Hey y’all!

This past week Kate and I worked on building our crate at the OEDK and are so excited to share our process.

designing -> cutting -> routing -> assembling -> sanding -> painting -> adding name plate

We first began by assessing our wood by laying it out and planning out our steps. We needed to recut some of the Pre-cut wood due to knots being near the joining points, causing weak points, and deep holes in the wood that would not be covered up.

Next, we routed the edges. For the bottom 3 pieces of our wood we did not route them to ensure there were no holes/gaps in the bottom. We routed only the side pieces and the vertical posts. For the vertical posts, we made sure the inner corners were 90 degrees so they would lay flush, and routed the outward facing corner. We routed the bottom ring of wood only on the top outside corner as to not create a a gap on the bottom. For the middle ring we did both of the outside edges. And finally for the top, we did all but the inside bottom edge. All of this can be seen in the drawing below:

 

After our initial routing we began to work on our handles. We drew outlines, then using the indoor bandsaw we cut out small slits within the wood. This created weak points and we were able to snap out the unneeded wood. Once a little section, slightly larger than the length of the blade, was removed we then finished cutting out the hole with the Bandsaw. Afterwards we decided to go back to the table router to clean up the handle’s edges. We decided to mess with the height of the table router’s bit and adjusted it to have a new design. We were concerned due to the woods variability and lower quality that if we tried using a more elaborate bit that it would chunk away and not be smooth, so we decided to use our second routing style as a modification to the same bit. By raising it, the flat 90 degree angle was exposed and created a cool outline around our routing!

Now that all our wood was prepped, we began assembling. When the OEDK was not busy, we created an assembly line. We had 3 drills (only 1 charged battery), and set them up so we did not need to change bits between turns. We used the 90 degree corner clamps to align the wood, then fastened it to the table using normal clamps. We measured and marked out our screws and began drilling. We made sure every piece was evenly aligned and flush to ensure our crate was level and beautiful.

*While assembling we came across a deep issue in one of our planks where the wood had split up and a chunk was peeling up. We applied wood glue and clamped it down and let it rest for 24 hours. Now, the wood is flush and you cannot even tell where it was!

After assembling we began sanding. We used the orbital sander and spent some time smoothing the surfaces until we were satisfied.

After being happy with our crate, we initially planned to stain the wood but noticed no one had painted their crate yet. We went outside and decided to have fun and try to decorate our crate with spray paint. We came up with the idea to make it Rice themed and use some stencils we would create with the vinyl cutter. Here are some images of the process. While painting, we got carried away and while our box is Rice colors, its a little Patriotic or Dallas Cowboys themed! Afterwards we sprayed it with a clear gloss top coat to protect our box.

We then worked together to learn how to use the laser cutter and created our two name placards that are secured onto the box with the yellow double sided tape.

 

COST ANALYSIS:

Screws: $12

Wood (1″ by 4″): $24

Wood(1″ by 1″): $3

Spray Paint: $12

Labor (10 hrs at $25 per hr): $250

Total: $301

For our cleaned up workspace, I have included an image of the table router as it had been left a huge mess and took a really long time to vacuum up and get all clean.