Designing a midi pedal board Part 5: Box building phase

Tools needed:

-  Jigsaw with decent blade.  I bought a set of Bosch blades (12 tpi) for cutting.

-  Set of Rasps or some related tool used for planning an irregular surface after cutting.

-  Orbital Sander for finishing surface of the plywood and with a a very rough grit paper can actually be used (with care) for planning edges on thin soft plywoods (like Birch).

- Woodworking clamps, general purpose C Clamps (6 to 8 inches or as necessary for your project for glue working.

-Titebond glue.  I haven't really used anything other than Titebond and highly recommend it.

-Spray Adhesive, or any decent adhesive in adhering your printed template to the surface of the wood.  Ideally you should after finishing necessary cuts and having drilled holes, be able to remove the paper and adhesive with some preferably lighter sanding, so it shouldn't be on the order of super glue strength in terms of adherence or having left any significantly stronger and more resistant than the wood itself behind in terms of residue (omit epoxy or resins of this type).  :)

-Wood worker's square

-Angle Gauge 

-120 grit, 220 grit and 400 grit paper for sanding (for Orbital sanders).

-Miter saw (optional: for cutting woodstock)

-Additional woodstock for joining plywood on glue up schedules.

-Stain, Finish, and wood filler
-Plywood (Birch or whatever you like).  (I used approximately 5 mm thickness for mine). 

Adhere the template:

Check for grain orientation as related to your design.  How do you want the grain running?

I don't use nails, screws, staples or anything of the sort for my joinery work.  If you have routers and the like or have any fancier equipment, likely for more decorative or better joinery work include dovetails, box joints, and the like included in joining this surfaces.  I've kept mine as simple as pure surface contact joining while incorporating interior wood stock cut to the interior of the necessary pieces and having glued these prior to joining plywood pieces.  The reason for this, in my case, relates to increasing the surface contact area of the joinery work for the gluing which provides overall greater strength to the integrity of the contact surface especially where the joints are likely to receive overall potentially any greater load stress (i.e., gravity and potentially foot pounding).  The Titebond as advertised is (as long as the surface contact is good) as strong as the wood itself (and probably exceeding), and generally is considered superior to nails, screws or staples.  Some might prefer the other types of joinery mentions (dovetails especially) since with fine work, these potentially could be used without glue reinforcement (and again being superior to nails, and screws).  

Cutting edges:

I generally don't use rulers or any sort of measuring device, outside of the templates which should have enough metric precision for design layouts and provide visual guidance when planning cut edges.  Any wood stock that need be cut for the interior can refer to the actual cut plywood piece when measuring and marking necessary cuts.  

When I've cut, work as slowly and carefully as needed to avoid chipping the plywood while maintaining slight small equal distance as needed from edge boundaries of the template.  I usually gap this to no more than 1 mm if I can do it, and generally maintaining a straight line in doing so.  If you feel you can incorporate fences or rails in augmenting your cuts it may be worth it, but keep in mind the precision of the cutting instrument that you are using here.  A jigsaw isn't exactly a circular saw in terms of being rigidly maintained in it articulated vertical position as it is cutting (the blade is somewhat flexible and any cutting stress could throw lateral articulation off) which means that you may need to readjust the position of the jigsaw as necessary depending on the cutting medium that you are working, so even with higher end precision cutting instruments, ultimately the blade is responsible and guidance of the machine is as good as the cutting. 

Plane edges:  Use care when planning the surface of the plywood, the veneer depending on quality of the plywood may be prone to splintering and chipping.  Check for any possible curvature of your rasp (if you use these).  You should use a square in checking overall square for pieces as necessary.

Glue ups:  I use clamps.  You shouldn't need to apply too much clamping force.  If you have a glue up jig ready to go, this is probably one of the more superior setups especially used in mass production setups, but your step up can be as simple depending on how much time you want to invest with as simple as direct clamp contact with the plywood.  With irregular angles you will likely want to have (as shown below), contact blocks which establish a perpendicular contact surface.

  

My simple configuration, for example.  I didn't want to invest too much time here.

Apply glue to all necessary contact surfaces, and generally outside of visual line of sight, you can use touch running your finger for calibrating the piece in terms of a discernible edge.  For, instance my side pieces were laid out visually, checking with my square, and then having run my finger across the edge to check for gaps, and then having readjusted a necessary.  When all is said and done post sanding, you should be able to run your finger across joinery and not be able to discern any discontinuity between one piece and the next.  Most importantly everything should visually look good.

Woodfiller: I use these in some cases in filling areas as necessary are filling in edge work on the plywood.  Really depends on what you are looking for, maybe you want something that actually looks a bit rough shod and banged up anyways, so it doesn't matter.  

A bit of advice on sanding:  First wood cutting project that I have had in awhile.  Watch over sanding, for instance, don't be tempted to sand to the extent that you plow through the plywood veneer.

Finishing:  Consult with your stain and finishing products.  Just sand between coats as necessary as directed with specified papers.  I usually have used cloth products.  Lambs wool has been suggested for high gloss finishes (e.g. wood floors) watch for bubbling which can be a sign of improper finish contact...polys do this if you don't sand between coats properly and the poly doesn't have a proper surface contact with itself.  I've used something as simple as a cloth usually.