September 6, 2002

To: Dick Morano

From: Dan Smullen

Subject: RWS Furniture SIG Minutes from 9/5 Meeting at WoodCraft

This was our first meeting using the Woodcraft shop as our meeting room. There were 31 of us, unless a couple more had wandered in after my count.

The yearly meeting matrix was reviewed and added to somewhat; the table below shows what we know so far.

DATE	HOST	PLACE	TOPIC
October 3	Tom Pedlow	Woodcraft	Shaker boxes
November 7	Woodcraft	Woodcraft	System 3 Epoxy ?
December 5	Jon Rouleau	Jon's shop
January 9	Mike Heiler/Ted Palis	Mike's new shop
February 6	Dan Smullen	Woodcraft
March 6
April 3	Dan Holmes	Dan's shop
May 1	Rick Diehl	Woodcraft
June 5	Jon Zuegel	Jon's shop

Refreshments

After some rehash of last month's discussions and some new ones, we decided that it would be helpful if 2 or 3 people handled the refreshments each month, relieving the host of the task, especially since setup at Woodcraft is more involved than at our homes. The general consensus was that everyone would contribute $1 at each meeting attended into a fund that the refreshment team could use month to month. Some thought we should kick off with $5 each, but for this meeting anyway, we just set it aside. The team will provide the refreshments whether we meet at Woodcraft or at someone's shop. Bruce Alles and John Britton have offered to provide this function for us, although perhaps one more could volunteer to spread the activity around.

RWS news

• Mark Rakestraw asked if a few of volunteers could arrive at the first U of R monthly meeting at 6:30 PM [9/20] to help direct us into the parking areas, etc. He got a few takers, but a couple more wouldn't hurt. Perhaps a sign or two might help as well for the first meeting.
• The RWS website also has directions to U of R parking, etc.
• Rick Diehl said that ideas for speakers for the 2003-2004 season are already being churned. Please contact Rick if you have any particular interests to throw in as ideas.
• Workshops are pretty well subscribed to – some are even full.

Woodcraft Hosting, rules, etc.

• When you host at the Woodcraft shop, you can bring a project, teach us something, bring a speaker, have a helper, or whatever – it can be very flexible.
• When operating the power tools in the Woodcraft shop, one must wear eye protection and if appropriate, ear protection. There are a few sets of safety glasses about, but try to bring your own eye and ear protection
• The meetings will start at 7:00 PM and must end at 9:00 PM at store closing. This means that the host must have a plan for time and keep to it – we will probably conclude the meeting part at about 7:30, - that leaves 60 to 90 minutes for the program topic.
• Sean has extended a 10% discount to all of us attending the meeting during the evening. He will know who we are by our RWS nametags. He has apparently had some RWS member hassle him about the specifics of discount timing, etc. The individual remarked that the item might be returned later as retribution if the discount policy was not "adjusted". Let's remember that Sean advocates for us in several ways, frees up space in his newsletters for RWS events, and offers us the 10% discount during meeting nights. Let’s not blow it!
• Lastly, please be discrete while we're in the Woodcraft store on meeting nights. Discussions of his competitors and "great deals" would be considered off limits by most of us.
• It is advisable to check with Sean a day in advance to make sure any equipment you need is going to be available.

Other items

• A woodworking show in Woodstock, Ontario is coming up on 10/4 – 10/6. Woodstock is about 3 hours from Rochester. Dan Holmes has hotel and show info. The cost is $10 CAN, including parking. There is a Goods and Service tax [GST] imposed on all sales in Canada. However, forms abound for getting this refunded after you return. Be aware of the following rules before you go to maximize the chance of a refund:
• Each individual receipt must be $50 CAN minimum
• Your amounts must total $200 CAN to be eligible for refund
• You can add accommodations AND goods to reach the $200 CAN minimum
• Ok to add receipts for more than one visit to Canada
• Use form GST 176 E [widely available in Canada]
• Bruce Alles has 20 slabs of pine bowling alley wood, about 42" W X 12' 6" L X 2" thick. Half slabs at ~$50; whole slabs at ~$90. See Bruce if interested.
• Shop tour open houses, set to occur on occasional Saturdays, with 3 or 4 shops to visit in a somewhat localized area geographically, seem like a good idea. Let's see how many of us can put their shop on the map, and let's do it.

Program

Chuck Rinehart and John O'Brien provide us with a comprehensive review of drawer design principles, and had quite a number of examples to pass around that showed various types of construction. Basically, the decision you must make first is where on the continuum from utility to art form do you want the drawer to fall? Are you making a workshop tool drawer or a Queen Anne piece? High end projects require a lot more thought all the way around. Personal preference dictates most drawer construction, unless you are challenging yourself or making period reproductions!

Grading systems for general drawer construction were characterized by John as Cadillac, Chevy and Yugo. The Cliff Notes description of each is:

• Cadillac
• High end, premium priced furniture, reproduction of various period pieces
• Hand cut dovetails, solid bottom, primary wood throughout, finished on all surfaces
• Chevy
• Mid-priced stuff
• Machined dovetails or mortise and tenon, secondary woods for sides and back, plywood bottom
• Finished on outside, probably not on inside
• Yugo
• Very cheap furniture or for drawers you need to make in a hurry for a not-so-important use
• All plywood, nails, screws, likely no finish applied at all

Poplar and Sycamore are good as secondary woods for sides and backs. Quarter-sawn Sycamore is great, but there isn’t too much of it.

Fronts

Fronts are typically ¾” thick, with sides narrower. ½” is good for medium to large drawers, with dimensions going down proportionately to 3/8” or so. As a practical matter, ¼” is about the thinnest that sides can be, and this would be for small, precision drawers.

Pick drawer dimensions and review hardware to be used before committing the rest of the carcase dimensions. Face frame and cabinet sizes should be based upon drawer and hardware, not the other way around. Flush drawers are more difficult due to the gap control problems.

Lipped drawers are nice, and hide gaps, but present their own issues, especially if you do hand cut dovetails. There will be a lot of chiseling and little sawing. An overlay drawer front will accomplish nearly the same effect, but is forgiving and gets the dovetail cuts out in the open.

Hand cut dovetails will make it easier to place pins properly per the drawer height, but take practice. Chuck has offered 1 on 1 help for anyone ready to tackle hand cutting.

Bottoms

Solid wood is much more work, since the bottom is typically on the thin side. When fitted and secured, the bottom must expand only rearward when using solid wood. Don’t run grain between front and back!

Bottom groove can be made to accommodate rabbeted, square edged slip or rounded over slip bottoms. It’s easiest to assemble [and finish] if the drawer back is made narrower to allow the bottom to side into the finished, glued drawer, with a single slotted hole and fastener to hold the bottom in place. With plywood bottoms, the expansion isn’t as much of an issue.

Stops

Don’t forget to control the drawer travel with a stop system; either located just inside the front or at the rear. It’s easier to adjust them before the carcase back is installed. Make sure to allow for movement along the axis of insertion if solid wood sides are used in the piece. Otherwise the stops cannot keep a flush drawer front even for long!

Other notes

Rollover effects and height relief along the sides are nice touches, and make for a more pleasing feel and look.

For supports, kickers must be in place to prevent drawer drooping when open. On multi-drawer projects, the second drawer down and below are usually OK, but the top drawer needs special help. Often a center rail can suffice and is somewhat easier to accomplish.

Chuck recommends a Stanley #70 router plane for half-blind dovetail cuts.

Finishes

This again is mostly personal preference. As mentioned earlier, high end pieces would be stained and/or finished all around. Shellac, 320 grit quick sanding and another shellac coat provides a very good option with relatively little fuss. Wax from a candle works great on bearing surfaces and beats normal furniture wax, which doesn’t build up as well.

Chuck distributed a 3-page “how-to” guide for hand cutting dovetails, and reviewed some specific tools used for this activity, including why they were chosen for this special task. John also distributed an excerpt from the book “ Chests of Drawers” by Bill Hylton. This is also available online at http://www.taunton.com../finewoodworking/pages/bw0006.asp [then click on drawer building basics.pdf].

We thank John and Chuck for offering to be the guinea pigs for our first Woodcraft meeting. I thought they had just the right amount of information to fit the time slot, and the handouts were great! Thanks, guys!

Fall is coming, so is our seasonal high tide in our shops, let’s roll!

Happy woodworking,

Dan