Australian Wood Review - June 2018

14 Australian Wood Review

TOOLS & EQUIPMENT

See Col’s box making demos

at Sydney, Perth, Melbourne

and Illawarra wood shows!

A full range of products available

See website for de tails

THE EASIEST

JIG TO USE

No measuring!

No fiddling!

No fuss!

The Veritas inlay kit from Lee Valley

is bought as separate components

costing around $60 and uses a 1/4"

cutter (photo 2). Both kits work very

well with the Veritas being a little

faster to use with its larger diameter

cutter removing more waste with

each cut.

The smaller diameter Whiteside cutter

in my opinion gave a cleaner and neater

cut, although it needs more care in use

due to its smaller diameter.

Initially I tried a cheap dovetail key

template that I bought over the

internet. Although it looked good, it

was too thin to use without packing

out to allow for the brass guide, and

the dovetail keys it made were not

symmetrical (photos 3, 4). The lesson

is here is don’t buy cheap templates.

I then moved on to making my own

templates by simply gluing up thin

wood to form the desired shapes.

To make round inlay you will need a

round hole and the best way I found

to achieve this was with a quality

adjustable hole drill. The main photo

on p.12 shows the results gained from

the kits.

Whiteside inlay kit from

http://www.woodworksupplies.com.au

Veritas inlay cutting supplies

from http://www.leevalley.com

5. Inlay pieces are bandsawn
   off after routing. The blue
   tape holds the key in place
   while sawing.


6. Recess prepared and inlay
   ready to be glued in place.


7. Dovetail key inlay completed.


8. ‘Double hammer’ template.


9. Double hammer inlay ready
   to be glued in place.

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