Building a wooden chest

[Estrix]

I wasn't sure where to put this. So I figured here. And I'm hoping some of the awesome people here can help

 

So, my wifes birthday is coming up and she's always wanted a wooden sea chest. But, I cannot afford such a thing. However, maybe I could make one? All advice welcome lol!

 

My carpentry experience is...limited. I haven't made anything out of wood in a long time, but I made some trays and a box and a bird house, that sort of thing. But I have some ideas for how it could be done:

 

1) Hardwood board for the base, get planks. Join planks to create sides (with...wood glue I think). Nail sides together, nail sides to bottom (or maybe dowels). Planks to make flat lid with vertical internal pieces for structural support.

 

2) Hardwood boards, nail four boards up to make sides (or maybe dowels). Lid.

 

3) More involved and cut notched joins in the board so the sides lock together. Same for the bottom.

 

All ideas so far have a flat lid. A curved lid seems more complicated than I can maybe manage. Is it?

 

Sand down with increasing grades of sand paper, varnish. I have some brass hinges and a lock that can be added.

 

So, is this achievable? Or am I crazy for this to be a project? I have all the tools I need, I think. But mostly manual not electric :s Coping saw, few grades of chisel, drills, sandpaper, even some varnish somewhere (from a fence job lol).

[Maj. Bloodnok]

Yer mad.  Mad, I say!  I like the way you think!

 

The arched lid is perhaps more complex than you might want to tackle, and not really necessary for a sea chest.  A flat lid makes the chest easier to stow under a bunk, table, dead man, etc.

 

You might want to check this page out: http://wayneofthewoods.com/cedarchest.html  It's pretty simple stuff; I wouldn't get into complex dovetail joints right now unless you want to go completely out of your mind.  Butting the edges together and nailing them will work perfectly fine.  If you want to get fancy, use dowels.  1X12 hardwood planks will give you a decent-sized chest with plenty of stability; if you want a bigger chest, you'll have to glue boards togather with dowels or biscuits and then plane them flat.  More work and frustration, as well as investing in bar clamps.  It might not be a bad idea to invest in a good Japanese pull saw or ryoko-noba; they work really well and they're cheap at Harbor Freight.  You can do cross-cuts and rip cuts with them.

 

Hope this helps!

[jfreaksho]

Since they are ridiculously expensive, I would recommend you call around to antique stores and 2nd-hand furniture stores in your area.  My wife found a very nice cedar chest (before we met) for a very good price at a store that resells stuff from estate sales.  It was beat up pretty well, which both gives it character and reduces the stress about banging it around or scratching it.

 

But yes, building one would be fantastic.  Keep in mind that quality wood is often more expensive than you'd expect.  You can save some money doing it yourself, but don't expect it to be cheap.

 

For what it's worth, if I were planning on building something like that I would spend the money and do it up well, or else treat the first one as a practice item.  Fence varnish might not be the best thing to use for a piece of furniture in the house.  Hinges you have lying around might not be the most effective ones.  Nails come loose over time, and aren't as pretty as they could be.  Hardwood is, well, hard, and not always the easiest thing to work with.  Nicely stained pine will likely be cheaper and easier to work with, especially for a first project that you might screw up.

[Anim07734]

I'll second checking second hand stores and estate sales first.  You may have to do some refinishing work, but it'll be a lot easier than making one from scratch.

 

If all you have is hand tools, you're probably going to want to stick with something small-ish for your first project.  Also, the bottom is typically just a board set into an inset (dado groove in the sides/front/back (see the how-to linked above).  If you use more than one board for each side, you're going to want them attached with more than wood glue.  Either a small block at the corners to attach everything or dowels/biscuits.

 

And a rounded lid isn't actually that hard, just cut a pair of matching half circles and lay flat boards around the curve of each.  You can cut the short edges at an angle to get a tighter fit.  I wouldn't recommend it for a first project though, especially without a jig saw or band saw.

[Nedwin]

I have a friend who makes them! They are beautiful and he adds whatever decals you want. Mostly they're Legend of Zelda themed...I can't access facebook from this computer, but when I get back to my room I'll try to remember to hop on here again and send you a link.

[Nedwin]

https://www.facebook.com/eric.joachim.31/media_set?set=a.858523010853260.1073741842.100000867088785&type=3

 

I feel like this link won't work...

[Estrix]

Thanks for the feed back and the link

 

In the end I went with the refurb idea. I bought a battered old chest and spent a fair amount of time restoring it (more or less ). It still has the previous owners luggage tag from 1944 so that's pretty cool. I can't link pics for some reason, but as soon as I work it out I'll post some.