Small hanging cabinet with drawers part 7 (the door)

I planed the rails and stiles so they were of a uniform thickness. They were then ripped to the correct width and the edges were cleaned up.

The grooves for the insert panel were made using my trusty Stanley 248 grooving plane. I planed them closer to one side, so the insert panel won't protrude too much.

For marking the positions of the rails and the stiles, I used a trick I have seen in "the essential woodworker" I simply placed the pieces in the door opening and marked the intersections right from there. I kept the pieces tight to the sides of the carcase, so I am pretty sure that the door is either a tight fit, or a trifle too large. But it is will be easy to take a swipe with a plane and make it fit.

I am not very good at making mortises and tenons. But normally my problems are related to when I make through mortises. For this small door I reasoned that I didn't have to make through mortises - it will look better with a stopped mortise, and the strength will be more than adequate.

I don't have a real mortising chisel in my sea tool set, but it is not a problem to make a mortise using a normal chisel, you just have to go a little easy on the levering action so you don't break your chisel.

To minimize the potential gaps at the shoulders, I tried to use the trick of first making a small groove for the saw, using a knife and a chisel. This can really help, and since I don't have a shoulder plane, with me, it is essential that the shoulder should fit tight straight from the saw.

Once the frame had been finished, I turned to attention to the raised panel.

The material for the panel is originally a stacking side for a Euro pallet. It is 19 cm wide, and I only needed a piece which was 16, so I didn't have to glue up a panel. This is a huge advantage in my opinion.
The panel was ripped to width, had its thickness reduced by planing and then it was squared up on the shooting board.
To raise the panel, I first made 3 series of grooves next to each other, so I ended up with some nice wide grooves parallel to all edges of the panel.
I then used the smoothing plane to create a bevel. The end of the bevel had been marked with a marking gauge.
Next I used the grooving plane on the thin edge of the bevel, to make it flat so it could enter the grooves in the frame.
Finally the panel was sanded and everything dry assembled.

I tested the width of the door on the carcase, and it is perfect. I need to reduce the height a little bit, but all in all I am happy with the result.


The wide grooves in the panel.

The first bevel, note the "fence"

The dry assembled door. Notice the "horns"

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