I always thought that woodwork was two things: working on something in the workshop, and pacing about the workshop trying to figure out how to disguise the latest mistake. At the time of writing, this project has been mostly the former. It really helps to have some super nice tools and plenty of space to work in.
I don't really know what to call it, but the thing that we put our TV on top of is a piece of junk that I made out of an old Ikea bookcase with some legs added to it.
It looks like crap from the side...
We wanted to buy a nice piece of furniture to use instead, but we had to eventually give up trying find something small enough to fit in this spot. So, time to build something nice enough to put inside the house out of good quality materials.
I started with an 8' x 4' sheet of 3/4 inch walnut veneered plywood. At one point, this would have been over $200 but lumber prices have settled down a bit since then thank goodness.
The full sheet was too heavy to put through the table saw on my own, so I broke it down into three sixteen inch wide strips.
The finished panels were made by trimming the strips to 15.5 inches wide and crosscutting to length.
I needed to cut rabbits in the top and bottom and both side panels to accommodate the back of the cabinet. Typically I would make the back panel out of 1/4 inch plywood, but this time I'm using the same 3/4 inch plywood as the rest of the cabinet....because that's what I have, and I want a uniform look. I cut the rabbits on the table saw. This was a bit of a drag for a 3/4 inch rabbit; next time I will find a better way to do this. The blue tape helps reduce tearout.
This is what the completed rabbit looks like on the side panel after cleanup with a sharp chisel and sandpaper:
The next step was cutting slots for the biscuits:
Dry assembly....
Checking the back panel fits...
The panels fitted together perfectly, so I moved on to adding veneer to all the exposed edges:
I bored a couple of cable access holes in the back panel with a 1.25 inch diameter forsener bit in the drill press:
The left side of the cabinet will have a shelf that is not adjustable, but can be removed. The shelf is supported by four pegs or pins which insert into 1/4 inch diameter holes...which are just about visible in the next picture if you have a suitable magnifying glass to hand.
The method I used to cut the rabbits meant that I had to cut some small plugs of plywood to fill in the gaps which would otherwise have been visible from the rear.
The veneer was applied over these plugs:
With that done, I sanded all the panels to 220 grit.
I don't have enough clamps to glue up the cabinet in one go, so I did it in stages, starting with attaching the side panels to the base...
After that, I cut some spacers to help me align the center panel. The spacers were cut from scraps of plywood which I taped together and trimmed with the miter saw - this way they are all exactly the same size.
I used four spacers at the bottom to align the central divider...
...and another four at the top, before the top panel was added. Then I clamped everything and left it overnight.
The next day I had to destroy the spacers to remove them.
Glued on the back panel and left that overnight.
While the glue was curing, I trimmed and veneered the removable shelf:
All done...and square!
Stay tuned for for part two, making the cabinet doors!
