Hand Cut Dovetail Drawers and Parts Drawers Complete!

I tried my hand at making a couple of hand cut dovetail drawers.  This is a task that is intimidating for many woodworkers, myself included, so I made these just for the shop.  They're made out of 2x4 pine ripped and planed down to 1/2 inch thick, like my last batch of under shelf parts storage drawers.

I'm not going to attempt to give a tutorial on how to make these dovetails.  There are hundreds if not thousands out there online, and most of them are better than anything I can do.  I will tell you that I used the "tails first" method (google it), and that it worked for me.  I also used a relatively low quality saw, and I have no experience doing it.  These first attempts came out as functional drawers, and that counts as success for me.  They're not the most beautful joints in the world, and the only reason they are as good as they are is that I cut well outside my lines and spent a lot of time pairing down the pins to fit with a chisel.  If you're taking this project on for the first time, I'd recommend making through-dovetails only on your first attempt and use a false drawer front.  Make them out of 1/2 inch material, and plan on using them in the shop or somewhere else that no one will expect fine-furniture quality.  And remember that even dovetails that don't fit perfectly still make good strong drawers!

I used this web page as my guide: http://www2.gol.com/users/nhavens/htmlfile/dt1-e.html

And now, without further adieu, here are all pictures of all 8 joints.  The good, the bad, and the ugly.  Also note I made the slot for the drawer bottoms all the way through so that's the square gap you see on all the bottom half-pins.

And here's the picture of the full completed row of parts storage drawers.  All but one of these are already at least partially occupied, and I'm really pleased with how they turned out.



If you like what you see, consider subscribing to our blog.  We have email and rss/atom options on the top right of this page!