WWA Info Exchange

Tom has mentioned that we're working on a new project and I've finally got some time away from it to post about it. As some of you know, Tom and I successfully collaborated on a shift knob for a sailboat. That went so well that I thought a modestly larger project might be in order.

My wife and I have wanted some built-in cabinets in our family room for a long time and we finally got around to doing something about it. I don't have the room or the skills to do something like this so I planned to hire a local cabinet maker. I was at Tom's one time and told him about this plan and asked if it was a commission that he would like to take on. He thought about it for a while and said "Yes, if you'll be my assistant". What's not to like?

To begin, here is the family room in question:



As you can see, the back wall is the home of the computer, bookcases, financial records, files, etc. The challenge to Tom was to build-in cherry cabinets, computer surface, and a bookcase that spans the entire back wall. That's about 14' 6". I drew up a basic sketch and Tom took it from there. We spent the last two days breaking down a ton of plywood. I'll leave Tom to talk about the design bits because he knows what he's doing, I hope

Behind Tom you can some of the results of our endeavors.

I dunno, PK. Featuring the coffin I built for Halloween in the back of the picture of me... maybe that's some foreshadowing.

I have PROOF that PK was in my shop...



Yeah, we're building a set of cabinets for his home just up the road a spell from my house.

Friday we took delivery of about 14 sheets of ply and a ...

Drum Roll, please...

A Festool track saw.



YES, this saw is da bomb. It cuts with no splintering or roughness. It's the cat's meow, the bee's knees. As PK said, "This saw must have come from Harry Potter." It was that cool!

We are building these cabinets as Norm did in his nine-part kitchen cabinet opus. Here are some of the pieces/parts from the day.



Yes, we even had a stack for the Boo Boo cuts... FYI - PK made just about all of the miscuts! I'm not in trouble.. YET!

After two days of cutting pieces and plowing dadoes and rabbets, we finished the first of nine cabinets.



Only eight more to go... plus a base frame... plus some desktops...

I'm beat... it's hot in the shop...

From here, my plan is to assemble one a night (at least) after work. Should cut my TV watching time down a little, but I'm OK with that..

Now, let's see how long it really takes!

_________________
* http://tomsworkbench.com
* Purveyor of the world's finest Weasel Spit
* Why do they call it a WORKshop if I go there to have fun?
* Founding member: WWAFLAUX#1
* Passed 16,000 posts 7/23/09 - 8:41 a.m.

COOL!!! For both of you, but especially for PK and Mrs. PK!!!

It sure looks like an ambitious project.....hummmmm.....somewhere down the road I'd like to build new kitchen cabinets.......at least I know where I can borrow a Festool track saw

Keep the pics coming--I need to see how to do cabinets.

Verna

But, Verna, it would be a very long trip from the Tampa Bay area with all those cabinet parts!!

_________________
* http://tomsworkbench.com
* Purveyor of the world's finest Weasel Spit
* Why do they call it a WORKshop if I go there to have fun?
* Founding member: WWAFLAUX#1
* Passed 16,000 posts 7/23/09 - 8:41 a.m.

Thats a cool project!

_________________
My Boss is a Jewish Carpenter!

I have to second what Tom said about this saw. It is amazing. You can cut plywood with razor precision and minimal set-up time. There is no way I could have moved as fast using a table saw. It also felt way safer.

Looks like you guys are having entirely too much fun!! If I'd seen this post a few months earlier I might've broke down and bought that saw but ..... a friend asked me to replace his kitchen cabinet doors & drawers and, since I hadn't planned on charging him for it, I couldn't justify the expense. So I just used my Milwaukee 7 1/4" with a new Freud blade and a 50"guide. After the first few cuts I was amazed that I had even considered spending so much on the Festool ..... just think of all the planes I can buy with what I saved!!
Don

The festool stuff is fantastic isn't it.

Before I could afford a sliding panel saw I made 10 or 12 kitchens, laundries and other builtins with one back in the mid 90's.

They are indeed "the bomb"

Eric

Great build for you guys! I'm looking forward to your future posts.

Question about the Festool set up - are you using the Festool vacuum
for dust pick up?

How do you index for repeatable dimensions on your cuts? I have
been old school for so long i.e. break down the sheets with a circular
saw and true up and dimension the smaller pieces on the table saw
using the fence for creating the dimension repeat.

Looks like you two are having fun. Keep up the posts.

Tom

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T-n-T

Tom -

The saw sure does have a dust port, but I'm just using a regular shop vac for dust collection. The adapter at the end of the hose is a nice friction fit around the dust port. Of course, we have to switch the vac on and off, but, hey, it's a less expensive alternative to a dust extractor.

As far as indexing, PK is one heck of a stickler for accuracy. We're squaring one of the short ends on every sheet then indexing from that edge. With two marks, we just 'connect the dots' with the track and off we go.

So far, we've been spot on with the sheets, and everything is lining up.

The main advantages of this is not having to lug the full sheets up to the table saw for cuts and not having to take the second step of cutting then recutting the pieces to get a smooth edge.

Yeah, we sure are having a blast. The pieces are all cut to size and I ran the dadoes and rabbets yesterday. We did one of the cabinets yesterday and I'm planning on getting to the shop tonite to assemble some more.

_________________
* http://tomsworkbench.com
* Purveyor of the world's finest Weasel Spit
* Why do they call it a WORKshop if I go there to have fun?
* Founding member: WWAFLAUX#1
* Passed 16,000 posts 7/23/09 - 8:41 a.m.

Quite a project you've taken on, and it's always great to work side by side with a good friend. Looking forward to seeing more of this build.




BTW PK, be sure to keep Tom away from the nail gun. Trust me on this.

_________________
Frank
WWACOAUX#1
"I love the smell of Sawdust in the morning, it smells like, victory."
WWA'ers I've met: Popeye, Ed Avery, Stephen Wolf, Rockfish, Rodedon

Nail gun , nobody said anything about a nail gun!!

I have to agree with Tom. Once we squared the end of the ply it was a piece of cake. You make two tick marks with a pencil, lay the edge of the guide on the middle of the pencil mark and start cutting. No clamping required. I did four pieces in a row and laid them on top of each other. I couldn't have gotten as close with my table saw.

Tom measured corner to corner on a 24" wide cabinet and we were out by 1/16". I'm OK with that

Looks like you guys have a plan and having fun doing it.

_________________
Bob Malone
WWASCAUX#1/WWAMDAUX#11

Went to the gym last night and worked out...

So I only had time to assemble one more box.

But, not workout tonight... so I'm working out in the shop with more cabinets!

_________________
* http://tomsworkbench.com
* Purveyor of the world's finest Weasel Spit
* Why do they call it a WORKshop if I go there to have fun?
* Founding member: WWAFLAUX#1
* Passed 16,000 posts 7/23/09 - 8:41 a.m.

You guys are having too much fun. - oh yeah, and you suck on the TS55!

Lawrence

Tom, you got the Festool!!! That is totally awesome. Thumbs up.

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Gail
www.whitewoodkitchen.com

I'll second what others have said, you're having way too much fun. Sounds like a great project, and creating the dust in Toms place is the way to go. Keep us posted on the progress.

We are making some killer progress. In fact, PK moved a bunch of the completed cabinets to his house yesterday... today, we will try to install one bank of them - Hope we won't make too many mistakes!

_________________
* http://tomsworkbench.com
* Purveyor of the world's finest Weasel Spit
* Why do they call it a WORKshop if I go there to have fun?
* Founding member: WWAFLAUX#1
* Passed 16,000 posts 7/23/09 - 8:41 a.m.

So here are some progress pics. Most of the boxes are done, the cabinet bases are built and yesterday I started moving boxes. Here is the first lineup in my garage. The interiors are pre-finished and the outside panel that you can see is cherry. This is one of the two banks of cabinets that will be spanned by a computer "shelf" that sits a few inches below the top of the cabinets. There will also be a bookcase on top of the other bank of cabinets.



Here is one of the two bookcase sections. We had a couple of pieces of cherry ply that had some nice movement in them. You can see one piece on the "show" end of the bookcase.



I've sure learned a lot and Tom has been quite patient. The good news is that much of the next phase will be done in air conditioning.

Thanks, PK... The heat almost made me a patient yesterday. Fortunately, working indoors in the A/C is MUCH better than being in the garage...

_________________
* http://tomsworkbench.com
* Purveyor of the world's finest Weasel Spit
* Why do they call it a WORKshop if I go there to have fun?
* Founding member: WWAFLAUX#1
* Passed 16,000 posts 7/23/09 - 8:41 a.m.