This was another project I started a couple of months ago, and now I’m finding time to finish it up. Awhile ago, I made a foot rest for one of the LumberJocks contests. It was for my wife and it was loosely based on a nursing stool she had. Although we never had kids that needed nursing, she just found it comfortable under her desk. I made a few changes and made it slightly larger. She liked the first one so much she wanted one to take to work. I also needed one of my desk, so I thought I would just make two while I was at it.

I’m using Mahagony for these foot rests. I found a nice board at one of my local suppliers.

I marked out the pieces on the board and rough cut the longer board into a couple manageable pieces. I milled the boards using my Planer. Because of the width of the board, I started out using my Planer Sled to get one side flat. I then milled the boards to 5/8″ thickness. Going thinner, than the standard 3/4″, looks better for the scale of this project, and it makes the foot rest a little lighter.

Next I cut each of the components to their finial size. I also made a couple templates I would used to shape some of the pieces.

Using the templates to trace the shape onto the pieces, I rough cut the pieces on the Band Saw. I then used some double-sided tape and mounted the templates on the pieces. I use a router and a template bit, to do the final shaping.

To make this a changeling project, all of the joinery uses Through Tennons. To help place the mortises in the same place for each of base leg pieces, I made this jig.

The jig registers the leg and holds it securely. The mortises are cut using a router and spiral cut bit. I added some stops to the side of the jig, to limit the length of the mortise.

Once the mortises were cut on the legs, I cut the tennons on the Table Saw, using my crosscut sled.

I then removed the waste between the tennons using a Fret Saw.

I then cleaned up between the tenons using some chisels. This is about how far I got, when I first started the project, and because it was a few months ago some of the pictures seem to have been missed placed or were never taken. So, there are no pictures of assembling the base.

The bases were assembled. The stretchers have through tenons which are proud of the outside surface. The ends were “pillowed” to soften them. They were then pegged, to give the joint a little more strength.

Now for the really tricky part to this project, laying out and cutting the through mortises in the top. To do this, I started out by positioning the base on the underside of the top. Once I got it centered, I clamped it in place. I then used a marking knife to scribe the locations of the tenons. It’s very important to get the base square with the top. I used a router and a fence to cut the mortise, and if they aren’t square the router won’t be able to cut the mortises correctly.

The tops were clamped to this simple jig with a fence attached. I used a couple clamps as stops for the router, to set the length of the mortises. I made several passes with the router. I left about an 1/8″ for the final pass. This final pass will be what shows on the top surface. I made sure I was extra careful when making this final pass. I didn’t want the router veer off at all on this pass. I was lucky, no mishaps on any of the mortises.

Fitting and attaching the base to the top took a little bit of work. The mortises were cleaned and squared up using some chisels. The tennons on the base also needed a little tweaking, using a shoulder plane. Once the final fit was achieved, the base and top were attached. These joints were also pegged to give them some added strength.

All in all, I think they came out pretty well. I put a few coats of Arm-R-Seal on them and called it good. Here are a few shots of one of the finished foot rests. One has already been delivered to my wife’s office.

I started this project a couple months ago, before my back problems started. Now that things are better and I have time off from work, I finished up a few of the minor details on this project. The pictures I took during the building of the Outfeed Table have vanished, so here are some pictures of the finial results.

The Outfeed Table is made from Baltic Birch plywood. One 5′x5′ sheet was plenty for this project. The main are of the top is 30″ x 48″. I bolted the section on the saw using (6) 3/8″ bolts. That section is very sold, I think I could sit on it without any problems. Although, I didn’t test that fact!

The center adjustable support leg, worked out really well too. I wanted something adjustable, simple and effective. The support has a large magnet attached to it, which contacts with the center hinge and holds it in place for storage. I used some standard door hinges on the table. I might not have needed something this “beefy”, but I had these lying around. They do make taking the top off pretty easy.

I applied a couple coats of Danish Oil to the surface. After that dried, I applied a coat of wax. I think this should be a decent finish for this Outfeed Table. I’ll apply new coats of wax as needed.

Now that this project is done, I have a couple other projects that are near completion. I need to wrap these project up before I move on the next project, which will most likely be some Greene and Greene furniture for our library. I need to put those Darrell Perart classes to use!

I have yet to have a project that has given me more grief as this little table.  It seems it’s been one thing after another with this project!

A few of weeks ago I attached the curved part of the apron, and while clamping it for the glue up the apron distorted slightly.  Ok, that was my fault.  I thought I was being extra careful, because I knew this could be a potential problem.  What little pressure I used, was too much.  I let the base sit for a while, and it came back into shape for the most part.  At least enough where I could work with it.

Then the other day, I happened to walk past the base sitting on my bench.  The legs looked odd to me, they looked warped or twisted.  I thought maybe the wood had started to move on me.  I put a straight edge on the faces and everything seems to be ok.  I’m thinking the grain is causing a trick of the eye.  I wasn’t happy with the selection of wood I had for the legs.  I think I just learned, not to settle on the wood selection of your project.

Here’s a picture of the base.  The picture really doesn’t show the effect unless you know where to look.

I brought the table inside to see how it would look in the hallway.

Even thought this still “raw” wood, both my wife and I feel it is going to be too light for the room.  I’m going to play around some different stains to see if I can find something we like.

For a project that I thought was going to an easy knock it out quick project, it has turned into a frustrating little project.

In my last post I showed some of the problems I had with the apron and the tapers on the legs.  I have remade the apron and it came out much better.  I have the new leg stock milled up, but I haven’t tapered them yet.  More about the tapering process later.

My plan was to use sliding dovetails, to connect the apron to the back legs.  Although that turned into another disaster.  I’ve lost track on how many that is now!


The dovetails on the apron were pretty easy to make, using my dovetail plane I got from Philly Planes.  I have to say Phil makes a really nice plane.

Cutting the sockets on the legs is where the disaster took place.  I was pretty frustrated with the results, I didn’t even take any pictures.  Needless to say the joints were so loose, they were beyond being structural.  I had to decide if I wanted to have another go at the dovetail sockets, or to use some other joinery.

The project had already caused me enough heartaches, I decided to try something else.  My choice was to use loose tenons.  I felt this approach was the safest and easiest.


I whacked off the top of the legs, now the table is about a 1.5” shorter.  I also had to cut off the dovetails on the apron, but that wasn’t a big deal either.  I then used my new router, and cut the mortises in the legs and apron.  Overall I’m pretty happy with these results.  I think I could have gone a little deeper with mortises, but I think I have enough glue surface for this small table to hold together

The next challenge was how to improve the cutting of the tapers on the legs.  I felt I needed a better jig, than the one I used before.  I found some plans for nice jig over at Fine Woodworking.  So, last weekend I started to build the new jig.  I only have a few things to finish on it.  I should be able knock that out tomorrow, and test it out.  If all goes well I think I can finish the table this weekend.  Look for an upcoming post on the tapering jig and how it works.

The last couple of days haven’t been that productive.  I’m working on the legs and apron for the small table project.

The tapers on the legs aren’t as perfect as I would like.

It’s not as noticeable in the photo, but where the taper starts at the top is inconsistent.  I could probably get away with it, but because of another failure I think I will just do them over.

The next failure was with the apron glue up.


When I was working out how thick to make laminate pieces, I did a few test cuts.  I then cleaned up the cut face with a hand plane.  In the test pieces I had figured out the right thickness, including the amount of hand planning needed to clean up the cut face.  When I did the final “production” cuts, the pieces ended up a little thicker than I had planned.

I went ahead with the glue up any way.  I think the added thickness of the laminates made it difficult to press everything together.  What I didn’t notice until this morning, was that the center piece of the mold had rocked up during the clamping process.  This meant the bottom part of the lamination did get proper clamping pressure.

The first picture shows a gap in the middle of the lamination.  I might let that one pass, but the other one is on the outside lamination.  This gap will also be near the end of the apron, once I cut the excess off.  This is a total do-over.

So, off to the local hardwood supplier to pick up more lumber.

If every failure is a learning experience, I should be a genius by now!

For my birthday back in May I bought myself a new router (Bosch 1617 2.25 HP) and new router plate from Incra.  Today was the day to finally install them.

I had an “older” router plate installed on auxiliary wing on my table saw.  The size of the new plate doesn’t match current opening, and as you can see it has seen some use.  So the table saw wing needed to be replaced.

I chose to go with Phenolic Plywood, which I was able to find at my local Woodcraft.  This stuff isn’t cheep, a ¾” x 24” x 48” was $59.  It is a very nice grade of plywood, but I think Woodcraft has quite a markup on this stuff.  I’ve seen full sheets for about $98.  Dark green was my only color choice, but it looks pretty good.

The original material used on the wing, wasn’t quite ¾” and this plywood was right on ¾”.  The plywood stuck up just a little above the cast iron top.  I had to cut some recesses where it sat on the mounting tabs.

I just used a Forstner bit to remove about a 1/16” of material.  It worked out nicely.

Next it was time to cut the opening.  When I bought the router plate, I also bought a template for cutting the opening.  When I installed the original plate, I had some difficulties.  So I thought the template was worth the investment.

The template really did make quick work of cutting out the opening.  I’m glade I bought it.

Once the rabbet was cut, I drilled holes in each corner of the material that needed to be removed from the center.  I then used a jigsaw to remove the material, leaving the rabbet for the plate to sit on.

I set the depth of the rabbet to a little more than the thickness of the new router plate.  That way there was no possibility of it being higher than the surface of the plywood.  I then used the leveling screws to set the level flush with the top

The plate went in without much of a problem. Although, there was slightly too much play in the opening.  Not much but just enough to cause a problem.  In the upper left corner of the plate, there is an offset cam that locks the plate into the opening.  Because of the extra play, the cam really didn’t engage.  My solution was to add something in the corner to give the cam something press against.

The screw worked really well!  The screw was adjustable, which allowed me to set just the right amount tension.

Even though I bought a router plate for my model of router, it didn’t have a hole for the above the table adjustment the router had.  After locating the position of the adjuster, it was an easy task on the drill press.

Overall it was a pretty easy install and should a nice addition to the shop.

Today I got started on a built-in bathroom cabinet for my brother.  He’s remodeling one of his bathrooms, and asked if I could build him a custom cabinet.  This cabinet needs to go into an odd shaped area in the bathroom.  So the cabinet isn’t something you can pickup at one of the big box stores.

The cabinet will be about 62” high, 20” wide and 22” deep.  The cabinet will be divided in half.  The top half will have a couple shelves and bottom half will have a pullout for a clothes hamper.

Because of the size of the cabinet I will be using plywood for this project.  I have to say, I really don’t like using plywood.  Not that I dislike plywood, it’s I’m really not setup to work with large sheet goods.  My strategy, for my shop, is to break the sheet goods down with a circular saw.  Then cut the rough sized pieces to their final dimension on the table saw. Even this is difficult in my shop.  I have to move everything out of the way, and then work on the floor breaking the plywood down.  I’ll stop whining, someday I’ll have more room ☺.

The first order of business was to go pick up the plywood.  I don’t buy my plywood at the big box stores, anymore.  Instead I go to where they sell real lumber.  I have a couple choices in my area, today I chose to go to Crosscut Hardwoods.

I decided to go with some “shop grade” maple plywood.  Because the cabinet will be a built-in, you will only see the inside of the cabinet.  The doors and face frame will be ebonized (black), so I didn’t think a ”higher end” plywood was needed.  We’ll see if I’m right on this aspect.

After getting back from the lumber store, I started to break the sheets down and get things to rough size.

To attach the sides to the top, bottom and middle shelf I’m going to use Locked Rabbet joint.  As most people will learn, when you buy ¾” plywood, it’s not really ¾” it’s a little less.  The last time I built a cabinet like this, I bought a special router bit that was suppose to match the smaller thickness of plywood.  In reality, plywood varies, and at times this special router bit cut a dado that was too tight.  You just can’t win when it comes to plywood.  To get around this, I chose the Locked Rabbet instead.  I can cut the dado portion of this joint to a known width (3/8”), then cut the mating rabbet to match the dado.

I’m using a router to make this joint.  I decided to knock together a jig to help guide the router while making the dado cuts.

I just used some leftover plywood pieces, to make the jig.  I chose to put runners down both sides on this jig.  In the past I have had a few mishaps when I’ve only used a single straightedge.  The router can pull away from a single straightedge so easily.

You have to be pretty precise when using 2 runners.  You don’t want the router to bind up in the jig, if the 2 runners aren’t absolutely parallel.

I took a few passes for each dado.  The jig worked out pretty well.

Tomorrow I’ll start to cut the rabbets in fixed shelves and maybe play around with some finish samples.