The easy part. Each wedge is pared fl ush with the surrounding tenon. Then
they are removed and stuck to a piece of blue painter’s tape.sides, and to make the runners a substantial thickness.
A small rabbeted lip is left on the end grain of the drawer
front, so that any trimming needed to fi t the front would
be on this small edge. I’d seen a similar detail on an original
drawer, and was curious to see if it would be as easy to trim
and fi t as it fi rst appeared. The fi nal fi tting was indeed easier,
but this complicated the drawer construction.
I cut the dovetail joints at the front and made the sockets
between the pins^1 ⁄ 8 " deeper than the thickness of the drawer
sides. After fi tting the pieces, I took them apart, and cut the
rabbets on the ends of the drawer front at the table saw.
When I was satisfi ed with the joints at the front of the drawer,
I cut the drawer back to length, then cut the through-dovetails
at the rear of the drawer’s sides.
Setting the sides of the drawer in from the ends of the
drawer front posed a problem for letting in the groove for the
drawer runners. I used a small router with a fence to cut the
grooves, but had to temporarily attach thin pieces of scrap on
each side of the groove location to keep the base of the router
above the end of the drawer front’s lip.
After cutting the grooves, I carefully measured back 1" from
the inside edge of the rabbet on each side. The fence on the
router left the grooves short of this, so I used a chisel to ex-
tend the groove to this line, squaring up the end of the groove
in the process. It’s important that the grooves end at the same
point, so that the ends of the runners can act as drawer stops.
I cut the maple runners and fi t them to the width of the
grooves in the drawer sides. Gravity will keep the top edge of
the groove in contact with the runner, so the runner can be
sized to slide easily. I left a margin of^1 ⁄ 32 " so that the drawer
won’t bind if the runner swells in width.
After fi tting the width, I planed the faces of the runners
until the combined width of the drawer and runners with both
runners in place was^1 ⁄ 16 " less than the inside of the cabinet.
There needs to be some room to allow for easy movement of
the drawer, but not so much as to make the drawer sloppy.
The drawer bottom is^1 ⁄ 2 " thick, and slides into^1 ⁄ 4 "-wide,
(^1) ⁄ 4 "-deep grooves in the insides of the drawer sides and front.
I used the same setup on the router table for raising the back
panels to form the tongue on three edges of the drawer bot-
tom. The back of the drawer is^1 ⁄ 2 " narrower than the sides to
allow the bottom to slide in after the drawer is assembled. A
couple screws in elongated holes secure the thick back edge
of the bottom to the drawer back and allow for seasonal
wood movement.
With the drawer completely assembled, I measured in from
the front of the case 2^5 ⁄ 16 " (the 1^3 ⁄ 16 " thickness of the drawer
front, plus the 1" distance from the back of the front to the
end of the groove in the side, plus the^1 ⁄ 4 " set-back of the
drawer front from the front of the case).
I measured down from the bottom of the lowest shelf and
BOOK STORAGEBOOK STORAGE^6677
203 / 8 "
507 / 16 "
35 / 8 "
35 / 16 "
3"
3"
3"
273 / 8 "
203 / 4 "
(^3) / 4 "
(^1) / 2 " 1
/ 2 "
(^13) / 16 "
R=^1 / 4 "
BACK PANEL
BACK PANEL DETAIL
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