Festools for cabinetmaking

[Jonhilgen]

Steve thanks for the explanation on drawboring.

The house I live in is a William Poole redesign of a very old Dutch Colonial home. The trim in the house is simple aprrox, 1x3 boards. The kitchen cabinets use face frames that kind of match and I plan to continue the theme for the cabinets I will make for the house. I will make some shop cabinets and some for my business that can follow the same theme or something even simpler. To complicate things a little further I need kennels/crates (over 20) as short term holding places for dogs to nap & sleep over night in. The construction of the dog quarters has some similarities to building cabinets except I plan to use some less conventional materials like: metal, HDPE plastic, plastic mesh (for floors). As it turns out HDPE is chemically resistant to glues so they will be of no help joining that material. All this adds up to a large amount of similar joinery that I would like to be well tooled for.

The original reason for the post was to help me figure out what further tools might be most helpful in my cabinet making plans. I have a very old freud router table with an even older Makitta router that no longer plunges, throw aways at this point I think. I have been considering constructing a better router table from some of the quality tops, inserts, fences... etc. available. I have the Festool 1400. I'm just not sure it is a good tool for making rails & stiles etc. for cabinet door face frames. I have also been considering a Domino. It looks like a toss up cost wise between a better router table with a Triton router and a Domino. I am getting tight on shop space and I am wondering if I have the Festool 1400 and a Domino if I can do without having a router table.

If you are going to use starboard or another version, I highly suggest the domino to use as an alignment aide.  I just recently built an outdoor kitchen, and it would have been easier if I had the domino at the time.  Even with the domino, predrilling every screw hole with a countersink bit on both sides of the piece will speed up assembly enormously.  the product will mushroom when you drive a s crew through it that will push the two pieces apart.  A clamp helps with his as well (obviously)

Jon

 

[grobin]

Hey thanks—I used Starbord years ago and I assume the glue is no longer available.  It was prety toxic and you had to sign for it even in the '80s.  

As for drawbore Part 1
Part 2

You can use a mechanics drift instead of a drawbore pin.  I like to use the ¼ or 3/16 pin punch for checking.

3/16 drift you may want to taper it a bit more and add a comfortable wooden handle.  The Lee Valley pins tend to bend and the Lie Nielsen are much better (well the should be for $90/pair).  I find a set of pin punches useful for checking joints and for dissembling them.  fancy Starrett set.  I just went down to sears and bought one 3/16 and one 1/4 for about $7.

Once you are set up its much much faster than glue and I am not convinced that glue adds all that much to the strength of the joint.  I know about the FWW joint strenght test but that lacks specifics and appears to be based towards the max glued area.  There was no comparison of strength by glue area; not where applicable unglued joints.

 

[MacMitch]

Very interesting video.

I have been planing cabinet projects to finish and enhance the construction projects I have been working on for the last few years. Purchased some decent plywood on sale about a year ago and have been adding tools as well. So, yes Upscale, I have been thinking and planing for a good while. I built a building for my business that is getting a face lift right now, prior to adding the cabinets. I finished the basement in our house, creating a shop area in the process, there is still more construction going on there too. The T15 drill and Fein MultiMaster I purchased recently have both proven to be very useful for construction and plumbing projects and will help with cabinets. I have also increased my systainer collection and added a systainer cart in my effort to better organize and corral my tools, fasteners...

I don't think I could afford to use Starboard for my dog housing project. I believe HDPE is less expensive. The joinery for this material will probably end up a combination of: screws, nuts & bolts and heat welding. I am pretty sure that glue & solvents are not useful in joining this material. It is very resistant to chemicals, which has some advantages in this application. I have seen male dog pee destroy galvanized fencing. I don't think a domino or router table will be of much use for this project. I am hoping to: cut sheets with the T55 plunge saw, drill, countersink, screw & run nuts with the T15 drill, make small tougher cuts with the Fein MM. A buddy and I are going to play around with welding some HDPE tomorrow, using a heat gun designed for the job. I may end up making frames from PT wood large enough to house multiple dogs and cover the interior of each dog's individual area with HDPE. Wooden frames of that large a size will probably be built with more conventional construction techniques.

So I have actually made tool purchases pursuant to my research on these pages and will continue to do so.

 

[grobin]

Sounds like you have it sorted.  Be careful with heat as these materials the out gasses are all pretty toxic.  Take a look a the Spax screws as they might be just what you want.  Also do some tests, all of these materials tend to be difficult to work.  I agree that a domino, or any more or less conventional technique except for screws is probably useless.