The job that pays the bills has been getting in the way lately but I have made some progress.When I assembled the spice chest the first time, I must have been tired or in a hurry because it was out of square big time.
So....I had assembled it with hide glue and decided to test the reason I used hide glue by taking every thing apart. It worked! Sort of. I had one side of dovetails that I did not soak enough in hot water and a couple of tails broke.
As luck would have it, they were on the top and the most visible. Well if the mark of a good craftsmen is hiding his mistakes, I must be getting close to being one because I think I did a fair job.I grabbed my new Bosch Pin router and routed away the tails and inserted patches. The sides will be covered by the trim so I only had to worry about the top 1/4 inch or so. The router made short work of everything.
I made the trim the other day using my new Bosch router and a bit that I had laying around, plus the table saw and my shoulder plane. Although I would have liked to have made the trim with hand tools only, time is running out and I had to make do. I am fairly happy with the results.
Another job I tackled was making the tongue and groove back for the Spice Chest. I used Eastern Pine because I like the smell of it.
I used my LN 1/2" T and G plane for this task. There is a learning curve to using this plane. I found out quickly that the proper way to plane is to begin at the far end of the work and work backwards. This creates a grove or a tongue, depending which part of the joint you are working with, for the plane to track. Otherwise it is easy for the plane to drift off and ruin the joint.
