How To Make Plywood Boxes • 10 of 64 • Woodworking project for kitchen cabinets, desks, etc…
Cutting rabbets AskWoodMan.com In this video I discuss the box joinery I will use for the plywood boxes. I also explain why it’s a good idea to work with scrap samples to keep from making an error in our finished panels. At the end of the video I show cutting this rabbet joint on the General table saw. You will see me using the following tools and machines: General model 350 table saw. This is video 10 of 64 in the How To Make Plywood Boxes series. Allan Little is AskWoodMan™ Follow him on twitter, be a fan on Facebook, or subscribe to his blog! twitter.com facebook.com askwoodman.com
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Like the way you handle the rabbets. Don’t need a dado set. Thanks for the tip.
@wdworking I have a dado set but they have a tendency to not leave as clean of a cut in plywood as I like. They also produce a lot more dust. They have their place don’t get me wrong, but I like to cut these rabbets like this where there is just fraction of resistance over a dado cut. Unless the dado blades are super sharp they are also prone to slightly lifting the piece making for an inaccurate joint unless everything is passed a second time.
it looks sort of precarious when you’re cutting the pieces standing on end.
@Majoofi The piece does waver a little and if I had a whole bunch of panels to cut or if it was for a higher end piece I would have clamped a guide board above the rabbet height to stabilize the piece. You definitely want the guide board above the joint so the waste drop does not bind. If I had introduced too much error I would have just made a micro pass with the router set up with the guide fence to true up any irregularities. The joints turned out well.
@Majoofi I made the mistake on the first pass to bind the waste drop with my pressure block and you saw the the saw throw that piece back. That is why I could not made the same cut with the piece flipped around against the fence because each waste piece would have bound between the blade and fence. It would have been ugly. Waste pieces have to be able to freely fall away.
Even though you were applying pressure to the back of the block you still got kickback. The waste piece just got lifted and thrown, not bound. Was there a hole in the wall behind you?
@smfield I made the mistake of binding the waste drop against the blade with my pressure block. I thought about editing it out but wanted to leave it in to show no matter how much I work on a machine I can overlook actions that can have negative consequences. The wall was ok.
I like your project and the information you are providing. However, I am concerned for your safety on a couple of places in the video. A feather board might have been a better choice. Kickback happens fast. Please stay safe.
@bgriggstwcny I could have edit out the clip where the piece shot back but left it in to show now matter how much experience one has bad things can happen. I never use featherboards. And it this case one would have needed to be shimmed up above the rabbet level or the feathers would bind the waste piece against the blade with disastrous results. I do often use straight wood pieces clamped to the saw to act as guide pieces and they also work as blade shrouds. Thanks for writing.
why didn’t you use a dado stack?
@attainableapex I have one but they can leave a ragged edge cross cutting in plywood. I would have had to add a sacrificial piece against the fence also. They also have a tendency to lift the piece often necessitating a second pass to avoid a hump in the rabbet. And the dust off of a dado is just a mess. They have their place and I use my set a lot but I prefer to do it this way. Thanks for asking and commenting.