Category: The Anarchist’s Tool Chest

This isn’t a tutorial on dovetails. The world needs another one of those like we need another portal to hell below an abandoned Chi-Chi’s.

Instead, this blog entry is about some of the details that are specific to making a tool chest. So not all these bullet points apply to drawers or other casework.

Gang Cut Your Tails
I’m indifferent as to which part of the joint I cut first. It really depends on the type of dovetail joint. When I cut massive dovetails for a tool chest, I cut my tails first because I can gang-cut the tails. When I introduced this idea to my classes on building tool chests, we saved almost a day.

The only downside to dovetailing through 2” of pine is that the sawdust can pack into the gullets of your saw and stop the cutting action. Here’s how to avoid this problem with the flick of the wrist. Once you are about 1/8” deep into the kerf, begin lifting the saw a smidge on your return stroke. This allows the sawdust to fall from the teeth and clears your gullets.

Also, here’s a tip when gang cutting: Clamp the boards together as shown above when inserting and removing the boards in your vise. This makes it effortless to keep the boards aligned throughout the cutting.

A Joint in the Tails
Many old books on building tool chests recommend you stagger any glue lines in your panels for a tool chest so that the entire chest doesn’t split in the middle if/when your glue fails.

I have seen many pieces of messed-up old furniture, but I have never seen a glue-line failure on four panels. So I generally don’t worry about this advice.

I do, however, try to bury the glue line in the middle of a tail. If your glue is sub-optimal you don’t want it running through the sloping wall of a tail. A piece of your tail could break off during assembly. This I have seen.

Chop to the Side of Your Chisel
If you stand at the end of your panel while chopping then you have no clue if your chisel is 90° to the surface of the panel. You need to stand or sit to the side so you can see if the chisel is 90° or some other angle if you are undercutting the floor of the joint.

Good Marks
Finally, I recommend you use traditional marriage marks on the edges of your panels. By looking at these marks you can instantly see if you have your panels messed up. I have watched hundreds of students ignore my advice and use their own A-A, B-B, C-D system and mess things up royally at glue-up. No marking system is perfect, but marriage marks are the best method I’ve found.

Plus, it’s a universal language. I can see if someone is screwing things up from across a room and attempt to save them if they are using marriage marks. If your marking system involves emojis, Pokemon and the compass rose, only Squirtle can save your butt.

— Christopher Schwarz

Note: This article is part of an ongoing series about the details of tool chest construction.

When building a tool chest, it’s tempting to get to the dovetailing as soon as possible. However, the work you do before the dovetailing is more important in the long run. (Even crappy dovetails hold nicely after hundreds of years.) And so I’m afraid we’re going to talk about a topic that bores people to tears: stock preparation.

Stock Selection
I use white pine for tool chests whenever possible. It’s lightweight, easy to work and plenty strong. My second choice is poplar (Liriodendron tulipifera), which is dirt cheap here in Kentucky. Poplar is easy to work and available in wide widths. The major downside to poplar is its smell. Some people find its odor to be as pleasing as dog poo. It doesn’t bother me.

Crosscut in the Rough
After I purchase my stock, I immediately crosscut it to length while it’s still rough and sticker it for a couple weeks in the driest area of my shop. I check the moisture content with a meter to ensure I don’t encounter any surprises. Boards move the most while losing their last few bits of moisture as they reach equilibrium. So let them do this while in the rough.

Making Panels
Tool chests are painted, so you don’t have to fuss over the grain patterns in the panels. But you should fuss over the grain direction. After jointing and planing the boards to size, orient the boards in each panel so the grain direction runs the same way.

Also, and I know this will make people howl, orient the heart side of the boards so they will face the outside of the tool chest. Doing this will ensure the corners of your tool chest will stay as tight as possible. That’s because when boards warp, the bark side becomes concave and the heart side becomes convex. So putting the heart side facing out will force the corners of your carcase together. If the bark side faces out there is a danger that the corners will open.

This is a fine detail because the carcase is enclosed by dovetailed skirting. But you might as well do it right.

Squaring and Planing
After your panels are glued up, square them up. Don’t trust your machines to do this. Check the ends with a reliable framing square and tweak the panels with a handplane. Then remove all the machine marks on the boards’ faces with a handplane. Do this before dovetailing.

If you handplane your panels after dovetailing, you can create gaps in your joints. You can plane the tailboards without creating gaps, but planing the pinboards after the joints are cut is asking for trouble.

With your panels square and clean, you are ready to cut dovetails. Details on that operation next.

— Christopher Schwarz

When I wrote “The Anarchist’s Tool Chest,” I didn’t think a single person would actually build the chest shown in the book. That’s why I greatly condensed my construction instructions, and I eliminated chapters for a traveling version and a Dutch chest.

Six years later, building these tool chests comprises a significant portion of my income. This is both surprising and heartening. Yes, wall-hung tool cabinets and racks are great – no argument. But there is something about a tool chest that appeals to certain woodworkers.

I have been working out of a tool chest since 1997 and – after using racks and cabinets – am deeply satisfied with my choice.

This week I have launched into building two full-size chests for special customers. Both chests will have a full suite of hardware from blacksmith Peter Ross. Plus lots of details I’ve been itching to try, and some new ideas from the customers that I’m quite excited about.

I’ll document their construction here – not so much to generate additional business (I have 14 commissions lined up for 2018), but to make up for the lightweight instructions in the book.

First up: Choosing lumber and gluing up the panels. Look for it soon.

— Christopher Schwarz

Memory is a damn funny thing. It can be as impossible to hold onto as a handful of water. And yet you can drown in a cup of it.

Today I went to pick up a load of sugar pine for an upcoming tool chest I’m building for a customer and got whacked upside the head by a pointed 19-year-old memory.

Since the closing of Midwest Woodworking a few years ago, I’ve run dangerously low on my stock of sugar pine and didn’t have enough to do the job. Enter Kevin McQueeney, an Indianapolis woodworker who offered to help me purchase a load through his local supplier.

After some back-and-forth, it became obvious that the sugar pine was going to come from Shiels Lumber here in Cincinnati. It’s an old place in the neglected industrial lowlands of the city, about a half mile from the foundry that makes our holdfasts.

Hearing the name Shiels was like waking up from a deep dream. How had I forgotten about this place?

When I started at Popular Woodworking magazine, the first significant project I was permitted to build was an interpretation of Benjamin Seaton’s tool chest. My boss made me change a lot of details so it would be accepted by the magazine’s readership – the corners were assembled with finger joints instead of dovetails, and the interior till had to be simplified.

But despite these compromises, it was a major piece and the first cover project of my career.

The first hurdle with the project was finding white pine that was thick enough for the job. One of the associate editors took me to Shiels, a wholesale yard that is off-limits to retail customers. We loaded up a truck with the pine, and I remember looking up at a weird sign painted on a building that towers over the yard that reads: “This Way Sinners.”

I wondered about the sign 19 years ago. And I had the same sense of wonderment as I loaded my pine today and looked up at the same sign. Thanks to the Internet, I dug up a history of the sign behind the guy who had it painted in 1896. You can read it here. It involves a trip to the Holy Land, a misplaced photograph and hieroglyphics. And the story ends with: “Most salads require a little pinch of salt.”

And the pinch of salt in this story: After 19 years I’m back to building tool chests, buying pine at Shiels and wondering which way this sinner should go.

— Christopher Schwarz

Though you might find this odd, a sizable chunk of my commission work is building tool chests and workbenches for people.

When customers first approached me with these jobs, I resisted. My response was: You’re a woodworker; you can build your own for much less money. But after further discussions, I realized that I could say this to almost any aspect of the craft.

Don’t have a shop? You’re a woodworker – build one.
Don’t have a handplane? You’re a woodworker – build one.
Don’t have a wooden floor?
Don’t have a dovetail saw?
And etc.

When it comes to the great Time Vs. Money Scale, some of us have more time. Others have more money. (Few of us have both or neither.) And so I started making workbenches and tool chests for customers. This also conveniently drained my supply of half-built tool chests and workbenches in my garden shed that were left over from classes.

For woodworkers who can’t afford a tool chest from me (they cost $2,000 to $3,500 depending on the options), I encourage them to buy a vintage tool chest. In the Midwest, South and East, almost every antique store has a chest to sell. You just have to tune your eyes to see them. Typically they are holding other items – plates, glassware or creepy dolls – and so they are easy to miss.

They often show up in local auctions – an Amish auction near me usually has a dozen chests each year.

And the price is right. About $200 to $400.

Most of them need to be cleaned up. The tills are worn out and need to be repaired. Mouse holes are common. Rot in the bottom boards is a frequent feature. Dislocated hinges and a pink paint job round out the list of things you’ll want to remedy.

But it is a great alternative. Most chests can be fixed up with a day of work in the shop. And you will get a gold star in woodworker heaven for saving a tool chest from its doom as another plant stand.

— Christopher Schwarz, editor, Lost Art Press
Personal site: christophermschwarz.com