Chunky Planter Build Process

15/10/2021

After a lovely walk round Westonbirt arboretum this afternoon there was still a bit of daylight and it was dry so I thought I'd cut the middle slots in the long lengths. I went through each piece and picked a face that would be on the inside of the planter and then alternated them so that four had the inside face pointing towards me and four had them pointing away. I then clamped them all together with some of the spare pieces in the end slots to make sure all the pieces were aligned.

I then marked the extents of the slots, deliberately marking them very slightly under-size so that I don't inadvertently end up with a loose fit. I could then use the track saw to cut the edges of the slots:

I'd left the router plane set up at the slot depth after cutting the end slots. I could thus use it to quickly mark the depths on the front and back planks:

I then removed the bulk of the waste with an oscillating multi-tool:

Each plank was then put in the portable workbench vice and the router plane brought the slot down to depth.

With only eight slots to do, it didn't take me long at all to get them all done.

I still need to bring them all to the right width as they're a little under-size as I mentioned earlier. I also need to cut a blind slot in six of them, as you can see in this CAD model:

The image makes it look as if the slot goes most of the way through the plank, but that's a result of the rounded corner on the plank (and possibly modelling the slot deeper than it's planned to be - I can't remember): it's a 20 mm deep slot in a 47 mm wide board so there will be plenty of material left.

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