I wasn’t planning to make a saw till, but…
I pulled a panel saw off its peg while finishing another project, and cut my hand on its teeth. I thought bugger this, abandoning my current project mid-stream, I lay my largest handsaw on a big piece of cardboard I keep for making prototypes and started to design a saw till around it.
If I have the time, I like to build my shop furniture like proper furniture, as I need all the practice I can get with joinery and hand tool skills. I never lose an opportunity to cut some difficult joints!
I chose to join the main carcass at all four corners with through dovetails to support the cabinet's hanging weight, and added two utility drawers under the main till.
The draw shelf and divider are joined with simple stopped dado grooves.
The drawers are made with Jarrah from an old recycled desk 18mm drawer fronts joined to 12mm draw sides with blind dovetails. The drawer backs are joined with through dovetails and a ply-based slide from the back into a 4mm groove cut into the side, and with my handy plough plane.
I had some unused space above my back saw storage section, so I built a small cabinet to display the kerfing plane that I built last year. The little top cabinet is joined with wedged through tenons top and bottom with through dovetails where the shelf and the upright join. Huge overkill, but I wanted to practise my wedged tenons as I love the look of them. I added a small 16mm oak dowel to hold my hatchet on the side of this top section. I like the idea of all rough stock prep tools in one space.
The saw blade holders are made from Jarrah, with 5mm kerfs cut out and fitted into dados cut in the cabinet, secured with wooden nails.
The back is 12mm pine lining boards
Special features include two toggles to hold my fret and coping saws on the till, and a magnet in the centre blade rest to hold my Japanese flush trim saw.
The case is finished with a mix of Boiled Linseed oil and beeswax.
It was a fun project, I am happy with the progress I made with my joinery. I needed to find a place for it on my tool wall, which resulted in half a day of reorganising the wall. I have left a space in the centre of the wall to build a low-profile plane-till. I dont have enougth space to have a sloping plane till so I am deciding if i am going to use a bottome rest and a 20mm Neodymium Countersunk Pot Magnet on the top or make a wodden cleat to hold the top of the planes.
I hope you get some ideas or inspiration from this project the way I do from the other woodworkers I follow.
Cheers
David
Rather nice. I’m convinced that shop-organization in a tight workspace is an endless task 🤯
Now you need a proper spot for your router plane :)
It’s a step up from my plywood offcut version. Nice work.