Here are four of the chests stacked and ready to be delivered. The first was already en route to its new owner.
by Todd Ferrante <back to homepage >
Background: For Christmas 2002 I made five toolchests for the various guys in my and my wife's families. Each chest holds two trays for carrying about hand tools, boxes of nails or screws, or whatnot. Below the trays, there is room for small power tools or a toolbelt. Over Thanksgiving I spent a couple of days building the ten trays. The five boxes I worked on during the two weeks before Christmas.
|
|
|
Here are four of the chests stacked and ready to be delivered. The first was already en route to its new owner. |
Design goals:
I made myself a single carrying tray based on a tray my Dad made for himself. I found it quite handy for doing little jobs like hanging pictures, where you just need a few hand tools and a box of screws and a box of nails. The design of the box is roughly based on a toolbox that my Granddad made for himself. It was plywood except for the perimeter lid boards which were solid pine. His chest has a single tray made of metal that slides back and forth for access to tools in the bottom of the box. I replaced the single sliding metal tray with a pair of wooden tool trays. I didn't do any fancy joinery of finishing. I wanted the boxes to be able to be roughly used, or tossed in the back of a truck with no guilt.
Tools and materials used:
The trays are made entirely from 1x6 pine boards and some hardwood doweling for the handles. The pieces were cut out with a table saw. The holes for the dowels were drilled with a spade bit on my drill press. The trays are held together with #8x1 1/2 flathead wood screws. The top and bottom of the box are 3/4" plywood. The sides and ends of the box are 1/2" plywood. The sides and ends of the lid are 1x4 pine boards. I had to resaw the ends of the lid to be 1/2" thick to match the ends of the box. This was to clear the trays when they were in the box. The box and lid pieces are joined with simple butt joints, glued with wood glue and held together with finishing nails. The nails held the joints together while the glue was drying so I didn't have to use a bunch of clamps. The hinges, corner brackets and latches are just off-the-shelf items from Lowes.
Plans: The drawings were created using Solidworks mechanical design software. You are welcome to use them for non-profit purposes.
Here are the drawings: Assembly drawing and parts drawings for the tray dxf and jpg. Drawings for the toolchest aren't done yet.
|
|
|
The carrying tray, as modeled in Solidworks. |
