Storage: A Cabinet Under The ShopSmith, Part 3

Cabinet is FINISHED!

Another hot, hot day in shop today!  I wasn't planning to do a third installment of this project, but with the trials of getting this thing mounted up, I thought it deserved some discussion.

As you can see, all the doors are mounted (and they close all the way!), that wasn't particularly difficult, though I did need to do some measuring and marking to establish some symmetry between the double doors on the large side of the cabinet.  I also trimmed a bit off the small door and flipped the hinge around in order for it to close all the way.

Large side has doors front and back.

Once that was all done, I began the task of trying to get this beast mounted.  I once again ran into the issue of written measurements and real life not necessarily being the same, and were it not for my wife's help, I would have had a lot more difficulty.  And very likely a broken machine.

The hard part of mounting this cabinet is getting the bench tubes in between the ears on the end panels.  Turns out that the tubes on my machine are about 1/4" wider than what was listed as the dimensions for the cut out.  I don't know exactly how much wider, but we had to lift and shift the ShopSmith several times making test fits, then sanding material away, lather rinse repeat.  

Last bit of rasping!

Eventually we got the fit right, and could work on finishing up the mounting.  I first retracted the casters, so the ShopSmith was sitting at its lowest level, then I slid a couple of pieces of 1x under the cabinet ends to make sure that it will have good clearance then casters are deployed.

Elevation!

Positioning the cross ties

A backer board prevents blow-out

Carriage bolts and wing nuts finish the job

I was so excited when this was finished, that I had to start loading as much stuff in the cabinet as I could.  This is all preliminary, as there will be some better/additional customization, but I was able to store all my accessories (excluding the bandsaw) in or on the cabinet.

Box of assorted items to be stowed

The planer tucks nicely in the back.  Easy to access through rear doors.

First items in the small cabinet!

Lots of stuff, but lots of space!

Better organization on this side

Just about finished!

Found out what these holes are for! (Chuck key and Allen wrench!)

Now that this project is finished (finally!), it was time for a good clean up of the shop.  I cleaned up all my tools, extra hardware, took out a bunch of trash, and vacuumed everything.

Nice and clean!  Ready for the next job!

Final thoughts on this project:

• Buy extra material to accommodate errors.
• Relative dimensioning is your friend.  Real life always trumps theory.
• It's okay for something to be "good enough", but don't leave it that way because you're tired of dealing with it.  I was inspired to take another shot at the small door, and because I did, it is now significantly better than "good enough"
• Plywood often gets bowed.  Make temporary braces that hold case sides at the proper distance before cutting any partitions to final length.  As well as being a really beautiful project, there's a really good demonstration/explanation of this over here.
• Getting ready to make a cut?  Check that measurement again!
• When you're really excited/motivated to work on a project, not even a really hot shop can stop you!

That brings the Storage Cabinet project to a close.  Let me know what you think in the comments!  I'm still learning about EVERYTHING, including how little I actually know, and would appreciate any comments, criticisms, tips, etc.  Thanks for reading!

Check out part 1 and part 2 here!

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Storage: A Cabinet Under The ShopSmith, Part 2

There!  Close enough to done that I feel okay about writing this post.  I've got 4 doors left to install, and then hang it from the ShopSmith (I've gotta get some carriage bolts to do that!)

Also, it was stinkin' hot in the shop today!  I was certainly a sweaty yeti, but I drank lots of water and persevered.  Not having AC in a garage shop in Phoenix is not particularly enjoyable, but I really wanted to get this assembly done today.

Another important lesson learned: if you're using material that is thicker than what the plans call for, you have to allow for that in your cuts.  It seems so obvious in retrospect, but at the time that I was cutting, I thought that everything would regulate, since I was using material that was consistently thicker.  I had to do a lot more cutting for the shelves and doors to fit.  That's the main reason that assembly was not entirely completed.

Assembling the cabinet base

Counter-sink those screws!

Main carcasse assembled

Yay dados....

Shelf supports going in!

Partition and shelf installed!

Sliding shelves installed

Door and cabinet back installed

Hooray for the doorknob!

The body of this cabinet was assembled with Titebond II glue and #6 flat head wood screws.  I failed to take pictures of the intermediate step of a dry assembly with clamps so that I could drill and countersink pilot holes for all the screws.
Now, dados are very strong mechanical wood joints, but since this is supposed to be suspended AND hold a lot of tools (some of which are quite heavy) all the joints have been reinforced with screws as well.

As you can see in some of the pictures, a couple of the shelves have some dados cut in them.  These are an example of that "measure 15 times, cut 50" thing that I was talking about in my last post.  Those 2 shelves were originally cut way undersized.  I'm not sure how that happened, but I had to use some scrap that was in the pile to replace them.  I will eventually replace those shelves, as material becomes available.

Other things I need to do: either sharpen my chisels, or get a hinge mortising bit for my router.  The strap hinges need to be recessed just a touch, and until I do that, the doors don't close correctly.  It also doesn't help that, while the body as a whole is pretty darn close to square, slight warping of some of the panels led to the shelf partition being a bit-more-than-slightly out of square.  Had I realized that was happening, I would have glued and screwed the back panel of that partition in place before screwing down the central partition.

Another thing I should really get: a stacked dado set.  Having that would have saved me a LOT of grief on cutting these dados.  That and maybe measuring 20 times.

Had to patch an incorrectly placed dado

These dados are a bit oversized.

Final verdict: Overall I am satisfied with this being my first complex project involving a decent number of techniques.  Could it have been better?  Absolutely.  That being said, though, it will certainly serve its purpose, and I am happy with the final result at this stage of my learning.  I will likely build another one down the road when my skills have improved, and that will be an interesting experience!

Parting thoughts: I have discovered that theoretical knowledge gleaned from reading and/or watching videos will only take you so far.  In the end, you've got to really practice those skills and techniques in order to convert that theoretical understanding into practical know-how.  So, I'm going to do what I should have started with: skill practice.

If you're just joining, Click here for part 1 of this project, or here for part 3.

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Storage: A Cabinet Under The ShopSmith, Part 1

It may not be incredibly obvious from this picture, but there is a lot of open space underneath the ShopSmith.  This machine also has quite a lot of accessories!  The base package has a miter gauge, a big rip fence, 3 10" saw blades, a 12" sanding disc (with a few sheets of sand paper), upper and lower saw guards, drill chuck (with key), a lathe tool rest, tail stock, cup center, drive spur, and a safety package including a feather board, over-fence push block, push stick and gripping push block.  Some older models also come with a set of drill bits and a set of lathe chisels.  That's a lot, and doesn't include any of the accessories for any of the SPTs. It makes a lot of sense then, to keep as many of these tools with or near the ShopSmith.

Several years ago, ShopSmith published a magazine, HandsOn!  Several of these back issues are available on ShopSmith's website.  One of the projects was an under-the-Mark-V cabinet.  I stumbled across this plan some time ago, and have been planning to make it for my shop.  I'm finally tackling this project!

On the surface, this cabinet doesn't look that complicated, and it has storage for a LOT of ShopSmith accessories.

 

I quickly discovered that simple is fairly relative.  While it's certainly not overly complicated, there are quite a few areas that are relatively easy to mess up.  Some errors can be easily dealt with, others require cutting a whole new panel.  I encountered a few of the latter, much to my chagrin.

Right between the center and right-hand tables, you can see three panels that I messed up.

 Though I tried my best to "measure twice, cut once", on more than one occasion it was more like "measure 15 times, cut 50".  Later I realized that some of these problems were due to some alignment issues, while others had more to do with process and personal attention.  I'm still learning, so process will improve, and the extensive extra work taught me the value of really paying attention to measurement details.  My next topic is going to cover the alignment, maintenance and cleaning issues.

I learned some interesting techniques with this cabinet, such as "fluttering" the quill to cut dados without a dado blade (or dado stack)

Dado, dado, dado!  I cut you from the wood!

Even though I did the initial break down of the plywood with my circular saw and straightedge guides (scroll to the bottom of this page for some plans for one of your own!), I also learned a bit about dealing with larger stock on the table saw.

Blade guard added for the saw's safety!

Due to a lot of extra work due to cutting errors, I wasn't able to get the cabinet assembled and placed in time for this post.  Part 2 of this post will go over all of the assembly, including hardware placement, as well as some finishing.  But here are a couple of pictures of all the pieces cut and (mostly) ready for assembly!

This is the main carcasse, shelves and mounting supports

Here are the doors!

Looking for the rest?  Part 2 and Part 3 are available!

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