In my last post, I assembled the frame-and-panel carcase of my tool chest. This week I have only a small amount of progress to relate. I got the bottom nailed on: 
You will notice that not all the boards on the bottom are the same thickness.
That’s intentional.
Sort of…
It all kind of came together serendipitously. I had a fairly wide 5/4 cedar board that I wanted to use for the bottom, but I didn’t have enough to cover the whole bottom. I did, however, have a couple 4/4 poplar off-cuts from a previous project that just fit into the gaps. The casters I have are 2″ tall, so I decided to put the thin boards on the ends, where the casters would be attached, and put the thick boards in the center. And now my tool chest smells like a cedar blanket chest inside. A nice bonus.
The boards are shiplapped–that is, each adjoining edge has overlapping rabbets cut into the boards, which allows the boards to expand and contract without opening up gaps between the boards. Shiplapping boards of uneven thicknesses is an added challenge. But between my Veritas plow plane and my Stanley 78, I got everything fitted okay.
Now to make the lower apron, which will be dovetailed around the bottom. It will add a some rigidity to the carcase, which feels just a little bit delicate right now. Once the skirt and the dust seal are on, though, it will feel beefy.
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That thing is beautiful, will you paint it? Seems a shame to cover such vivid grain!
Yeah, just wait until you see the dark green milk paint I’ve got picked out for it. I can’t wait to cover up all those ugly spots on the panels.
Ha! Not a chance. I’ll be finishing this with a few coats of Danish oil rubbed out by hand. But that’s a little way down the line yet.
Its great to see some one with a passion to create beautiful things in wood, I have made several boxes in years gone by that are still used today for storing blankets and linen at the end of my bed.
Is Cedar a soft wood? Well done.
Cedar is classified as a soft wood, and they’re not kidding! It dents if you look at it cross-eyed. It’s easy to nail through, but also very easy to split, so I had to be careful. Cedar chests are wonderful things, but the wood does dent easily, so many cedar chests are finished with several coats of polyurethane or other film finish.
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speaking of cedar…
Be sure to let Scott know if any of his cedars fall down. Remember when we made fragrant discs out of the larger branches? That would be the limit of my woodworking skills. I wonder if I am any relation to Bezalel or Oholiab? If so it certainly skipped my generation. We hippies were more interested in burning things down etc. My Dad could do a lot with wood in a practical farm sense but his Dad had that talent too. But none of them ever attempted anything this artistic, unless I missed something. I suspect that your literary bent gets an alternative workout in these objects out of your soul…very sweet, son.
I never was very “artistic” as a kid. I tried my hand at drawing but never got past simple 3D objects. I guess these kinds of projects are just an extension of my one drawing ability.