Small portable apothecary cabinet


Andrew Pritchard

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I've just finished my new router table with home made router lift. One of my new years resolutions is to not buy any new tools unless strictly necessary, but that doesn't including building new tools. The router table will be essential for this project. I've already built a router sled to do the coping on the end of the rails.

 

For a while I've wanted to build a small apothecary cabinet for one of my other hobbies. I'd done a couple of sketchups, and finally settled on this design:Carcus6.skp

 

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The side panels are exposed in the sketchup so you can see the shelves more clearly. Each space inside the cabinet will have a drawer. I've not yet decided about the joinery etc for those just yet, but I am leaning towards machined dovetails (seeing as I have a dovetail jig). I'm going to put a secret bottom into the base. I have some magnets I removed from some failed hard drives which I'll epoxy in place and the can grab onto some screws placed on glue blocks on the underside of the cabinet. That'll let me adjust the depth of the panel. The panel will be able to be pushed out by removing the bottom draw and pushing a finger through a 3/4" hole.

 

The main carcass will be made from red oak, though I've been inspired by Marc's Fancy Raised panel, so I'm going to attempt that for the doors, using some soft maple for the panels, and red oak overlaying the top. I'm using the same cope and stick router bits to create the side panels for the carcass, but use flat pieces instead of raised panels. Having made a few raised panels I didn't think it would look right. I haven't yet decided on a finish, though I'm leaning towards either Danish oil, or shellac and poly. I'm more comfortable with shellac and poly, but the cold weather is going to make applying the oil more complicated due to very limited amount of time in a warm shop.

 

My challenges for this project will include trying to use my table saw or jointer as little as possible as it's -10c (12F) in my barn workshop which I feel makes it unsafe. I'm limited therefore to portable power tools, my planer, my drill press, mitre saw and bandsaw. I've not done much resawing before, so that's going the fun.

 

The wood came to me second hard as 12/4 stock, and I'd managed to get some of it milled up before the weather set in. I've got a new 1/2" 3 TPI blade in my bandsaw which is making resawing pretty easy going, even with my little 1/2HP bandsaw. I've been resawing the pieces, then running both pieces of stock through the bench top planer to smooth the surfaces off and bring the work piece sides back to flat and parallel and remove the washboard saw marks

 

So far I've milled and glued up the two side panels for the carcass. As I was finishing gluing the second panel I noticed a problem with it as it was twisting significantly. As the glue was still wet, I put some cauls diagonally across the panel to straighten them out. Time will tell how much of an issue that will be:

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The other panel is fine:

 

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The glue has been drying for a couple of days so they'll be done by Saturday ready for the next step in the project: routing the slots of the shelving, and the rabbets for the top and bottom panels and resaw the wood for the top and bottom panels.

 

The shelves are only 1/4" thick. I want to do stopped dadoes for the shelves, but I don't have a 1/4" chisel. My current plan is to round over the leading edge of the shelves so they fit in the dado left by the router.

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So the glue up of the side panels didn't go quite as planned, most because one of the panels twisted. The cawls helped a lot, but there is still a minor twist in it. I had considered building a new side panel, but I think I'm going to persevere with it for now.

 

I also had a minor blow with some epoxy. I don't use a lot of epoxy, so I've been buying the 5 minute stuff that comes in the twin syringe so you get equal doses of resin and hardener. Except I don't think the batch I mixed to seal and stabilize the knots on one of the panels had enough hardener in it. I mixed and poured it yesterday evening in preparation for today's day in the shop, and came down this morning to a goey mess. The hole I sealed on the other panel was fine so I know the epoxy itself is fine, but I had mixed the batches separately. I've managed to clean off the resin from the panel and I'll have another go at sealing the holes. I've sanded the side panels with some 80 grit as it's easier to do that whilst it's flat. This has removed the majority of the epoxy mess, but my sander is too big to fit in the flat panel so I'm going to have to have another go by hand. I'll probably sand all the way up to 220 in preparation of finishing as it'll be easier to do before the glue up.

 

With the rabbets in the side panel done (very easy on my new router table :), I've glued up some panels for the top and bottom of the carcass to the desired width.

 

I finished today laying out the dadoes for the shelves. Next week, I'll route the dadoes and resaw the stock for the shelves and dividers. If I have time, I'll glue up the main carcass.

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The sides are now complete. I've routed the rabbets for the top panels, the back panel and the shelves. A quick dry fit shows how things are coming along:

 

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I did discover a slight annoyance. I have a very cheap router bit set. You can tell because when you pick out a 1/4" straight bit, you expect it to cut a 0.25" dado. Yeah. Not so much! My 0.25" comes out closer to 0.235". Fortunately all I need to do is run my 1/4" shelves and dividers through the planer a couple of times to slim them down a little.

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I did discover a slight annoyance. I have a very cheap router bit set. You can tell because when you pick out a 1/4" straight bit, you expect it to cut a 0.25" dado. Yeah. Not so much! My 0.25" comes out closer to 0.235". Fortunately all I need to do is run my 1/4" shelves and dividers through the planer a couple of times to slim them down a little.

 

Could those possibly be "plywood" router bits?  These bits are usually undersized because plywood is usually undersized.

 

Good progress!

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Could those possibly be "plywood" router bits?  These bits are usually undersized because plywood is usually undersized.

 

Good progress!

 

They aren't labelled as such, but it would certainly answer that. I was thinking it was more likely they were just cheap router bits. Initially I thought they were 6mm bits, just labelled as 1/4", but they aren't that either.

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This is a portable apothecary cabinet. Most of the cabinets I've seen are large and bulky and don't have doors on the front - certainly not portable. This is not a historically accurate piece. Most of the apothecary cabinets I've seen indeed have dozens for small drawers, but are otherwise not ornate and pretty simple.

 

I'm building this for two reasons: One for my LARPing games, and secondly because it's a delicate piece. I feel that I need to work on my accuracy for smaller pieces. The dividers are 1/4" thick, which is pretty thin when you're not used to working with pieces like that. It also has to look good because it's going to be on show to quite a few of my friends! I'm hoping I might even get a commission or two out of it.

 

It's very much a project to push my boundaries.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I've finally got to the point where I've glued the dividers into the shelves, but I'm now at a bit of a crossroads and I think I might want a little advice about the top.

 

If you refer to the picture in my original post, you'll see that there's a top piece with a routed edge. That's attached to the case, but I'm stuck on how to do that. Hadn't quite thought this through :(

 

The case has four sides, the top of which is rabbeted into the two sides. Eventually plywood will be added to a rabbet in the back.

 

The top of the case over hangs by 3/4" (or there abouts) and will have an edge routed into it. But I'm not sure how best to attach the top. I need to make that decision before I finish gluing the case. My current plan is to drill 4 over sized holes into the faux top to then screw to the top of the cabinet. I want to be able to take into account the movement of the top. It's a glued up panel of quarter sawn red oak.

 

Anyone got any insight?

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