... but I've been thinking a lot about cabinet scrapers lately. Such a brilliantly simple but effective tool that it is all too easy to neglect to treat them with the respect they deserve.
So, after far too long storing my scrapers like this
only (unsurprisingly) to find the hooks knackered when I want to use one, I decided I had to find a better solution. A box that would keep them separarted seemed like the best answer. I had a small piece of 10mm American black walnut and some scraps of birch ply in various thicknesses and here is the result
It holds 10 scrapers, Just rebated all round and glued together with a ply bottom. The front and back linings are 1.5mm ply and the side linings are 3mm. The trickiest part was forming the grooves in the latter to take the 3mm ply spacers. I had planned to use my Dremel in the new Veritas plunge base with a 3mm cutter but the runout on the Dremel ensured that I got 4mm grooves, so it was back to a hand tool
My trusty old Record 044 did a great job considering that the land between the grooves is only 2mm wide.
Here is the finished box with lid on
Yes, I know it's totally over the top, but I just can't resist making things look nice and I did happen to have a nice scrap of rippled sycamore. I thought about using it solid thinking I could probably get away with wood movement in something this narrow, but decided not to risk it so it's a bandsawn veneer on ply. The inlay either side of the joint line is scraper steel to make it easy to fet the lid on the right way round so the grain matches!! Again, not necessary because the lid will go on either way round but I couldn't rresist the temptation. I cut the recesses using the Dremel and Veritas plunge base which worked a treat and left just a little cleaning up with a chisel. Finished off with three coats of wiped-on shellac - it needs a couple more.
Hope you like it .
Jim
So, after far too long storing my scrapers like this
only (unsurprisingly) to find the hooks knackered when I want to use one, I decided I had to find a better solution. A box that would keep them separarted seemed like the best answer. I had a small piece of 10mm American black walnut and some scraps of birch ply in various thicknesses and here is the result
It holds 10 scrapers, Just rebated all round and glued together with a ply bottom. The front and back linings are 1.5mm ply and the side linings are 3mm. The trickiest part was forming the grooves in the latter to take the 3mm ply spacers. I had planned to use my Dremel in the new Veritas plunge base with a 3mm cutter but the runout on the Dremel ensured that I got 4mm grooves, so it was back to a hand tool
My trusty old Record 044 did a great job considering that the land between the grooves is only 2mm wide.
Here is the finished box with lid on
Yes, I know it's totally over the top, but I just can't resist making things look nice and I did happen to have a nice scrap of rippled sycamore. I thought about using it solid thinking I could probably get away with wood movement in something this narrow, but decided not to risk it so it's a bandsawn veneer on ply. The inlay either side of the joint line is scraper steel to make it easy to fet the lid on the right way round so the grain matches!! Again, not necessary because the lid will go on either way round but I couldn't rresist the temptation. I cut the recesses using the Dremel and Veritas plunge base which worked a treat and left just a little cleaning up with a chisel. Finished off with three coats of wiped-on shellac - it needs a couple more.
Hope you like it .
Jim
