Would I do it again

Drawers -  were certainly a lot harder than I thought they'd be using those runners. They were extremely difficult to set in and get right but I think they were worth the effort, not to see all the hardware when you open the drawer. As I had carved the front and carcass already it was much easier to fine tune the doors and drawers to match. I would have been in big trouble if I'd put normal drawer runners.
Carving - If I made this cabinet again I would set all the doors and drawers in, fettled them so everything was in place then carved the front. 
Because there where things I had to wait for I used that spare time to carve. It was  time management that forced me to carve earlier than I should have.
Hinges - setting the hinges in for the doors was difficult as there was no straight edge/point to measure off - nothing was square. The quality of the hinge was poor as I said earlier, very disappointing.
Lock - I was disappointed with the lock, the quality was very average. I thought being English it would be better than what it was. 
I'm not happy with the spacings around the drawers and doors. You need some but I didn't allow for sanding. Sanding takes a little bit off each and that compounds to a lot overall.

Handles - not sure they worked all that well. They are not sharp/crisp where they went into the wood, I feel that is not as good as it could have been. 

Would I make this cabinet again.....................yes if someone offered me enough I would. 

Photographing

Good friends of ours Steve and Stef Lloyd-Smith kindly photographed Hidden Spirit in our garage as moving the cabinet would have been an effort.

Steve takes the pictures while Stef and Sue stand around talking!

Finishing touch

Because the drawer sides where not square onto the front I had a small gap, so decided to finish with a small piece of silver

Finish

Sanding the cabinet through the grits was time consuming but I wanted to oil the cabinet to give a rich colour. Using 120,180,240,360,400,600,800 and finishing with 1200. Then applying 3 coats of livos oil brought the grain to life.

Finishing

Fettling the edges, making sure all the peaks match and the doors and drawers are flush with the cabinet carcass. 

Handles

As this cabinet has random carving I decided to place the handle on the top draw more at an angle, to irritate the eye.

Handles - the process

I designed the drawings so there is a flat area on each draw and door to accommodate the handles. I had already worked out what handles I was to make before drawing and carving the front panels.
These handles I wanted to be not very big, quite unobtrusive, like the crest  of a wave. But they needed to be big enough to grab, get your finger underneath and on top. 
I thought silver would be a nice contrast.

Dremel cutting space for silver handle

Random pictures

Some random pictures my wife took during the silver handle process

Handles - the process

Cutting out the shape

Filing the shape

Annealing 

Shaping

Handmade sterling silver handles

At the start of 2011 I attended South West College of TAFE in Bunbury gaining a Certificate IV in Jewellery with lecturer Steve Pease a Margaret River artist. 
 Took a run down to Steve's workshop to run past the design and process involved with him.

Drawer and drawing of handles on his bench

Under draw mounted runners

Spacing the drawers was a nightmare for me and I've more space around the drawers and door then I would like. 
Now I understand how these runners work and how they're mounted I would use them again as they give a slick finish. Why have a delicate cabinet and then see all this hardware on the side of the drawers And they are soft close which is nice. 
I could have used the old way on rails and styles, so sliding wood on wood, but after awhile they catch, The drawers are quite short, only 320mm long in this cabinet and they could be pulled out, I didn't want that.
I told a friend who has been a cabinet maker for years that I was using this type of runner for my drawers, she laughed and said "we don't use them, they're to hard and expensive".

Drawer runners

I wanted under drawer runners so they look more inconspicuous. I found them harder to fit than side mounted runners. As this is new to me I'm gaining the knowledge to fit them. Once the drawer runners were in and the drawers fitted I fettled the drawers to fit.

Drawers

Dovetails

Found some more sanding to be done on this drawer

Drawers

These 4 drawers are curved inwards. All the same curve but different width, working from the smallest at the top to the largest at the bottom.
Top drawer 130mm x 420mm


Sliding dovetail at the front and back of drawer which I had to make up jigs for. Because nothing was square I found this quite difficult. 

I had to square up one edge of the side and then work from that side. I had to make a level mount for the router to go on then it had to have a fence in the middle of the draw. Then I had to extend the router deep enough to cut the grooves and I ended up doing it in 3 passes.  That meant I had to change the jig onto the next draw, the next draw and the next draw. I did a levelling cut then a depth cut and a dovetail cut on either side of the draw by 4 drawers.

Pin

To lock the door I purchased latch/pin and I'm sure they are still made in the 1600's, they haven't changed their design. I did something different , I put the lock inside the door, having the pin coming out.

Osada Success 40

When your spending 8 hours per day for 10 days embellishing you tend to go through the dremels. I purchased this tool (on the left with the blue light) It's quiet with minimal vibration.
Now I can listen to music while I work.

Lock

Because the door is curved I didn't get a big lock. Once again this was poorly made, the bit of brass was not square, a disgrace really. It was quite thick so I've filed quite a lot of the brass away, so I can get it into the door.  So even a small detail of fitting a lock has been an issue with curved doors.

Finally the lock is fitted