Festool this - Strawberry Tower project

[awdriven]

A riff on the design,  which puts the shelves on the outside.
http://m.flickr.com/#/photos/larseraq/4611630409/

 

[Ken Nagrod]

Your photos don't show up without signing in it says.  Don't have an account, can't see 'em.

 

[awdriven]

The Flickr ones, Ken? They're not my pictures, so its possible you need to be logged into Flickr to see them. I should also not re-host them for that reason, though.

 

[awdriven]

For the Non-Flickrs, its a 3 sided pyramid with uprights like our project. The twist is that the shelves are on the OUTSIDE of the pyramid and fit into notches in the uprights. The shelves make beveled-side boxes. It's our project turned inside-out.

 

[tiralie]

Your photos don't show up without signing in it says.  Don't have an account, can't see 'em.

Here's a link (public) Plant Pyramid from Denmark.
This link starts at the beginning of the plant pyramid photo series. The plants look like they are doing well.

I don't like the design much, mostly because of the sharp corners.

Walking into that would really hurt your shin and some poor child could poke their eye out running into it.

Tim

 

[harry_]

Your photos don't show up without signing in it says.  Don't have an account, can't see 'em.

I was able to view them,... I was not required to log in

 

[awdriven]

Just make it a pentagon or octagon! (That's a lot of miters.)  ;D I still really like the one I'm building, but this was an interesting.

 

[kfitzsimons]

This has been a fun, entertaining and educational thread. And I'm not even thinking about making one! It's the FOG's version of the Car Talk Guys Puzzler.

 

[awdriven]

You've got my number; I like a good puzzle. Glad this is entertaining some folks!

Should be more build updates soon.

Anyone find titebond 2 or 3 better for this application? I already have Titebond 2 and it is billed as good for outdoor use.

 

[tiralie]

You've got my number; I like a good puzzle. Glad this is entertaining some folks!

Should be more build updates soon.

Anyone find titebond 2 or 3 better for this application? I already have Titebond 2 and it is billed as good for outdoor use.

I think the consensus is that Titebond 2 has longer setup time and is easier to work with and probably better for this situation.
Here's a link to some comments by Gary Katz Greene & Greene Garage door(comment 23) about gluing up a large gate.
I like Titebond 3 for wood like Teak.

 

[awdriven]

Ok, more work on the project tomorrow. I think I have a jig design that will work. I cut some test mortises and the gaps were about as I'd expected, and acceptable for a planter like this.

The thing I am trying to figure out now is how to efficiently cut the shelves. They're a compound cut and my saw only has 38.5 detents with some adjustment on each side. Hopefully I can purposely adjust it out of range to my custom bevel setting.

 

[awdriven]

I got the jig built and cut all the dadoes today.

I could have compensated better for variations in stock thickness, but I need to move this along!

The dadoes went smoothly once the jigs were built. I'll post some pictures later. (However, there is some variation in the cut depth due to some of the stock being a little thicker.

I also assembled the main frame. I glued and through-dominoed the half laps that join the uprights to the cross-braces. I glued and screwed the upper ends of the uprights together. Eventually the topper will also help hold everything together up top.

It came together pretty nicely and didn't need much persuasion to have everything mate up properly.

I had a scare while quickly fitting a test shelf, so I put my laser level on it and 90 percent of the dadoes are within a sixteenth of their mates (vertically), so hopefully not too much hand tuning when it comes time to put in shelves.

So, I have to cut the mitered base pieces, make the topper and cut 44 shelves.

 

[spikfot]

I'd be tempted to put (well greased) casters on it, especially any design with more than three sides.

 

[awdriven]

It's got some heft, even empty without its shelves. Ultimately it will live outside in the yard somewhere. Since it has 4 sides, I'll need to be careful about placement so every shelf gets enough sun. It'll be impossible to reposition once filled up. I'd need 9 inch pneumatic casters and a tractor to pull it  [tongue]

 

[Mike Goetzke]

A few years back I built one of these.:  http://www.woodstore.net/flowertuteur.html

Not as challenging but simple and functional.

Mike

 

[awdriven]

Some new pictures of the project as it stands today. Sorry, took them in a spare room downstairs so it's a mess and rather distracting. Also pretty dark, so little depth of field in these pictures.

I'll need to do some tuning of the miter on the shelf, fit isn't right yet. I think I'll also need to do a little cleaning up of the dadoes with a rasp or sanding block, just to relieve the top edge of the dado a bit more for a better fit. Shelf in the first photo obviously isn't  in the right location  [tongue]

 

[Ken Nagrod]

Those dados don't appear deep enough for solid support of the slats with the weight of the plants and dirt, not to mention pulling the slats in and out over the life of the assembly will wear the edge and depth of the dados - I think. [unsure]  Was there a reason for not wanting or being able to go deeper with them?

Will you be keeping the math on them?  Might raise the value of the piece like it does with cartoonists drawings. (from what I've seen on TV)

 

[awdriven]

Sketchup drawings of the jigs. I was able to re-use the trough by simply spinning it 180 degrees when I was changing between doing left and right sides of an upright.  I made two parallelogram sleds/MFS-carriers. Their shape is the same, but flipped. I glued guide blocks onto the parallelogram base to register the sled to the proper angle relative to the trough and clamped the MFS carefully to the sled. I also had some wedges under the MFS to tilt it to a slight bevel angle. In retrospect, I would have experimented with this a bit more, but I've got growing plants at this point and I need to keep making good progress

The term sled is misleading because I wedged it into place on the trough and slid the stock through the trough.

I plunged the bit through the MDF sled base to make the cutout. This had the nice effect of making it pretty easy to line up the marks I had made on the stock with where the cut would go.

 

[awdriven]

I'm thinking about the dado depth too, this is approximately quarter inch. I'm not sure the shelves will really be carrying that much weight though, just a modest amount for the dirt actually inside each shelf. (At the lower shelves, that may be appreciable, though.) Staying true to the sketchup reverse engineering, Bruce's were probably close to half inch.

Getting the right angle takes some work, so you don't start cutting into the upright too close to the outside edge. I had one upright that I think was a bit thicker than the others, where the dado was overall a bit deeper and started closer to the outside face.

I think stainless pocket screws will be my backup plan for reinforcement if this doesn't pan out or can't readily be modified to work as we'd like.

 

[awdriven]

Might as well start collecting suggestions on how to deepen the dadoes if it turns out it is needed. I'm not great with neander techniques - would a hand plane work well in the cross-grain scenario like this? It's cedar, relatively soft and pretty dry.