My Grandchildren have been admiring a "document" box that I had made for my daughter(son got one too) and my daughter asked if I could build them one. So.... the process starts. They will be fully dovetailed, made from white pine grown on my property, and painted/grained. My granddaughter wanted something in pink so I'll have to work that out. Grandson didn't(yet) specify. I'll dovetail the box together, nail on a top/bottom, and use the table saw to separate the lid from the body of the box. You can see the cut line going through the extra-wide dovetail(allow for the kerf). Tools used for the work are also shown.

Those are going to be fabulous!

Nice job on the dovetails. One heck of a heritage gift for the kids.

 

Like the others said, super job.

Thanks Gerald. What looks like gaps in the dovetails are really a shadow line from the tails(caused by the smoothing plane on the surface). This was the first "joining" of these two sides and everything fit properly, except for the far right fitting. I mark these and then separate the sides to make any final cutting/filing to fit. Pine does well for dovetailing because of the soft wood and being able to compress a little.

Here's where I'm at now. I did use my Delta shaper, for the first time to put a slight "cove" into the edges of the lid. It went well! The third photo shows the lids separated from the box by a cut(s) on my table saw. The second photo shows the back hinges cut in temporarily and checked for fit with the lid. Once the boxes are finished-painted, I'll redo the hinge mortises for a better fit. The catch and knobs for the boxes will be added after painting. 

Edited August 22, 20214 yr by FrederickH

Looks really nice 

Here are the finished projects. I was surprised by how the pink-on-orange(grand daughter's choice) came out. In a raking light, the orange seems to be a gold leaf underlay. The grandson wanted an dark red-on-orange and it came out more of a muddied brown. I really struggled with positioning of the hinges. It seemed, no matter what, they were always slightly out. After many tries, they are now perfect!

Nice! I agree about the pink one. At first I thought they were pink clouds on an orange sky.

Two thumbs up here Frederick!

Moved from Tips to General Woodworking.

@FrederickH. Awesome. I missed this thread since I was AWOL. Thanks to @John Morrisfor moving.

Love the boxes and even more the story especially using wood harvested from your own place.

You might consider creating a gallery project post for this. Thanks for sharing.

On 11/14/2021 at 10:50 PM, John Morris said:

Moved from Tips to General Woodworking.

John, thanks for the move! I didn't realize that it was posted to the wrong forum.

Nice job Frederick lucky kids!