Bedroom Dresser Part 1

About a year ago, Amy Sheep and I refinished an old dresser I've had in one bedroom or another for many years: 

I've since learned that it was made by the Hickory Manufacturing Company and comes from their "Tung-Si" collection which also included these units:

The only problem with our piece of furniture is that it is not big enough for our combined needs. We've been looking for a complimentary piece for ages so that we can ditch the battered old thing on the other side of the bedroom. Finally, I decided to make a similar dresser myself.

The inspiration piece has twelve drawers in a 3x4 grid. The construction consists of a box which holds the drawers and is suspended within a framework of darker material. My dresser will also be twelve drawers, but in a 2x6 grid and the drawers will be narrower. I will be using modern drawer slides instead of integral wooden slides, and my construction will differ slightly in how the weight is transferred to the frame.  

I'm also using different materials. I was originally planning to build with white oak and some unspecified darker wood. However, after spending an hour or so browsing at MacBeath Hardwood in Berkeley, I ended up with a mixture of hard maple, African mahogany and maple plywood. Apart from the fronts, the drawer parts will be made from Baltic birch plywood. This batch of material cost $706 out of the door. I'll be keeping track of costs on this project; for context I would have been willing to spend up to $3000 on a dresser from a store or online, but we could not find anything to complement what we already have. 

After a couple of months of being preoccupied with other projects and/or finalizing the design and/or letting the wood acclimatize to my shop, I was ready to begin construction. I've been waiting for an excuse to swap out the blade on the table saw, so I started with that. I'm using a new "Woodworker II" from Forrest, which is ten (10) inch diameter with 40 teeth and is a very popular multipurpose blade. 

I've been having some issues with the sled I use for crosscutting. It's fine most of the time but it loses accuracy on the longer cuts. The design is fine for making cuts of twelve (12) inches or less on either side of the blade. However, for the dresser project I need something I can rely on for longer cuts.

My new design, which is a mishmash of other folk's ideas that I've seen on YouTube is intended to make cuts on the left side of the blade only. This means I can build a much longer fence to support my work piece. The fence is made from three (3) pieces of 3/4" birch plywood instead of to (2) for enhanced rigidity.

When the work piece passes through the saw blade the off cut is small enough that support at the right side of the blade is not required:

There are key reasons why this sled works as well as it does. One is the slides which fit into the miter slots on my table saw; this particular brand can be minutely adjusted such that wiggle is entirely eliminated. The other is the fine tuning of the fence which was achieved using this version of the 5-cut method.

The basic cabinet will be constructed from three (3) upright panels (left, right and center), a base panel and several stretches at the top and between the second and third drawers. Cutting the panels from 3/4" maple veneered plywood is straight forward. The first embellishment is cutting a 1/4" wide by 3/4" deep rabbit in the front-facing edge of both side panels. This will allow the drawer fronts to recess within the side panels which is a design feature of the inspiration piece. 

I'm making my own veneer by cutting 1/8" strips from the maple stock:

Veneer is attached with a mixture of glue and pin nails and clamped while curing:

The photo below shows how the side panels look after adding veneer to both front-facing edges. There is no need to add veneer at the other exposed edge since it is not obviously plywood.

The stretches were trimmed to length at the miter saw and pocket holes were bored: 

Veneer was added to front-facing edges:

Dry fitting the panels and stretchers:

Post-assembly: 

Once the cabinet is complete, pocket holes will be visible only at the base panel when the lowest drawer is removed.

All front facing edges were veneered even though none of them will be visible when the drawers are closed.

In keeping with the inspiration piece, the top panel is a separate piece constructed from a large plywood panel with maple side "wings." I started by making the wings from two (2) pieces of stock, which are a little bit bigger than I need, and jointed one edge on each piece:

The maple plywood I'm using is exactly 3/4" thick, so my material requires planing down: 

The boards came out of the planer so smooth that they look polished. I did change the blades on the planer very recently, but the finish mostly comes from the beautiful maple wood.

The next step is to trim the boards to the final width (3-3/4") and cut an 11-degree bevel:

Mockup of the wing and the plywood panel, which has been veneered at the front edge:

Biscuit slots were cut in the wings and at both ends of the panel.

Glue up:

The most important aspect of the glue up is that the top edges must be flush. The panel is slightly too wide by design and the wings overhang beyond the panel.

Top panel after sanding and trimming to final width:

Glue up:

As well as being glued, the top panel is secured to the cabinet with wood screws which were installed from below the stretchers:

Basic cabinet with top panel installed:

The back panel is made from 1/4" Baltic birch plywood which is recessed into the cabinet. The upright panel at the center of the cabinet and the stretches below the top panel have been made 1/4 inch  smaller than the top, sides and base panels. This means that there is no need to cut anything away to accommodate the recessed back panel:

The side and base panels do need to have a 1/4" x 1/4" rabbit cut at the inner edges:

I learned while doing this that I need a new rabbiting bit for the router - fortunately the burn marks will be obscured by the back panel.

There are some spots the router cannot get to...

Which have to be cut out by have with a chisel:

Gluing and pinning the upper section of the back panel:

And the lower section:

After installing the back panels, the basic cabinet is complete apart from wood filler, final sanding and staining/finishing. Before that I need to make the drawers and construct the frame which will support the cabinet.