Ash Blanket Chest

[Rutabagared]

Been picking away at my big ash pile o’ ash lately.  A blanket chest for my great niece.  I’ve made several of these over the last couple of years.  Inlay and templates made with the Shaper Origin, 8mm dominos for joinery.

The veneer used on the panels is olive ash from Certainly Wood.

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I used Rockler’s lid-stay torsion hinges.  It did eventually get a cedar bottom, but no pics.

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The leather bumpers are from an old belt using a plug cutter.

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Love the Whiteside bits.  I’ve used this oval edge profile bit a ton and it still leaves an almost shiny surface on this ash end grain.  To be fair, ash end grain does machine very smoothly, almost glass-like.

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[egmiii]

Nice work!

For the inlay, did you cut everything out on the Shaper Origin? I've been looking at getting one, but the examples I've seen on the web have poor fit and finish (in my opinion). Your inlay on the other hand looks very good. No gaps, chip out, fuzz, etc. Wondering if that's straight off the machine or if you have to do a lot of hand work to get it to that level.

 

[Rutabagared]

Nice work!

For the inlay, did you cut everything out on the Shaper Origin? I've been looking at getting one, but the examples I've seen on the web have poor fit and finish (in my opinion). Your inlay on the other hand looks very good. No gaps, chip out, fuzz, etc. Wondering if that's straight off the machine or if you have to do a lot of hand work to get it to that level.

Thank you for your kind words.  Yes.  I did all of the inlay using the Shaper Origin.  I practiced on several samples to get the depth right using an egraving bit (0.020 using a 60° engraving bit with an on-line cut).  I always practice when engraving because you can get different results with different fonts and especially with different font sizes.  I originally intended to spell out "September" but wasn't satisfied with the results of some areas of the letters.

You do tend to get a lot of fuzz that needs sanded away (always cross grain).  The biggest factor by far impacting finish quality is feed rate.  Usually, you have to go very slowly, much slower than I would normally feed a router.  I've found this to be the case with routing templates in MDF also - going too fast results in a washboard effect that needs sanded away.  Chip out is also species-dependent.  Cherry and maple are best.

I was pleased with the final fit of the cherry inlay.  But I had to be extra patient.  I believe it was around a -0.022" offset (inside cut in the pocket) before the inlay finally fit.  Shaper videos typically show about a -0.002" to -0.003" offset.

 

[Michael Kellough]

The diameter of an engraving bit at the business end is so small, requiring very slow feed rates.

I like how you used the veneer. Hope you used a lot of long tenons to join the breadboard ends.

 

[Rutabagared]

The diameter of an engraving bit at the business end is so small, requiring very slow feed rates.

I like how you used the veneer. Hope you used a lot of long tenons to join the breadboard ends.

Thanks, Michael.  I used 8mm dominos (about 6 or 7).  I've been sitting on an earlier version I made a couple years ago almost daily for donning my socks.  So far no issues (fingers crossed).

 

[Rutabagared]

So far the best species I've found for engraving is maple (tried ash (obviously), cherry, walnut, shedua).  It leaves crisp edges and allows for more intricate engraving.  A sign for same great niece.  All the clip art and fonts are available on Shaper Studio (paid subscription).

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