More mahogany steamer trunk

[petersb]

Well, I am so excited about how well the dovetails came out, I just had to share them with you! These are the first that I have done on a project and I was a bit apprehensive about doing them at first. Now I feel confident to do them again with only half of the tension!

I only have two corners cleaned up and I wiped them with mineral spirits to show them off.

Here they are, Thanks for looking.

This is a link to the first post about the box.

[Sac]

Wow.. that is absolutely gorgeous.. That is on my list of things to do. Hand cut dovetails that is.. Cant wait to see the finished product!!

[petersb]

Wow.. that is absolutely gorgeous.. That is on my list of things to do. Hand cut dovetails that is.. Cant wait to see the finished product!!

Thanks SAC. I am heading out right now to clean up the last corner.

The dovetails are not that hard. Its just one of those things that you have to do to get over the anxiety of doing it. For me it was the unknown/unexpected.

I went to Grizzly and I checked out your new jointer, that is a really nice tool! Nice score man!

[PaulMarcel]

Some of the nicest I've seen (mine are some of the worst ) Definitely a skill you have mastered now!

So... some questions:

Pins or tails first? doesn't matter, really, but curious

Chisel out waste or fretsaw? or both?

Pull-saw or Push-saw?

[Sac]

I went to Grizzly and I checked out your new jointer, that is a really nice tool! Nice score man!

I heard about that. I dont know how you went there and only spent $18. And the dovetails will soon become a reality. The bench is almost finished, so I will soon have a place to work on them.

[petersb]

Some of the nicest I've seen (mine are some of the worst ) Definitely a skill you have mastered now!

So... some questions:

Pins or tails first? doesn't matter, really, but curious

Chisel out waste or fretsaw? or both?

Pull-saw or Push-saw?

This is how I did it.

I cut the tails first and then the pins. I cut the waste with the bandsaw with a 1/8" blade for the bulk and a flush trim saw for the little angle parts that were left after the bandsaw. I cut to about 1/16th away from the layout line and chiseled the rest away.

After all of the tails were cut, I marked the pins. I did one corner at a time and worked it until they fit right. The first one I did, I had A LOT of sanding/shaving to get the joint to fit properly. I didn't want to take to much the first time and I really didn't know how much was too much or too little. The next tree went together on the first try, but I still worked each joint some to get it "just right".

I used a $10 Buck Brothers saw from HD. It is a push saw.

I read a lot on the internet on how to do them and I watched a couple of video on the net too. One was Marcs on the half blind dovetail and the other was Kari Hultmans dovetail video. Just watching how it is done was a big help.

[PaulMarcel]

This is how I did it.

I cut the tails first and then the pins. I cut the waste with the bandsaw with a 1/8" blade for the bulk and a flush trim saw for the little angle parts that were left after the bandsaw. I cut to about 1/16th away from the layout line and chiseled the rest away.

WHAT?! Heathen! omigod who does tails first... oh, wait, ha ha, that's what I do too!

I used a $10 Buck Brothers saw from HD. It is a push saw.

If you get a chance to watch Rob Cosman's "Mastering the Dovetail Saw", he takes an el cheapo saw from a Canadian version of HD and tunes it up. At the end, he does some side-by-side test cuts between his LN dovetail saw and the tuned saw. Was very impressive. But if yours works great out-of-box, excellent!