It’s time for the exciting conclusion to this coffee table build: the ebonized walnut top with inlay banding. I know, it sounds complicated! It really isn’t though; you can do all of this build with a circular saw and a router, if that’s all you had.Start by ripping some 4/4 walnut into strips that are 1 5/8″ wide. This will allow for a 3/8″ deep tongue that will go into the plywood, and a 1.25″ solid frame for the plywood. The plywood piece should be 50″ long by 27″ wide. You’ll note that this is a bit different from the measurements I put in the last part for the total dimensions. It’s going to actually be 52.5 x 29.5″ wide. I was originally planning on a 1″ board but 1.25″ looked better. Plane it to be exactly as thick as the plywood.
Using a slot cutting bit with a 1/4″ tall cutter, cut a groove on every edge of the plywood that is centered. Try to get as close to centered as you can when adjusting the bit depth; my plywood had a 1/4″ thick MDF core I used to line everything up. To ensure it’s dead centered, flip the plywood and route again from that side.
Now, create a matching, centered tongue on the walnut lumber that is 3/8″ deep. You can use a router table; I used a dado on my table saw. You could also use the same slot cutting bit, using the bearing to guide it. You have options!
I decided to add a really, really subtle to the bottom of the walnut frame. The legs have a 4 degree slope on them, so I added a 4 degree chamfer to the underside. I used a featherboard to hold it tight, and put that slight chamfer on with the table saw. Barely noticeable, but trying to pull elements together on this design.
Using the miter sled on your table saw, cut mitered corners on everything. Make sure they’re as tight as you can get them and dry fit everything together. Once it looks good, place some Titebond Dark glue in the groove, put everything together, and clamp.
Sometimes you have to get creative with your clamps
I like to put a spline on all my mitered corners to reinforce them. Miters are mostly end-grain joints, so by adding a spline you add a method to connect them with long-grain, which glues better. The easiest way I’ve found to do this on a large piece is use two cutoffs to create a flat reference edge. Then use the slot bit.
You can either immediately glue in a walnut spline, or wait until after the ebonizing to add a contrasting wood.Here’s how it looks once it’s all put together!
Now comes the truly magical part: ebonizing! Take that solution we set aside a week ago, and strain it through a coffee filter. I tried a few different dilution rates, and I settled on 50% of the mixture plus 50% more vinegar. This gave it a deep, rich black color but allowed some of the grain to still show through.
The reason this works is the mixture we created is actually iron-acetate. It’s a chemical that, when it reacts with tannins in wood, turns the wood black. Any wood with a high tannin content will work; oak, cherry, or walnut. Since walnut is already pretty dark, you may have better results. The grain is also more subtle than oak.
Apply it with a clean soft rag, making sure the walnut is uniformly damp, but not soaking wet. Here’s a video showing me applying some!
Just immediately after applying the solution you can start to see the effectsAfter one full night of drying. The wood will look less purple once it receives a top coat.
To protect the thin veneer on the plywood for the next stage, coat the top with two coats of a dewaxed shellac sanding sealer. This will keep the ebony from being removed as well.
Mark out your corners. I decided to use 1 inch in from the edge of the walnut plywood. These lines are there to tell you when to stop your router; you’ll use a sharp chisel to clean up the corners.
The inlay banding comes in 40 inch sections. We will use four of them for this table, using a scarf joint to create the longer sections. It’s 13/16ths of an inch wide. You’ll need a straight cutting router bit and a router with a guide fence to route the channel. My router came with a guide, but you may need to buy one depending on your model. You can also clamp a straight edge to the table and use that to guide your router. Make sure you check the depth of cut on a scrap before attempting it on the table.
You can see the marks the router guide left; they will easily sand off from the shellac with a light hand sanding
The only tools you need for cutting the inlay are a sharp knife and a straight edge. In theory, they should be 45 degree angles on each corner. I found the fit turned out better if I used the knife to mark the inside and outside corners, then connected them with the straight edge.
With a funky pattern like this, you’re shooting more for a close match on the miters; it’s very difficult to get an exact pattern match. I was happy with the results. Glue them in using Titebond liquid hide glue. It is urea based, not water based, meaning it won’t swell the inlay and make it warp. Put a straight piece of wood with painters tape on top and clamp it down to hold everything flat.
On the two long sides you’ll need to splice a small strip of veneer in to get the length we need. This is a good place for a scarf joint. The pattern lends well to it as well. Cut a line along the slope of one of the shapes, match it to the other piece, glue in tight for an almost invisible seam.
You can barely tell this was a joint
Splines getting glued in
This is a good time to attach the frame. Use 1″ pocket screws. The guide on my kit says I can use 1.25″ but I found they almost punch through.
Sand, very lightly, with 220 by hand to remove the router marks. Then apply topcoat as usual. I did 3-4 coats of General Finishes Arm-r-Seal in Semi-gloss.
If you’ve been following my blog, you likely saw my post a few months back about the collaboration I did with Osborne Woodworking on their new acrylic leg line. If you didn’t, here’s a link!
They’ve asked me to do another write up, and I am incredibly thrilled to do so! In the interest of unbiased disclosure, I am making $0 on this project. Osborne provides me with the legs and inlay, but the table is going to a friend’s home. The friend paid only for the additional materials, and I make nothing for my time!
Now that we’ve gotten THAT out of the way, let’s talk about the project. Osborne asked me if I could incorporate inlay strips into a project, and I requested these acrylic legs as well; I’d had a design for those legs marinading in my mind, and I thought these inlay strips would be a perfect fit.
This is the table that was my beginning inspiration. There really aren’t a lot of examples of acrylic legged coffee tables out there. What I liked about this table was the way it uses the acrylic legs to elevate the beautiful wood and granite on top.
Credit: Allan-Knight Showroom
Now, I have no idea how to cut or process granite. And while I COULD get zebrawood, it seemed a little busy, especially with the brass that would be on my table legs and the inlay on top. Instead, I opted to use African Mahogany for the aprons and ebonized walnut (plywood and lumber framed) for the top.
I’ll post the final measured drawings at the end of the next post! I want to emphasize though that, unlike the last acrylic project, this project requires a bit more lumber processing. The apron height needed to be four inches in order for the threaded rods to line up on the legs, and you won’t be able to find 1x stock in four inch widths. Instead, you’ll need to rip the lumber with a table saw, circular saw, or even a hand saw.
Before you do ANY cutting though, we need to prep the ebonizer. It sounds ominous, but it’s super simple. Take some 0000 steel wool, rinse it with dish soap and water to remove the rust inhibitor. We want rust! Then put it in a jar with some normal white vinegar and let it sit for a week. By doing this now, we make sure they ebonizer is ready once we need it; more to come in the next post!
0000 Steel wool, washed and ready to corrodeDIB Woodworking, proudly sponsored by Heinz…well, not really. It’s what I had. I’m sure any 5% vinegar will do. Foodies, restrain yourself from using cider or wine vinegar!The chemical reaction creates gas, make sure to add a few holes. Pro tip: corn holders are the best for poking baking potatoes too!Let this sit for a week, then strain through a coffee filter and store.
I was able to build the entire table frame using just two boards of mahogany. Both boards were about 12 ft long and about 5 inches wide. Rip them both to 4.25 inches. In my case, the mahogany was only available in S4S at about $5 per board foot. It was pretty darn straight, but I jointed and planed it down to about 3/4″ thickness before ripping to the final 4″ dimension. The customer’s couch was 78″ long, which meant the coffee table should be about 52″ long. I knew I wanted an inch overhang on each side of the legs, meaning the frame should be 50″ long overall. Subtract out 5″ to account for the combined thickness of two legs, and you get a 45″ apron on each long side. Cut that from the mahogany.
The width of the table was a bit more subjective. I looked at a few examples available online, and most were around 60% as wide as they were long. That seemed a little wide for me, so I opted for 28″. It’s completely arbitrary within the confines of what you think looks best. Subtract 2″ overhang, 5″ for legs, and you arrive at 21″ aprons on each of the short sides.
Mahogany aprons (left and top center) and mahogany corner brackets (bottom center)
The legs attach to the aprons using corner brackets. Rockler sells these, pre-made, in galvanized steel. For almost any other application that needed corner brackets, I’d buy those in a heartbeat. Since the legs are clear acrylic, though, I don’t want the galvanized steel to be visible when you are looking at the table. That means creating your own corner brackets.
Note: This is by far the most complex part of the project. If you lack the tools, or are simply uneasy about it, I think the Rockler brackets would likely work fine with very little impact on the overall look.
The brackets need to accomplish two things: 1) they need to give the legs a firm place to attach and 2) they need to be firmly attached to each adjacent apron to secure the entire frame together. This means putting a 45 degree miter on each edge of the bracket and putting two holes in the center for the bolts to attach.
I wanted the aprons to align just behind the end of the brass band on each side. It required a decent amount of geometry (hello Pythagoras and 64ths of an inch!) to make sure I got everything where I wanted it to be. To save you the trouble, all you need to know is this: the back end of the bracket (the long face, where the miter points are) needs to be about 5.5″ long to accomplish this. I’ll put the final dimensions in the plan, but my wood came in right at 11/16ths thick instead of a full 3/4″ which is why I’m saying ABOUT 5.5″. You could do this on a miter saw, but using the miter sled on your table saw will give you much better results; less slop.
The holes in the center of the bracket need to be 1.25″ and 3.5″ from the top, respectively. The bolts are 5/16″ thick, so I went with 3/8″ holes. The extra 1/16th gives us a bit of wiggle room. If you have a drill press, make sure the table is square and drill away. If you don’t, you’ll need to use a drill guide. It’s essential that they be square and plumb, otherwise the miters won’t contact the aprons correctly.
Test the fit. You want the corner bracket flush to the top of the leg, and the miter sitting flush against the apron. These were my test bolts, the real bolts are less random.Tops completely flush
Using a hand drill, make 4 small pilot holes, one inch off each side. You want these to angle the opposite direction of the miter so that the screws will enter the aprons at 90 degrees.
Now you need to create the rods that will attach everything together. I couldn’t find any pre-cut 5/16″ rods in the length we need, so I had to cut my own. I started by inserting the rod all the way, adding 3/4″ for the bracket, and then adding the length of the wingnut, washer, and lock nut. Overall, 2.5″ seems to be a good length. You’ll need to cut them by hand with a hacksaw and file the cut ends to fit. Tip: thread a wingnut on before you cut the rod, then twist the wingnut so that it goes over the threads you just cut. Most of the time, that corrects the threading.
Do a test fit on everything. The brackets may feel a little wobbly; mine did. Two things will help with that. First, we’re going to use glue on the miters. Second, the frame will be attached to the top as well. That should keep everything snug.
I chose to use hide glue for this project for two reasons: 1) I could easily undo it with water if I needed to fix any of the brackets and 2) it’s urea based, not water based, so it won’t cause warping or waves in the inlay we use later. If the idea of a cow hide based glue rubs you the wrong way, you can use regular wood glue; just make sure you fit everything really well first. I’ll address the inlay in the next post.
Drill small pilot holes into the apron being careful not to go through the finished side, glue, and then screw everything together. 1.25″ kreg screws were just right. I also had good results with 1.5″ #8 screws. Just be careful not to over drive them.
Add some pocket screws on the sides. I know, I know: I’ve been a very vocal critic of Kreg screws before, but this is really the perfect application for them. We want a hidden fastener that will be going into a dimensionally stable top (plywood) and will have no shearing force exerted, only pulling force. All three of those things add up to pocket screws!
Placement is relatively arbitrary. I chose 10″ off each leg on the long sides and one in the center. On the short sides, I did 7″ off each side. Completely arbitrary.
Check for square by measuring the diagonals before the glue dries. Let it sit. We will apply the finish later, once the top is attached and the legs (which will dissolve if the finish touches them) are removed!
Wow, it’s been a while since I’ve written anything here. I guess having a baby will do that to you? Slowly, but surely, I’ve been getting some work done, and I wanted to write a quick post on a new regimen I tried on some white oak that I really like. If you’re looking to accentuate the natural character of the wood, and not stain it, this is a great process:
Sand the entire piece to 120, then 220 grit with an orbital sander
Coat with Danish oil in “natural” finish. Follow the directions carefully, and make sure to rub out all the excess so it dries properly.
Let it sit for 3 days to fully dry.
Coat with two coats of shellac sanding sealer, sanding at 220 in between.
Top coat with your favorite wipe-on finish. I like General Finishes Arm-R-Seal or Minwax wipe-on poly.
That’s it! A great, natural finish that is durable as well. Here’s how it looks on a finished product!
A while back, my brother offhandedly asked me about building him a replica ammunition box for his Civil War reenactments. At the time, he sent me a link to a YouTube video and a written tutorial on how to make these by hand. Here are some pictures of munitions boxes from that period:
And here’s a link to the article I’m referencing for reproducing these.
Here’s a link to a site that sells reproduction crates.
The first thing I want to emphasize is that this article was a great guide for starting out, and the author admits his goal was to create a pseudo-ammo crate that was really double stacked to help hide his modern accouterments. 100% historical reproduction was not his goal. But, it is mine!
Right off the bat, I noticed a few issues with the way the box was built. First, the author mentions that the dimensions for the box should be 14.75″x 10.75″x 6.38″, but that 1×6 stock could be used with only minimal loss in height. Presumably, the author was assuming a 1×6 was truly 6″ tall; as those who follow this blog know, that’s simply not the case these days! A 1×6 board is actually only 5.5″ wide, meaning this replica box would be a full 7/8″ too short. The first thing you need to know about Civil War reenactors is that they’re (more often than not) sticklers for accuracy; I couldn’t see that large of a difference being acceptable.
The second issue I noticed was that the author mentioned the sides needed to be dovetailed together, but then proceeded to use what I guess would be called large finger joints? This is an important distinction, because while a finger joint can be strong in modern joinery, it’s only strong because of the large amount of glue area. Modern glues are very water resistant, but Civil War era glues would have been made from cow hide, and water soluble. Meanwhile, the historically accurate dovetail joint gets all of its strength from geometry and does not rely on glue at all! You can see the trapezoidal shape of the dovetail in the first picture above where the wood has chipped off.
Both the tutorial article and the merchant site both reference the Union Army Ordinance Manuals from the time. So, I figured that’s a good place to start. Here’s a link to the full text on Google Books, but I’ve posted some pictures here too of the relevant sections:
There’s a lot of really great information in these two images, but let’s just break down the essentials:
White pine boards
Dimensions for the .58 Caliber box are 14.75″x 10.75″x 6.38″ (6.38 is that same as 6 and 3/8ths, rounded up)
Should contain 1,000 cartridges (this is from the sentence on the previous page I had to crop out)
Dovetailed and nailed
Wooden handles nailed and clenched
Lids (plural, I take this to mean top and bottom) attached with 1.75″ screws.
In the interest of full historical recreation, I also opted to do this using only hand tools. Even my hand tools are certainly more advanced than what they had at the time (they would have used wooden bodied planes, for example), but they’re still the same in form and function.
Let’s start with the dimensions. The article’s instructions say to cut each piece of wood to those dimensions. However, I found references to the fact that these would have been interior measurements, not exterior. CS Cutlery mentions this in their dimensions (though theirs, curiously, still don’t match the manual…). As a woodworker, these dimensions being interior measurements makes a lot of sense to me. The lumber they were working with was by no means universal in any way, shape, or form. Each piece would have been individually surfaced, by hand. As such, there would be no way to know that each box would contain the same amount of ammo if exterior dimensions were given as each board would be a different thickness.
I was able to double check this using the dimensions for the 10 cartridge bundle listed in the manual as well. Each bundle would be approximately 8.67 cubic inches, for a total volume of 867.1 cubic inches of volume per 1,000 cartridges. A box with exterior dimensions as listed above, with side panels of 0.75″ thick (about the thinnest you could reasonably go) would have interior dimensions of 13.25″ x 9.25″ x 4.88″. This gives only 598.11 cubic inches, whereas the interior measurement method would give 1011.63 cubic inches; plenty of room for 1,000 cartridges and paper lining.
Enough of the historical referencing for now, how about some woodworking?
I chose to start with rough cut lumber, since it seemed a bit liked cheating to tout doing this with “hand tools only” if I had it surfaced before I bought it. This board is about 12.5″ wide, 4/4 rough, and 12′ long white pine. If you aren’t a stickler, you can get pre-surfaced pine at any home improvement center; this would simply be 1x material. I doubt Home Depot or Lowes would carry it in this width though, so go to your local lumber yard like I did (thanks WunderWoods!). What you get at HD would be SPF which means ‘Spruce, Pine, or Fir.” I’ll let your degree of accuracy dictate whether or not you care about that.
Big bonus of using Wunderwoods? St. Louis had a major Union arsenal during the war. All of the white pine they used would have come from this area. Since I know Wunderwoods harvested this locally, is it the progeny of a tree that was at one time cut down during the civil war to also make ammo boxes? I’d like to think so!
On a board of rough cut lumber, no matter how good your lumber yard is, there’s no good straight reference edges.
You can do all the dimensioning of these boards with four tool(s): A crosscut saw (this is the one I have), a rip saw, a #5 plane (#4 would also work), and a set of chisels. If you get a two sided Japanese Ryoba saw, you can actually get away with just one saw! A dedicated, Western style rip saw is almost impossible to find these days unless you want to spend at least $80. Antique malls and Craigslist are your best bet, though you’ll need to sharpen it (which is a whole ordeal on it’s own)
I’m going to cross-cut everything at least two inches longer than I need to account for more waste when I square everything up. Since we’re working off interior dimensions, add 1.5″ to that to account for the width of the sides (we’re shooting for about 3/4″ thick sides). Then add 2 inches to that to account for waste. This 12 ft board came up JUST short of doing the box on it’s own, if so make sure you buy more like 14 total feet. Coincidentally, 12.5″ is almost dead on the width we need for the top and bottom, so if you can get that width, do! If you can’t, you’ll need to edge glue two pieces together.
Use a square to make a line off one edge as a saw guide, knowing that it won’t be your final cut
After you get the boards knocked down, you need to get to the proper height; in this case, 6.38″. You COULD try to go right to rip cutting, but you still don’t really have a reference edge, so it might not turn out well. Instead, I put the boards in my vice and plane on edge dead flat and approximately square to the face. That gives you an edge from which you can measure off parallel lines.
My phone’s camera was on the fritz, so I lost a few pictures; you should be able to follow just via text. Off that edge you just planed, mark a line the length of the board, parallel and 6.5″ from the flat edge. Use your rip saw to cut just on the outside of that line; that will leave room for final planing.
Now that you’re almost at the width you need, you’ll need to surface both faces flat and parallel to each other. If you have a woodworkers bench, you can use the various clamps and vices on there to hold the board. I just have a regular work bench, so I needed to make bench hooks to help hold the piece while I plane it.
Here’s the process I followed:
Plane one face, checking for flat with a ruler or, in my case, a perfectly flat surface like a cast iron table saw top. Make sure it’s also square to that first edge you planed.
Plane the other edge square to that face, making sure not to go past the 6.38″ line.
Plane the final face, using both edges to check for square. If your edges are square to the first face, and the second face is square to the edges, both faces will be parallel.
After surfacing your first board, repeat with the other three, using the first as a reference for thickness.
This is maybe a quarter of the shavings I made
Now we need to know how thick our sides will be so we can measure the final length of the boards. The best way to do this is put each pair of opposite sides together, measure the total thickness, and then add this to the adjacent length (width) depending on which set you’re measuring. In this picture, my long sides measure about 1 and 13/16ths thick. So, my short sides (10.75″ interior width) need to actually be 10.75+1 & 13/16th long. This is to account for the dovetails (this will make more sense soon).
Using your square, cut a perpendicular line off one side of each board. Then, measure the length you need off that edge, and crosscut the other side to your final dimensions. Use your hand plane to get the width down to 6.38″ if you haven’t done so already.
I use the “dividers” method for laying out my dovetails. Here’s a video of that process for you.
I’m gonna level with you; I’m not great at dovetails, at least not great enough to pretend I can instruct you how to do them. Here’s a video from Paul Sellers on how to make them. Here’s a link to an inexpensive dovetail saw. You can mark the dovetails using only a combination square, but a dovetail guide, marking wheel, and marking knife make this easier. I got all three as a kit from Woodcraft around Christmas for $25. The cut lines made by the knife and wheel help guide the saw blade.
Dovetails are difficult on hardwood. They’re really, really difficult on a soft wood like white pine. Don’t beat yourself up too much, I’m telling myself it adds to the historical character.
I found examples of munitions boxes from that period that had the dovetail “tails” on either the long or short boards. I chose the long boards, the geometry of the tail providing a strong force to keep the box from pulling apart if one were to drag it by the handles.
Here’s a pic of the rough fit for the box bottom/lid. Mine was the exact width needed by pure chance. Surface this just like you did the other boards.
Time to add the screws. The manual specifies 6 screws per lid. Presumably, both the top and bottom lid would have been screwed on, only to be opened at the battlefield or camp. There didn’t need to be a mechanism for closing and reopening these boxes frequently.
For the sake of “hand tools only” I went and bought this old egg beater drill off Facebook Marketplace. It was about $15 and, though it didn’t come with bits, readily accepted a normal brad tip drill bit. A brace and bit setup would likely be more accurate, but my brace only has auger bits, which would be too large.
The screws used at the time would have been slotted, or “flat head” screws, since the Phillips head wasn’t invented until around the 1930s. While they COULD have been brass (as some use in their box construction) I find it unlikely, given the added expense, and whatever you find at your hardware store will likely be zinc coated. The only option I could find was Kennedy Hardware. They carry flat head, slotted, steel wood screws in a bunch of different lengths. Unfortunately, not in 1.75″ (when I was looking). So, I settled for 1.5″; will the reenactors forgive me? Too early to know. (Note: They have No. 12 screws in 1.75″, but those are almost 1/4 inch in diameter, which I was sure was far too large). Before you screw anything together, measure the diagonals. If they’re equal, all your corners are square.
Here’s a look at everything with the bottom attached. Since I am making this as accurate as possible, I will probably ship it to my brother with the top attached too. I’ll also include two little strips of wood and some cut nails so my brother can put them on the inside of the lid, if he likes, to make it more usable for storage during reenactments (see the plans above). Not accurate, but more practical; his call in the end. ATTACHING THE TOP LID SHOULD BE THE LAST STEP YOU DO.
Some gaps on the dovetails, but just as strong. Once painted, you’ll never be able to tell.
The ordinance manual also specifies the dovetails should be nailed. The way a dovetail works, it is very strong in one direction, but separates easily in the other. In the case of this box, it would be very hard to pull the short sides off the box, but relatively easy to pull the long sides off. By driving cut nails into the “tails” of the joint, we ensure the tails will not pull out. Modern wire nails would do a very poor job accomplishing this, as they have very little gripping power. But cut nails are wedge shaped, which compresses the wood as the nail is driven. Here’s an excellent video explaining the advantages of cut nails. Make sure to drill a small pilot hole with these.
I’m going off the original image, above, for my plans. In that image there are handles on the sides, but no rope in the handles. The ordinance manual doesn’t specify rope; an omission that I think points very strongly toward there not being any, given the specificity in all other aspects.
Use the scraps you’ve cut off to make these handles. By looking at the image we can see the handles are about 1/4 of the box height (call it 2 inches), as long as the side, and sit about 2 inches from the top. Use your plane to taper the ends down, then drive some 2 inch long cut nails (3 total) into the handle and through the box. I chose to drill a small pilot hole to aid in this, and prevent the wood from splitting. I purchased mine from House of Antique Hardware. Again, get the plain steel ones, not the galvanized ones.
After the nails are driven through, there should be about 3/8 inch that pokes through the inside. This is where we “clench” the nails. All that means is you hammer the tip sideways until it’s flat. Now that handle will never come off.
Attach the top and that’s it, folks! The manual specifies different paint colors depending on the ammo. This box would get an olive green paint. The manual even includes mixing instructions, but I’d urge caution given the use of turpentine and boiled linseed oil. Premixed, canned paint was not invented until 1866; if you decide to purchase a paint, rather than mix your own, powdered milk paint (not pre-made) would be period appropriate. I’m leaving it raw for my brother to decide what he wants to do with it.
I hope this is a valuable resource for all the reenactors and woodworkers out there! If you have questions on building the box, please feel free to email me. If there’s anything you think I did wrong in trying to reproduce this box, please let me know!
If you really want a historically accurate box like this, but don’t have the desire to build one, shoot me an email and we can talk about commissioning a few pieces. dibwoodworkingllc@gmail.com
Check for square by measuring the diagonals before the glue dries. Let it sit. We will apply the finish later, once the top is attached and the legs (which will dissolve if the finish touches them) are removed!
Do It Better (DIB) Woodworking 