Trinkets, curios, whatnots, bric-a-brac... A nick nack by any other name will still catch just as much dust!!! My daughter wanted some contemporary wall cubbies for some of her nick nacks. And after showing me a picture of some she liked online, she asked me if I could build her some. So, I did. This is the result of that effort.
It seems as if I've seen these at Target, Wal-Mart, or some of the import stores, but for the life of me, I have no idea where, but it was easy enough to get some basic dimension ideas online. After cutting out some cardboard scraps to get a real world idea of the size, I decided I didn't much care for them, but since they were for her, I thought I'd let her make the decision. She didn't care much for them either. So, we drew up some new sizes and she left me to do them.
Anyway, I found these things online at many different places, but they were all packaged as a set of three. One of us (probably me) decided that a set of four was a much more appropriate number, so that's what is in the works...
Time for me to head out to the shop.
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Starting off...She wanted them in what is currently contemporary... black. I guess that's "vogue" right now, but I was glad she wanted me to make them for her. So, black it was. But, since black won't show grain, and all I had on hand was some nice cherry or maple, I decide to go with something a little less frivolous; pine! So, off to the borg to get some. What I wound up with was some pre-primed pine trim. Pre-primed pine is seconds, scrap, the stuff that most of us would through away. It's shorts that can't be cut into otherwise usable lumber and shipped as a "money" product. But, the shorts have all the knots cut out and it's kilned well. They finger joint these clear pieces together in a continuous stream of lumber product, and then prime it to hide the fact that it's just a bunch of scrap pieces spliced together. Ultimately, if one has a light duty project that is going to be painted, this stuff is perfect. Pine it is. |
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Materials and cut list...
** Notes **
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Milling the stock...Believe it or not, this stuff is pretty straight and flat right out of the home center. It started off as 2" wide and " thick. I wanted to take it down to 2" X ", and the easiest way to do it was on the jointer and planer like it was rough lumber. One edge and one face across the jointer, a couple of trips through the planer, and it was ready to trim to width on the table saw. It's easy to see in the photos where the short pieces were finger jointed by the manufacturer. Anyway, once the milling was done, last step was to cut them all to length. She decided that 7", 9", 11", and 13" were what she wanted, so a quick trip on the crosscut sled, and all of the pieces were done. Only thing left of the construction was the joinery and glue. Also, I wanted to make sure I could keep a couple of pieces for tool setup. That's the photo at left... |
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Straight forward joinery...The joinery was tongue and groove, and couldn't have been easier on the new router table. I used a " upcut spiral bit and set it to cut both, the tongues, and the grooves. The bit height was set at " and pretty well left alone for the rest of the project. First pass to cut the grooves. I set the fence a " behind the bit and ran a test cut. A couple of quick measurements confirmed that I was pretty well on it, and I cut both ends of half the stock. The second pass was done with the fence set flush to the back of the bit. This was for cutting away half the width of the board for the tongues. I figured it was easier to make adjustments on the tongue than on the groove, so as soon as I was happy with the fit (after a couple of test cuts), I ran both ends on half of all the rest of the stock. Ultimately, this is going to yeild a rectangle rather than a square, with the cubbies being " longer in one plane than in the other. But, she liked them that way, so I left it alone. If you want them square, you'll need to cut half of all the stock in the cut list above by " short, and then cut all the tongue pieces from the short sides. |
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Glue up, paint, and hardware...The glue up was pretty straight forward too. A little yellow glue and a few clamps, and it was done. Sanded down the outside with a random orbit sander and the inside by hand with a little 220 grit. Lacquer. I HATE LACQUER! I've seen some truly remarkable work with lacquer, but it was never any of mine. I don't know if it's environment, technique and process, too much hydrodgen in the air, sunspots, or what, but whatever it is, I just don't have the knack. I can't get a good finish with that stuff to save my butt! But, it's got several coats of it on there, and I'm done. Not really satisfied, but... Last step was the hardware. I was going to go with one of the little saw tooth hangers in the middle of each, but then I realized that with nick nacks on them, they would never stay balanced. So, I started a quest for mounting hardware to put on either side of the back that would keep it level regardless of the load, and I couldn't find anything I liked. I was completely stumped! Then, a very good friend suggested that I put a little saw tooth hanger on either side. For some reason, I just couldn't see that until it was mentioned to me. Thank you, my friend. One last note about mounting the saw tooth hangers... I mounted them on the sides with the tongues. With gravity always working against me, to mount them on the sides with the grooves may cause the assemblies to fail over time should the glue joints fail. |
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All done...Many coats of that dreaded lacquer and they're done. Got the ultimate complement for my effors... "Thanks, Dad." It doesn't get any better than that! |