I would love it if you could show a few of my recently made boxes. I am quite proud of them and I would like to see what some real woodworkers think about them. Either way negative or positive responses are always appreciated. The first box is Oak with dovetails. I used Dark Walnut Danish Oil and I left it without a top coat. The second box is Oak as well with miters and splines. I used Medium Walnut Danish Oil and top coated it wish paste wax. The third box is Maple with a 9/16 box joint. This one also has the Medium Walnut and a wipe on poly.

And here are some unique inlayed boxes submitted by Larry. I love the way the handle was incorporated into the design. Check them out:

I just wanted to show you the end result of the gift boxes I had made. I had asked you a few questions regarding their constructing/finishing, to which I thank you for your insight. I basically built them from a guide in Woodsmith magazine. I used my own ideas on materials though. I made the inlay first. I used black walnut and maple glued up to form a “blank” that I cut the inlay strips from. The cool part is, I got the black walnut from a pallet about 2 years ago. I had never seen black walnut used on a pallet before and have not seen it since either. The maple came from some old warped flooring that was being discarded from the school system I work for. The basic box is made from cherry as that has always been a favorite of mine. The top and bottom is plywood. I’m pretty sure it was a birch veneered plywood but I’ve had it laying around so long I don’t remember. I used the plywood because I wanted to be able to glue the tops and bottoms securely as I flocked the inside. By the way I also followed your advice by making up a “mock” box to practice flocking. It was one of the easiest things I ever did. All you have to do is follow the instructions they give you and the results are excellent. After the inlay was done I used the remaining inlay stock to make the handles.
Thanks again for your website and taking the time to do what you do. It is greatly appreciated!!!

I was looking through my archives and found this old Whisper Mini that I never posted (I hope).
Ever find yourself short on material and that one board you really need has a nice open knot in it? You could always go out and buy more material, but sometimes its just easier and faster to stabilize and repair the knot. And instead of trying to hide the knot, sometimes its just better to embrace it, and make it look look resinous and natural. And that’s the goal here. I use an epoxy/dye mixture to create a stable and decorative knot.

DVD’s, shirts, hats, push sticks, mugs……ITS ALL ON SALE! 20% OFF! I MUST BE GOING NUTS! Sale runs Friday March 12th to Sunday March 14th. Use Coupon Code woodcrazy at checkout.

Doug’s Dining Room Chairs Project
I’m an amateur woodworker with lots of passion for the craft, and this is by far my most adventurous project to date. I chose a simple mission-inspired design with mostly straight lines as I wanted to increase my odds of success. One thing worth mentioning is that I made these chairs in a 14 x 16 basement workshop that did not include a bandsaw. The wood species is red oak. I created some router template/jigs to put over the seats to rough out the contour and sanded them smooth with a sanding disc on a drill. I did screw up by making the tenons slightly too long on the slates of the back of the chairs, so the mortise/tenon joints didn’t completely close on several of them. Lesson for the future- do a better job dry-fit testing before the glue up! I tried to hide that as best I could, but it is disappointing. Any other suggestions on “after the fact” fixes for situations like this? Overall, I’m pleased with the outcome. It was definitely enjoyable and I learned A LOT in the process.

By the way, my wife put in the order for these, and she insisted that we needed eight. The matching dining room table is the next project on my list. A friend and I worked with a guy with a portable band-saw and home-made kiln this past spring to harvest and create our own lumber for the table and other future projects. I’m currently soliciting design ideas for the table, so if anyone wants to throw those at me, I’d love it.

Mark’s Mission Style Rocking Chair
This is the first mortise and tenon project that I have attempted. The plans were purchased from furnitureplans.com. The chair is 17.5″ wide, 28″ tall and 22″ deep. The mortises were made with a mortising attachment to my drill press. Setting up the mortising attachment was trickier than I would have thought. Keeping the mortise blade and the fence square to each other and keeping track of the offsets required attention. The tenons were cut on a table saw. I was surprised that it went together as well as it did. The unfinished photos are of the dry fit up. I bought The WoodWhisperer Finishing DVD, the wipe on finish went on easily and the final product looked like someone who knew what they were doing did it.

Man Wins $1.5M In First of its Kind Saw Case
by: Jenn Abelson

A Boston jury has awarded $1.5 million to a Malden man who injured his fingers on a saw while installing oak wood flooring several years ago in a first of its kind case that claimed the standard design of American table saws is defective.

Carlos Osorio accused One World Technologies Inc., maker of Ryobi saws, of negligence for failing to include a flesh detection technology that would prevent most serious injuries, according to a copy of the complaint filed in 2006 in US District Court in Boston.

After five surgeries and years of rehabilitation, two of Osorio’s fingers are permanently disfigured and unusable, and he has suffered numbness and loss of feeling in three other fingers.

“Hopefully, this means the industry is finally going to recognize that catastrophic injuries could be averted and they need to make this technology standard so people don’t have these senseless injuries,’’ said Richard J. Sullivan, one of the lawyers representing Osorio.

One World Technologies said it had been advised of the verdict.

“We are evaluating the results with our lawyers, and evaluating how to proceed,’’ said Jason Swanson, a spokesman for One World Technologies.

“Notwithstanding the outcome of this trial and any possible appeal, we remain confident that the saw which was the subject of this lawsuit was well-designed and manufactured with all due consideration for the needs and safety of the consumer.’’

Osorio’s case is one of more than 50 lawsuits pending throughout the United States against the major table saw manufacturers for failure to adopt the technology, which would stop a power saw blade almost instantly upon contact with human flesh.

During Osorio’s trial, an expert witness for the defense acknowledged that if the saw had the flesh detection technology, it would have created a 1/8-inch deep cut on one finger, Osorio’s lawyers said. Instead, Osorio suffered near-amputation of one finger and severe lacerations on four other fingers.

Now if you ask me, this is up there with the McDonalds hot coffee incident. You guys know I am big on safety. I even created Woodworker’s Safety Week to raise awareness. But if you were a friend of mine and you cut your fingers on a standard tablesaw and tried to sue the company because they didin’t use “flesh-detecting technology”, I would probably smack you upside the head. And on the ironic side of things is the fact that they guy was using a relatively inexpensive Ryobi tablesaw that most likely cost $200-$250, right? Guess how much that saw would cost if it had “flesh-detecting technology”? Given the way SawStop works, and assuming that’s what we’re talking about here, could that Ryobi saw in its current form even handle the impact of a SawStop break in action? Regardless, if all saws were required to have this technology, I would imagine that the $250 tablesaw would be a thing of the past. And whoever bought this saw in the first place, would most likely be shopping on Craigslist to find an old saw in his price range, instead of one of these new-fangled ones with the safety device.

One other question I have that wasn’t answered by the article: was he even using the stock guard? While I admit those guards aren’t the most user-friendly, they DO stop you from putting your fingers into the blade.

Oh and by the way, this is probably a great time to mention a new product we will have in our store very soon. Its called the Wood Whisperer Fun Suit. Now you can throw yourself on top of a spinning blade without a care in the world! (Thanks for the photoshop work Bill!)

So let’s hear your thoughts on this. Its a hot one!

So, the first combo issue arrived at my doorstep this week. I eagerly cracked it open and started taking it all in. Keeping true to their promise, the magazine is bigger, brighter, and printed on better quality paper. The layout for the cover is all Woodworking Magazine. As for the inside, I definitely see more Popular Woodworking. And really, that’s to be expected. Some of the most notable features of Woodworking Magazine were black and white photos, no advertising, and projects that span multiple articles. Obviously, these things just aren’t going to work for this single magazine that needs to be as many things as possible to as many people as possible (including advertisers).

All that said, the content was excellent. I found myself really getting into the Jerome Bias article on Thomas Day. A free southern black woodworker that owned his own slaves!?!? Yeah, you should read that article! I also found Bob Lang’s primer on tables to be very informative. Its one of those articles you want to cut out and put on your shop wall so you never forget this stuff. And of course there are some great offerings from other notables, like Chris Schwarz, Chuck Bender, Bob Flexner, Roy Underhill, Glen Huey, and Kari Hultman.

Now there’s one other aspect that we can’t ignore. The folks at Popular Woodworking Magazine are making a considerable effort to have more of an online presence. At the end of each article there is a small box that refers you to various online resources. This gives the author an opportunity to expand on a particular topic in a way that is just not possible in the magazine. And if you ask me, this is where the most exciting stuff is going to be. For some odd reason, I seem to favor video. Go figure! Now while the list of links is handy in concept, I find the TinyURL links to be rather off-putting. For those of you who aren’t familiar, TinyURL is a service that takes very long links and shortens them for you. This can be very handy when space is a consideration. So instead of a link like Popularwoodworking.com/marcs-awesome-article, you might see tinyurl.com/3s5u5hy. This works well on the web, but in a magazine, it just doesn’t work for me. Furthermore, should TinyURL go down the pooper, all links published in this magazine will be non-functional. A meaningful link with proper words would be much easier for me to remember, and I wouldn’t necessarily need the magazine by my side to find the content online. But of course, there isn’t enough space to put a full-length link in the magazine. While reading, I found myself in one of those virtual/real-life cross-over moments where all I wanted to do was click the link on the page. Of course, this is all a work in progress and I won’t even pretend to have a better solution for them. But what I hope to see is a dedicated page for each issue (on the website), where you can find all the supplementary material in one place. Then perhaps at the end of the article, they can refer people to PopularWoodworking.com/April2010. This way, its an easy link to remember and I don’t actually need the magazine when I am at my computer. Once readers get to the web page, the site itself will help them find the content they are looking for. For all I know, this might already be in the works.

Well, enough griping about a minor detail. Overall, I really enjoyed reading the new issue. I also love the fact that the Popular Woodworking staff, in addition to being a darn nice group of people, are very much aware of the changing landscape in media. And rather than waiting for the current to push them to their destination, they strapped on an outboard motor and are steering themselves in the direction they feel they need to go. I suggest either subscribing, or picking up a copy at your local newsstand. When you read it, come back here and let me know what you think. A discussion was already started in the Community if you would like to chime in with your thoughts.

***Just heard from The Schwarz: “The tinyurls will go away in a couple issues once we switch to Drupal. Then we’ll have meaningful urls.” That’s great to hear!

Cypress Planter by Dennis

This is a cypress planter I made for my mom. The panel assemblies were constructed using a 90-degree jig and some spacers for uniform gaps. The vertical slats are screwed to the rails with stainless steel screws. I cut mortises in both the posts and the horizontal rails of the panels and assembled them with loose tenons and Titebond III. Inside the planter are 2 horizontal stretchers that support the plastic liner purchased from Lowes. The legs are chamfered on the bottom to avoid chip out. The mitered top assembly was reinforced with glue and pocket screws to ensure they do not separate. The liner fits snug, but it can be removed and replaced if needed.

A majority of my time was spent on the finishing of this project. I consulted and went with the finish recommended by The Wood Whisperer. 9 coats of Epifanes Marine Varnish later, I was done. I applied 6 coats of gloss and then 3 coats of satin to get a perfectly smooth finish. I am very pleased with the look and with some luck, it will hold up just as well.

Cedar Lined Chest by Micah

The majority of materials I purchased for $1.70 Per Board foot and planed them down to just over 3/4″. I got the inspiration for this project from my dad when he built five of them years ago. I used one of his as a model but made mine slightly larger. This is my first project with raised panels in it. I did not find them hard to route, but I couldn’t take very much material off at a time. The base of the chest is made of 1×4 with 1/2in dcx ply on the top.The dimensions of the chest are 52 1/2” wide x 22 3/4” high x 21 1/4” deep. For the finishes I used Golden Oak by Minwax and for the sealer I used clear Satin by Minwax. All in all it was a great learning experience.

Ben’s Kitchen Cabinet

I am a student and got into woodworking the summer of 08. My apartment had no counters in the kitchen so when I went home for a visit I made this. I thought the top was cool, it is end grain ash. Nothing fancy about the rest of it but I was happy for the experience. Most people don’t even notice the mistakes. The whole project is ash but some as you can see is stained. I used a linseed oil finish for the body and a mineral oil and mineral oil/beeswax for the top which I just use as a large cutting board. I know ash has open grain and is not ideal for cutting boards but it has attractive end grain I think and it is cheaper than maple or walnut, so I just make sure to keep it clean and stay on top of re-applying mineral oil/beeswax. I enjoy looking at the projects on the site and I hope someone enjoys seeing this and gets an idea!

Dave’s Shop Cabinet

This a cabinet I made for my new Delta Planer. The base and shelf is made from 3/4 birch ply. The door and drawer front are Oak that I had left over from a blanket chest project that went horribly wrong. The drawer itself is made from poplar and 1/4 birch ply for the drawer bottom. The top is made from 15/32 Arauco ply (never heard of it but it was cheaper than most) doubled up and then routed with a 1/2 inch round over bit. My only regret is I used screws instead of brad nails, but I do not have a compressor or brad nailer yet. It’s on the list though. I used bullseye sealcoat for a finish, (two coats with a light sanding with 120 grit in between). I think it really brought out the grain in the Oak. I have only been woodworking seriously now for a little over a year and have made some decent projects so far, but this is my very first attempt at cabinet making.

Winner – Chris
Eagle America Multi-Form Molding Maker Bit- Create over 40 different beautiful profile and molding designs with a single pass or with combination set-ups. Simply by adjusting the cutter height and the fence position, along with two or more passes, the profile possibilities are almost unlimited. Your choice between items 177-2005 or 177-4005. Learn More!

Winner – Neal Aronson
A $100 gift card from ToolKing.com. Consider it your personal little shopping spree! ToolKing.com carries all the best brands of tools so head on over and see what they have to offer!

Want a chance to win?

All you need to do is participate. Each month, we select the winners(s) randomly from the folks who comment on our videos and blog posts. So the more you comment, the better your chances of winning! Good luck!

During my recent shop healing session, I realized I needed a better way to store my drills and chargers. This simple wall-hanging “box” did the trick. I also wanted to make the project fast and easy, so I decided to try out the DowelMax for the first time. The system is a breeze to use and produces strong reliable joints in just a fraction of the time it takes to create a traditional mortise and tenon.

Fee free to download the SketchUp Drawing for this project if you want to make your own. But I encourage you to use this as a starting point and build upon it. If I had more time and space, I definitely would have added a few drawers for additional storage. Also, be sure to check out the new Enduro-Var Water-Based Urethane I used on this project.

***Edit***Viewer Kevin sent us a modified Sketchup Plan featuring a beautiful drawer at the bottom.

Topics Covered:

• Construction of a simple charging station.
• Use of the DowelMax system.
• Clever solution for charging batteries safely.

Well today, I went to a local lumber dealer, Spellman Hardwoods. I was picking through what I considered to be a less than great selection of walnut, when I came across this board. At first glance, it looked rather rough and I almost threw it to the side. But the light hit it just the right way and I could tell that something beautiful lay within. The wild grain, the knots, the undulating waves of darker and lighter colors, were all subtle signs that this board was going to be something to behold, if treated properly. So I threw the board in with the rest of my loot and took it home to see if I was right.

I brought the board into the shop and quickly sprayed the surface with nothing more than water. Immediately, the wood came to life with swirls, curls, and contrast! My brain was immediately filled with the endless possibilities of what this deceivingly beautiful plank could become. Now because of the wild grain and knots, I doubt very much I will use this as a solid structural member for anything. Most likely, it will become a veneer panel, a drawer front, or something else where I can admire its beauty without depending on it for structural integrity.

So don’t be so quick to overlook that ugly duckling of a board. It could very well be the highlight of your next masterpiece! Have you ever found a diamond in the rough? Tell us about it!