Making the Box

For this assignment, we were tasked with creating a wooden box using materials and tools from the woodshop. I was excited to learn more about these tools and create a box of my own. I chose to make my own design for the box itself, which would look more like a crate than a closed box. I spent some time planning out the design, and then I was ready to measure and cut the wood.

In the woodshop, I used the circular saw, jointer, and planer to bring the wood to the correct dimensions. I chose to make a slightly smaller 11″ x 11″ x 11″ crate. This was surprisingly fun once I had created my plan; I just needed to complete all the cuts and follow my own instructions. Then, I chose to use the router on the inner corners of the vertical pegs, so that the corners would not be nearly as prominent. This had a subtle effect on the appearance and feel of the pieces, but a nice one. I also wanted to use the router on the bottom planks of the box, but after experimenting with some of my scrap pieces of plywood, I realized the challenge of chipping the wood, so I chose to finish up in the woodshop and start my next process: sanding.

Since many of the wood pieces had fairly rough surfaces, and I knew there would be hard-to-reach places once I had finished assembling the box, I chose to complete an early round of sanding on all of the wood. This took a surprising amount of time, but I was very pleased at the texture of all of the pieces (at least compared to their original state).

Then, I moved onto the assembly of my box. I began by fastening planks to the vertical pegs, starting at the corners opposite from one another. This allowed me to more easily clamp the table to add the sides of the crate. Once I had completed these two halves, I joined them together with some slightly more creative clamping, but the principle was much the same. I made sure to measure and line up the edges as nicely as I could, and I also used a larger drill to “countersink” the holes so that screw heads would not be protruding from the surfaces. This worked very well, and once the four sides were together, I was pleased that the wooden pieces were now beginning to resemble an actual box!

I finished assembly by adding the three bottom pieces of plywood for the bottom. I struggled somewhat with the new material, and I had more trouble driving the screws into the wood, which resulted in some of the screw heads becoming stripped and protruding from the bottom face. Despite some imperfections, I was proud to see the box fully built. To finish the box, I used finer sandpaper to smooth the surfaces of the box, and also to soften the edges and corners of the wood. Overall, I learned a great deal from building this box, and it took a surprising amount of detail and effort to ensure that it was a high-quality creation.

Cost Analysis:

Wood Planks 1″ x 2.5″: 10 ft of planks, ~$1.50/ft: $15.00

Wooden Pegs and Plywood: ~$4.00

Screws: 36 wood screws, $10 per 100 screws: $3.60

Sandpaper: ~$2.00

Labor Costs: 6 hours of work, $10.00/hr: $60.00

Overall, the cost to produce this box was about $84.60.

 

-Kenton Roberts