ wide and deep rabbet waiting for it.

legs ready for grooves

use marking gauge like nicker for rabbet

rabbets made and dados marked

I calculated where the drawers would go and marked out spots for dados underneath the drawers. These will house the drawer dividers and runners. I decided to make them the width of my chisel and will later plane the wood to match. The dados on the front were cut like half dovetails and those on the back are cut through.

through dados in the back for drawer runners

stopped dados in the front for drawer dividers

legs with various grooves

The main reason for a multi-year delay was I wanted solid wood panels for the sides rather than 1/4″ walnut plywood. But I wasn’t capable of or willing to try resawing 7-8″ walnut to get a wide enough panel. Now that I have a bandsaw I can try resawing and bookmatching thin panels. I resawed a wide walnut board and ended up making two side panels about 3/8″ thick, 17″ wide and 22″ long.

panels as band sawn

panels after planing

Rails were made for the sides from the same stock as the legs, so their widths will match at 1 3/4″. When the rail grooves line up with the leg grooves, the rails are set back 1/4″. They will be dominoed into the legs.

rail and leg joint

With the legs and rails finished, I trimmed the panels to fit. I planed the backside of the 3/8″ thick panel to fit in the 1/4″ wide grooves, leaving the show side flat. Again I have tear-out on the show side I will need to scrape or sand. Expansion will take place side-to-side and those grooves are 3/8″ deep.

thinning edge of panel, check for fit with offcut

dry fit sides

So two sides dry fitted is a good place to take a break. I have cut rails to go across the front and back, and will have to make drawer guides before gluing the whole thing up. Prior to glue-up I will at least finish the panels and am considering finishing everything.

Having marked the apron lengths in the previous step, I added about one inch to each side for tenons. For this project I wanted to try making integral tenons on the bandsaw.

I had to decide if I would try to make all the cuts on the bandsaw, or only the less visible ones and use a handsaw for the show cuts. I tried making all cuts on the bandsaw. I wanted the tenons to end up 8mm thick so they would fit in an 8mm domino mortise.

rough cut tenons

The tenons came out close to size but needed cleaning up. I tried a file and then switched to a shoulder plane.

For the front apron I made a curve on the bottom using the same curved bow I used for the front edge of the tabletop. This curve is concave, so a handplane can’t be used to clean the edges. I used a file and sandpaper wrapped around the offcut. The two short aprons were so short I didn’t bother putting a curve on them.

curved front apron

I wanted to drawbore these tenons. I like the look of pinned tenons on shaker furniture and wanted to practice. And I suspected my joinery would be sloppy and benefit from tightening up.

For the legs I drilled the drawbore holes before making the mortises. This way I wouldn’t have to clean up blowout inside the mortises. I drill a starter hole with a 1/4 forstner bit, switch to a 1/4 augur bit and drill until the tip pokes through, then drill in the backside with the forstner bit. The forstner bit helps to have clean entry and exit holes, but it’s not so good for drilling all the way through.

drilling until tip comes out the back

drawbore holes and mortise locations

This time I was smart enough not to have the holes intersecting, but I still had a couple collide with the aprons on the exit side. I will scoop out an exit path with gouges.

exit holes need clearance

I made overlapping mortises with an 8mm domino bit and rounded the tenons with a file. The peg holes in the tenons are 1/16 closer to the shoulder, a measurement I did not test but borrowed from my previous project in ash.

offset holes

Prior to assembly I decided to scrape and sand all of the pieces. Each face of each leg was scraped with a card scraper or cabinet scraper, then hand sanded at 220 and 320 grit. This was the most time consuming part of the whole project. For the aprons I only cleaned the visible outer face.

leg before

leg after

I drilled some pocket holes in the aprons for the tabletop. I wallered out the top holes to leave the screws loose for movement. The distance from front-back apron is only 8-9″, so I don’t think I have much to worry about.

wallerin

I glued up the short sides first and later added the long aprons to complete the assembly. I used liquid hide glue on the tenon, shoulders, and drawbore peg. Some of the pegs crumpled, which I blame on using sawn stock rather than split or rived.

glued up

sawn pegs before slimming down

riven pegs slimming down

Back to the tabletop, I marked the underside where the legs would sit and drew a chamfer about 1″ wide and half the thickness. 95% of this material was removed with a #5 plane, with a block plane, #7 plane, and card scraper taking care of the rest.

chamfer marked on underside of tabletop

planing chamfer, short ends first

For the topside I scraped the glue line as promised. After 1,000 passes or so it was flush. Then I scraped the rest of the top 3-4 times to blend in. I hand sanded the top, the edges, and the fondleable parts on the bottom with the same regimen as the legs.

scraping uneven glue line

I also drilled pilot holes for the pocket screws on the underside. I wouldn’t drill pilot holes for pine or plywood, but it seemed like a good idea for hardwood. First I drilled the pocket screws in 1/4″ or so to establish the angle, then backed them out and drilled the rest of the pilot hole by hand.

pilot holin

I read too much about finishing cherry and got analysis paralysis. A lot of what I read was about minimizing blotching, which doesn’t seem desirable for curly cherry. After all, the curls are blotches, right? Anyhow, I don’t have any polyurethane or ‘varnish’ and don’t plan on getting any, so my options included boiled linseed oil, shellac, and lacquer. I made samples of blonde shellac and garnet shellac with and without sanding back the first coats to accentuate the curls and decided to use garnet shellac without sanding back.

unfinished, blonde shellac, blonde sanded back

unfinished, garnet shellac, garnet sanded back

The last cleaning up before finishing was to scrape all of the pegs and scrub the glue squeeze-out with hot water. Then I sanded those areas with 220 and 320 again. I also took the table inside to its future home and marked and leveled the feet.

The finish is garnet shellac with 5 coats wiped on the top and 3-4 coats on the legs and aprons. After that I put it in the sun for a few hours.

shellaced and sunbathing

All put together and in the spot it was made for:

in place, angled view

in place, front view

I’m happy with it. A relatively quick project for me. And I practiced making tenons and pinning them.

detail view

This project shuffled to the front of the line because I had all the pieces and it seemed simple. It is a small table without drawers or stretchers or a lower shelf. Just four legs, aprons, and a top.

drawings

I previously made some legs about 30″ long from 7/4 stock. Later I bought a nice piece of cherry about 8 1/2″ x 72″ for the top.

stock to work with

Crosscutting the piece in half would allow a top about 17 x 36″. Seventeen inches was too wide for my needs, so I decided to rip 2 1/2″ from each long side. The top would end up around 12″ wide/deep and the offcuts would make three of the four aprons.

crosscut in half

two halves look nice but are too wide

12″ top and 2 1/2″ pieces for aprons

After the two top pieces were cut to size I flipped and rearranged the two boards to try to find a pleasing orientation. Then I jointed the long edges and glued them.

small step at glue line

This picture is trying to show the glue joint is not flush. On a good day with well behaved wood that is a problem for me to flatten. For figured wood like this I imagine it will be a real pain. My plan is to scrape it, even if it takes a long time.

I wanted the front edge of the tabletop to have a slight curve. I made a bow out of a thin strip of pine and some twine and used it to trace a curve. I cut the curve on the bandsaw and cleaned the edges with a handplane.

bow to trace curve onto wood

cut close on bandsaw

clean up with hand plane

The four legs I had ripped by hand. They are tapered on one face. I picked which of the remaining faces to taper, making two square sides and two tapered. These were cut on the bandsaw and cleaned with handplanes.

targets to plane toward

workholding for planing legs

planed vs bandsawn surface

The way I initially cut these legs, they tapered all the way up. I had to square up the top 3″ so they would be square where they meet the aprons.

top end marked for squaring up

With the legs shaped, I placed them on the underside of the tabletop to determine how long the aprons would be. I used a square to set the legs 1 1/2″ in from the sides and 1″ from the front and back. With the legs in position I could mark the leg-to-leg lengths of the aprons exactly.

planning leg locations

Next I will make the aprons and the apron-leg assembly.