More on the Hope Chest

I worked on the Hope Chest for a few hours this (now Friday) morning and it went well. Raising panels went well again too. As you can see I used a Stanley #4 across the grain to hog off a full 1/8” from the thickness of this 16” x 16” oak panel before I raised it. Notice that I am working across (90-degrees to its axis) the grain until just above my gauge line. That way I can remove stock very rapidly using a plane with a heavy camber on the cutting iron (as discussed and shown in an earlier blog). About 1/8”. Once the surface was down I finished the surface with a #5 ½.

With the bevels fully formed I finished off the surfaces with the new Veritas small smoothing plane and this works exceptionally both with and across the grain with the plane skewed on the cross-grain bevels.

I scraped all of the surfaces until they were blemish free and soon I will sand the panels using only 240-grit paper.

Two remaining aspects if the chest is making the lid and the drawer, which will be fun. I will be away in Yorkshire for a few days so not much to tell on this until I return to work Monday. Follow me on these aspects of the project and we will all learn something I am sure.

I love sliding the panels into the grooves and then uniting the tenons into their mortises. very satisfying.

Here is the corner of the chest with two panels in place.