HCJ: Chuperjirow

I have already finished the Pennsylvania Spice Box project. But before showing the pictures on the finished box, I'll write one last post about another new technique that I had to learn. This time is the case for Ogee Bracket Feet.

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OGEE BRACKET FEET

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I started the ogee bracket feet construction by drawing a template. I drew it in AutoCAD program and printed in autoadhesive paper. Then I stick it to a scrap piece of plywood and trim it at the scroll saw. The idea is to get a template that I can use more than once. I also milled four blanks, each one will yield two feet halves.

Use the template to transfer the shape on the workpieces, be sure to keep the template tight to the edges. I had to do some eyeballing to find the center of the semi-circle that forms the spur and draw a dot in place.

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Next step is to cut the feet halves. First use a forstner bit to drill a hole in order to get a sharp spur (using the eyeballed dot), then finish the cutting job at the scroll saw.

Note the grain direction on the spline. The spline is a great help to keep the pieces aligned but I didn't find an eficiently way to apply clamps... The ogee shape is very odd for clamps... Dang, that's a huge and embarrasing gap, fortunately is not a show area so nobody will see it.

The outside face of the feet has a particular profile, one part is concave and the other part is convex. With a band saw this should be straightforward, my problem is that I don't have a bandsaw. So I scratch my head and then it ocurred to me to cut the concave part of the profile using the cove cutting technique. This worked very fine so I was very proud of my discovery, unfortunately after a couple of days I found this article in the web, so my discovery wasn't new.  dang!!

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But still had to solve another problem. There's a convex part to be done to complete the profile. What to do? I scratched my head again but nothing happens. So I got a beer, then another, and another and... vualá!! Inspiration arrives. Lay out some lines and then used my block plane to cut a "big chamfer". Check this out:

Once installed, the ogee feet should be reinforced. I glue up a vertical wood block to carry the load and two horizontal ones to reinforce the grip of the feet to the box. It looks odd to me, but I found similar approaches like this on the web so I believe it's right.

Part I: Resaw wide boards

Part II: Hand cut through dovetails

Part III: Ogee bracet feet