Bombe' Chest....DONE!...pics*
Paul in NJ
>When I started this project my goal was to complete it in time for Christmas as a gift to my wife. It was ready a week ahead of time and was no surprise as she had seen it progress from the beginning. I used shellac for the finish using the French polish technique and I was pleased with the results. I followed the directions at http://www.milburnguitars.com/frenchpolish.html since this was a first for me. The French polishing wasn't difficult, a fair amount of work, but definitely worth the results. I experimented first on some scraps and received some advice and encouragement from my friend John Aniano. I did a final rubout with rottenstone.
We took a ride out to Ball and Ball located in Exton Pennsylvania and brought the chest along to pick the appropriate hardware. What a great place to visit. They had a nice choice of small-scale pulls for us to choose from. They also had several rooms of impressive period furniture built by the people at Irion Lumber with equally impressive price tags. Talk about nice tiger maple! If you are in the area it is worth stopping in for a visit. The brass back plates were gently shaped with a soft face hammer to fit the contours of the drawers.
I placed the number 5 Bailey plane in the next picture to give a sense of the scale of the chest as it is built to half size.
I would like to incorporate more carving in my furniture in the future like these ball and claw feet.
If you missed my previous posts showing interim progress they are located at http://www.woodcentral.com/cgi-bin/handtools.pl?read=14794 and http://www.woodcentral.com/cgi-bin/handtools.pl?read=15152.
This was a wonderful project for me and I think it was as much a gift to myself as it was a gift for my wife. I had trouble with some of the details like the dovetails and the beading and consequently they are not of the quality of some of your work and the work of other woodworkers I have seen. That said I am extremely happy with how well it turned out. Thank you for looking.
Paul Dzioba
P.S. If you want to see an exquisite Bombe' chest go to the SAPFM site and see the chest built by John Davis at http://www.sapfm.org/sapfmmay2003/einterview/davis/splash.asp
