Deluxe Sewing Center

This morning we start off by jointing up the planks for the top panels using a glue joint bit in the router table.  It is a very good idea when you're planing the boards that will be joined into a plate, to plane a piece of scrap along with them.  That way you have a piece to use in setting up the bit that is *exactly* the same thickness as the boards to be joined. Make sure it's at least 5-6 inches wide; you will be whittling it down in your test fitting.

Rip the scrap piece in half -- exactly in half will make things easier in a minute.  Then mark them for orientation; you will need to remember which one went through which way.  Center the bit on your work pieces as much as you can by eye.  Run one through face up, the other through face down.  Slip them together and see what you've got.

Unless you're *real* good at eye-balling something -- or real lucky -- you will need to adjust the bit up or down, just a little.  Just a very little.  Which way you go will depend on whether the top or the bottom is too fat.  This is why you need to know which one went through right side up and which was upside down.

Take your test pieces to the table saw and rip the teeth off of them, then run them through the router again.  If the fit is worse, you went the wrong way, adjust it back twice as much.  If it's better, go the same way just a little more; half of the error amount.  If it's perfect, quit and grab your planks.

The test pieces were small and easy to handle.  These planks are 48" long, about 5" wide, and are more of a struggle to keep them flat on the table; some have a little bit of a bow to them, so I have to lean on them hard to keep them against the table all the way through.  I anticipated this and left the planks just a bit thick so I'd have wood to plane off.

Once the planks are jointed, I apply a new-generation, non-foaming, polyurethane glue to both faces of each joint.  I have four planks per plate, so I work them in pairs; glue up one pair and use F clamps to snug them together while I work on the other pair.  With both pairs in F clamps, I glue up the center joint, remove the F clamps and bring in the bar clamps and pull them together tightly.

After the first plate sets up for an hour, I can remove the clamps and glue up the second plate.  I use a flush plane to remove the glue pips before they get really hard.  Then I use a low-angle block plane to smooth out any ridges that occurred and sand the plate with 60 grit paper on my heavy random orbit machine.

Now it's time to trim the plates.  I start by ripping them to width + 1/4", then switch to a fine tooth blade and take one more pass on each edge, taking 1/8" on each pass just to clean up the edges.  This leaves the long edges straight, smooth and perfectly parallel.  Leaving the fine tooth blade on, I remove the rip fence and install the crosscut sled to trim the ends straight and square.

Then we take a few minutes to pull the router out of the router table, install it's base plate on it and mount a 45° bevel bit to profile the under side of the ends and front edges of the lower top plate.  I go ahead and sand these lower edges to 100 grit now -- much easier to do it before I mount the plate than after.

Aligning the plate with the back of the cabinet, and centering it side-to-side, I hold it in place with a couple of small F clamps while I drill pilot holes from below.  I have to remember to elongate the holes in the front to allow the panel to move.

Note of caution: Because of the "floating top" attachments, and the fact that this cabinet will end up weighing over 150 pounds, it is HIGHLY recommended that when you want to move this cabinet, pick it up from underneath, not by it's top, or you may rip the floating points out.

Next we refer to the discussions I've been having with Paula about the size and shape of her sewing machine.  The goal is to minimize the gap around the machine that would allow her ruler, scissors, seam ripper, and what have you to fall through.  The less time you spend crawling on the floor retrieving your tools the better, I always say.  But, we need to make sure there is enough space for the machine to rise smoothly without hitting anything, and that any protruberances are allowed for.

I drill 3/8" holes at each corner, then fit a course tooth blade to my jig saw.  This white oak is tough stuff and I'll need an aggressive blade.

The result is an ugly hole just a bit smaller than what it needs to be.

To finish the hole we start by laying on some good old carpet tape, then align some thin template boards to the lay-out marks and press them firmly onto the tape.  I put clamps on them and let them set while I chuck up a pattern makers bit in the router.  Applying steady pressure helps the tape grab the template boards so they don't shift while routing.  That would be bad.

The pilot bearing at the top of the router bit rides on the template boards, and the bit cuts away the waste leaving a nice, smooth, straight sided hole.  No longer ugly.

That completes the bottom plate, and this is a good point to quit for the day.  Tomorrow we'll build the top plate.

Project Home