Japanese style toolbox

[Rezi]

Apart from screwing some bits of plywood together to protect my workshop gear when I moved house I have never made a box before.
A friend helped me with my Pergola build and his toolbox was a rough pine box that had seen better days and had an old bit of window shutter cord as a handle. As a thank you present I wanted to make him a new one and decided on this design as it was fairly close to what he was already using.

The pine, which I think is redwood, is recycled hence the random dowel plugs to fill some old nail holes. Despite my tools being as sharp as I could get them I still had some issues with the soft pine crushing and tearing out and a few of the mortices were a little loose. I thought putting some wedges into the tenons would help with that but it didn't so I had to fill some gaps. I know the wedges are not orientated correctly but I was trying to expand the tenons in that direction.

 

[AJB Temple]

Nice first box. Great practice on joints and economical use of wood. I am sure you re proud. I would be.

Do you plan to fit a lifting handle? Or do the side indents do a sufficient job?

With a deep box such as this you may consider installing a lift out inner tray to take your Japanese marking out tools and small saws.

 

[novocaine]

looks great, the repairs to the timber are just part of the story.

Pine is a bugger for chisel work, I've often wondered about a different bevel angle for softwood, but then I've stopped wondering and gone and done something more productive, because only a few twisted and odd individuals have the time to regrind a chisel and spend their time doing experiments rather than actual make something. has anyone seen Mike? I have an idea for winding him up and I want to test it.

sorry, lapse of concentration, looks awesome.

 

[Rezi]

Nice first box. Great practice on joints and economical use of wood. I am sure you re proud. I would be.

Do you plan to fit a lifting handle? Or do the side indents do a sufficient job?

With a deep box such as this you may consider installing a lift out inner tray to take your Japanese marking out tools and small saws.

I carved out a grip section on the side panels for lifting but they are only finger tip deep but, as it is a gift, I won't be adding anything else. I did consider putting in a small tower of interlocking boxes in one corner to store the small things (screws, drill bits etc) but I decided against it in the end.

 

[Woodbloke]

looks great, the repairs to the timber are just part of the story.

Pine is a bugger for chisel work, I've often wondered about a different bevel angle for softwood, but then I've stopped wondering and gone and done something more productive, because only a few twisted and odd individuals have the time to regrind a chisel and spend their time doing experiments rather than actual make something. has anyone seen Mike? I have an idea for winding him up and I want to test it.

Nice job and it looks great!

Pine is a walk in the park for hand cut joinery compared to kiln dried American Ash, which is what I'm currently using. The late wood growth rings seem to be almost case hardened which makes it really bloody hard to push a chisel of any sort through - Rob

 

[TrimTheKing]

Looks great mate. Love the look and contrasting timbers. It’s a terrific first effort, you should be rightly proud.

 

[Malc2098]

Nice.

 

[thetyreman]

you did a great job on this, looks like a very handy box to have around.