- The Wood Whisperer is sponsored
by Powermatic and Titebond.
So I just finished up this tool cabinet for my workbench
and it's a pretty elaborate design.
It didn't start that way.
I meant for it to be very utilitarian,
but it just kind of grew as time went on.
And while I was in this mode of total overkill,
I started to think about other things
that needed organization.
For instance, chisels inside one of these drawers.
You know, spokeshaves on the wall, my router plane.
Just things on the wall that,
if I take a little bit more time,
a little care and attention,
I might be able to come up with
a cool custom holder for these things
that makes it look really good
and it makes it very functional
because it's easy to get to the things
that I need to get to and I don't lose anything,
like little bits and pieces.
So that's what I did.
I had a couple of extra days of free time
and some scraps of walnut that I'd be able to use for this
and I just kind of geeked out on it.
So let me show you what I made.
First thing I wanna make is
a drop-in organizer for my chisels.
The bottom will be made from quarter-inch plywood.
I then lay out the chisels and transfer the center points
to a strip of wood.
Using a Forstner bit, I drill into the strip
leaving about a quarter-inch of material at the bottom.
The strip is then cut in half,
making two nice chisel handle holders.
I only need one, so maybe give the extra one to a friend?
I sand the strips and break all the sharp edges.
I can now mark the center of each chisel
at the sharp end for some additional support.
Because the chisels are different lengths,
I'll make a few different blocks for each chisel type.
Now with the chisel centered,
I'll make marks on both sides of the blades
to show where I need to make the dados.
At the table saw, I'll hug away the material.
That's looking pretty good.
Now I'll start by gluing the handle strip in place,
then I'll glue in the three support strips.
A little bit of oil makes it look nice and pretty.
As I install the chisels,
I realize that we can go one step further
to make the chisels even more secure
and less prone to moving around.
Magnets!
Each dado will receive a rare-earth magnet
which I'll epoxy into place.
On top of that I'll drop in a layer of rubberized cork.
That'll keep the chisels in place and prevent any marring.
The smallest chisel doesn't have room enough for a magnet,
so it just gets the cork.
On the left side of the drawer,
that's a good spot for my mallet.
So I make a small support block using
the same drilling technique that we used previously
and install the support with some double-stick tape
to hold it in place.
Oh yeah.
That makes the OCD side of my brain very happy.
Next up, we'll make a holder for
my spokeshaves and cabinet scrapers.
I take some time to work out the spacing on a strip of wood
and then drill at each handle location.
At the band saw, then cut into the holes on a slight angle.
Now we can split the piece in two,
giving us the two support rails we need.
I place the supports onto a plywood backer
with the supports at a slight angle.
It's not really necessary, but I think it looks pretty cool.
Once the glue is dry, I trim the excess and flush it up.
I'll drive some screws in from the back
just to be extra safe.
To attach it to the wall,
I'll pre-drill and countersink for two screws.
Bada-bing, bada-boom.
A nice spokeshave cabinet scraper rack.
And yeah, I'm pretty much screwed if I ever buy
that concave spokeshave that I've been eyeballing.
Next is a holder for my router plane.
The old holder was nice, but it didn't really have
any room for storing the cutters.
I took some inspiration from
Little City Workshop on Instagram
and decided to make my own version
that stores all of the accessories.
To be honest, I was pretty much just winging it.
I'll start by making some rabbets in a piece of thin stock.
The material left over after making the rabbets
should fit into the top slot on the cutters.
I could then cut a few slots for
the post of the cutters to fit into.
Now we'll glue those onto the bottom of the holder later on.
For the backer piece,
I'll trace the shape of the router plane
onto some quarter-inch ply.
Using that angle, I'll cut a couple of support blocks
out of three-quarter-inch stock.
These will support the router plane
when it's dropped into the cradle.
The top of each piece needs a little dog-ear
in order for it to fit correctly.
Now I can cut the backer piece to my lines.
The support blocks are glued in place
and a small strip of ply is then glued to the front face.
By the way, if you haven't tried this thick and quick glue
from Titebond, you're missing out.
On small projects like this when I want a quick bond time,
it's really convenient.
Now I can glue the accessory pieces to the bottom.
The router plane comes with a little fence attachment
that I actually never use,
but I may as well install a ledge for it to rest on.
This piece is installed just above the accessories
and a notch is cut in the middle for the post.
The whole thing is sanded and finished
and then screwed to the wall.
And here we go.
Next up is a very simple rack for card scrapers.
I take a block of wood and make a bunch of band saw cuts
at a slight angle.
If you have thicker card scrapers
you may need to make two passes for a double cut.
Now I pre-drill, countersink, sand, and finish.
(uptempo R&B music)
And just like that, I have a simple,
elegant little card scraper holder.