Display cabinet

Some weeks ago, I was lucky to buy an old chinese composite from Peter Dekker. Some of you have probably seen it already on Facebook. I figured it deserved a proper cabinet to protect it from dust, and this gave me an excuse to play around with other woodworking techniques that I have been wanting to try for a while.


[external image]
As I have been rehabilitating my workshop this fall, I had an old window to spare, and amazingly the glass had the perfect size for the project. The frame will become arrow shafts.


[external image]
I made the frame of the cabinet out of cherry, and dowetailed the corners. I've never dowetailed anything before, so I made two test pieces first. On the third try it worked alright.


[external image]
The materials were sawed on the bandsaw, and then hand planed. With a properly sharpened iron, sandpaper is not neccessary.


[external image]
For the back of the cabinet, I used some birch plywood. It would eventually be covered with textile anyway.


[external image]
I chose to make the door frame out of wenge, as it is the darkest wood that I had at hand. The dark colour would match the dark decoration on the bow. The sides and the top/bottom is book-matched, to make the pattern symmetric.


[external image]
I was considering using a tenon-joint at the corners, but figured the frame would be too thin and wide to makt it work properly. Half-lap joints are easier, and should be strong enough. Here you can also see where the glass goes. I fixed the glass to the frame by glueing some small pieces of wood around the edge after inserting the glass.


[external image]
The door was scraped smooth with a card scraper before putting on shellack. Wenge is really hard and wears quite heavily on any tool, so the scraper had to be set up a considerable number of times.


[external image]
Test-fitting the door to the frame.


[external image]
Here the hinges have been mounted, and I have started wondering how to cover the back panel with textile. I used black wool normally used for the norwegian traditional dress, and glued it down with non-gelling fish glue. The edges were covered with some small strips of wenge. Here is of course also the bow test-placed. :)