Deluxe Sewing Center

We'll begin today by straight line ripping the planks I've set aside to make the two layers of the top for this cabinet.  I have previously cut the planks to rough length and surface planed them so I can better see the grain of each board.  These planks have been allowed to sit while I've built the cabinet base so they can take on the shape they prefer.  Now it is time to impose upon them the shape I prefer.  the process starts by mounting my 'long fence' on the table saw and setting up in-feed and out-feed support

We start by sighting down the board to see which way the board bows.  One of the advantages of working with quarter sawn lumber is that it bows and twists less that flat sawn or rift sawn lumber, which is why it was so extensively used for furniture in the Mission and Arts & Crafts movements.  You can see on the end of this board how the annular rings in the wood run vertically (perpendicular to the board faces) instead of arching across the end of the board as is typical.  This means that as the cells in the wood expand and contract, instead of the board cupping and twisting, it will simply expand and contract across it's width.

I place the board on the saw with the concave edge to the fence -- both ends of the arch touch the fence and it remains stable.  If we do it the other way around, with the "humpy" side to the fence, the board will get thinner but we'll never get it straight.  This way we cut away the convex side and make it straight, flip the board over and run it through to straighten the concave side.  it may take more than one pass per edge, and I take off just a little at a time: 1/8" on the first run, 1/16" on successive passes.

We end up with nice straight edges.  Not quite glue joint quality yet, but pretty close.  So now I decide how I want to arrange the planks so the grain patterns match up the best and will help to hide the seams between the boards, which planks will be in the top top and which will be used for the lower top, and if there are any edges with checks or punkiness that will need to be cut away in the final trim.

I am awaiting the arrival of a special glue-joint router bit that will replace my usual method of joining the boards with dowel pins, and since I don't want to joint the boards until I'm ready to glue them up, I'll mark the boards for location and alignment.and set them aside for now.

In a lot of furniture, locating hinges is a matter of butting the adjoining pieces together, laying the hinge where you want it to be and tracing around it.  Then cut the pocket for the hinge with a chisel.  But this piece uses a special sewing machine cabinet hinge that features semi-circular ends -- those are a challenge to cut by hand with a straight chisel, and I don't have a set of sweeps to cut curves.  So, I make up a jig that will accurately position the hinges, and allow me to cut the shallow pockets for the hinges with my router equipped with a template guide and a straight bit.  However, the fit we get will be only as good as the template I make, so I lay it out carefully.

Before I go cutting into the wood, I double check to see that the hole I'm about to make will properly fit the hinges.  Measure twice, cut once.

I use a saw toothed Forstner bit to drill a hole -- just a tad under-sized -- to create the round end then use a fine toothed blade on the band saw to make the straight cuts.  I finish up by mounting a drum sander in the drill press and take these cuts out to the lay-out marks, as well as smooth the edges.  Then I sand the whole jig well and apply several coats of lacquer.  The lacquer will help protect the jig and keep it clean, but will also make the router slide across its surface easier.

Now that that is all done, I mount the door hardware: two Classic Oak knobs and two brass ball-catches.  Nothing especially note worthy here; alignment of the catch parts is important of course, but any competent woodworker can get that right.

Here's an old woodworkers trick; to prevent stripping the heads or twisting off screws being driven into hardwoods, drag them across a piece of beeswax first.  The wax lubricates the screw as it goes in and makes a world of difference, especially on delicate little brass screws.  I have seen people use a bar of soap or a candle to do this, but I find that chemicals in the paraffin wax (which is made from petroleum) and the soap can discolor the wood -- and some actually cause the wood to break down over time.  Not a good thing to have going on around the screws that are holding something together!

We're done for the day.  This was a patchwork sort of day, working on several seemingly unrelated tasks and half the day was spent building a jig that will get added to our collection -- so those are non-billable hours.  But we still made some progress.

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