The first thing I did was take some scraps of redwood fence boards,
and rip them on the table saw to 5/8" x 5/8" square.
I needed 4 of them at 32" long and 12 of them at 14" long, so I made sure to rip enough
length for those pieces.
I then miter sawed them to their final lengths, gang cutting them four at a time to make the
process faster.
I also cut a 45 degree angle on the bottom of the legs, to make them sharp for poking
into the dirt.
Here are all the pieces laid out.
Now I need to make the dado cuts for the half lap joints,
so I am swapping out my table saw blade for a 5/8" wide dado stack.
The stack is 5/8" wide to accomodate the whole width of the square piece.
I pulled out my old crosscut sled, which is now my dado sled, because the opening is so
wide.
Then I set the height of the blade to 5/16", which is half the thickness of the square
stock.
I set up a stop block to get consistent cuts on the ends of all the rail pieces
and proceeded to cut off one side on each end.
Be careful not to bump the stop block too hard, as this can shift its position.
Now it was time to cut the legs.
This is more complicated, because there are dados cut on two adjacent sides of the leg.
Follow the plans carefully, as these legs are not all the same.
I set the stop block to cut a dado 1" from the end,
and cut all 4 legs on one end.
Then I set the stop block to 2-1/4" and cut the adjacent side on the legs.
Marking the cuts beforehand with a pencil saves a lot of time and confusion for this
part.
Once all the dadoes were cut, I assembled 2 opposite sides of the frame as sub-assemblies.
Some of the half lap joints fit snugly, and others I needed to shave down with a block
plane to sneak up on a perfect fit.
Because this tomato cage is going outdoors, I used Titebond 3 due to its waterproof properties.
I brushed a small amount of glue on each joint, and then assembled them and clamped them together.
Once the glue had dried for about an hour on the sub-assemblies,
I glued the remaining pieces to the sides, connecting the two parts to make a cage.
The square shoulders on the half lap joints will keep the frame square
and prevent it from racking.
In order to reinforce the joints, I put two staples into each lap joint.
This gave them some extra mechanical strength, so they don't rely solely on the glue to hold
the joints together.
I used a staple gun, which worked but was a bit difficult.
I recommend using a neumatic stapler if you have one.
That would make the job much easier.