>> TOM: This week on Classic Woodworking, we're making a Shaker-inspired hall table out of beautiful solid cherry.

With classic Shaker simplicity, it has clean, light, refined lines, elegant tapered legs, an undercut beveled edge on the top, mortise and tenon joinery, and is completed with traditional pegs.

This project goes back to basics, and uses some fundamental hand tool skills.

And it's all coming up next right here on Classic Woodworking.

♪ ♪ >> Funding is provided by... >> Woodworking is a passion.

Woodcraft understands that.

We offer name brands and tools for fine woodworking.

Woodcraft, proud sponsors of Classic Woodworking.

And by Felder.

>> It's not only about work.

It's about fun and success.

We are with you.

Felder Group is your partner for your woodworking projects.

♪ ♪ >> And by SCM-- a rich heritage of woodworking technology since 1952.

>> TOM: So let's talk about our materials for the table.

We've got this rough-sawn cherry lumber that we wanted to efficiently get our leg and apron stock out of.

So we've got the six-quarter, the thicker material, to get our one-and-three-eighths square leg stock.

And we've got our four-quarter to get our apron stock, which is about three-quarters- to seven-eighths-inch thick.

So let's talk about how this goes together.

We're going to use the classic mortise and tenon joint.

We've got a mortise in the leg, and a tenon on the apron piece.

And they connect just like that.

It's super-strong, and will last for generations, especially when we put in the pegs.

Now, to get started, we've got to lay out our joinery.

So we're starting with the joinery on the legs first, the mortises.

Now, the legs are going to be tapered, so I want to think about the way the grain flows, so it agrees with the taper and doesn't fight into it.

So as I do my general layout, I like to use chalk, because it's bold, and it's easy to wipe off after, and I see it cleanly.

When we make our more precise, we'll go to the pencil.

So I'm looking at this leg, I see the grain going this way.

I'll taper it this way, and I want my taper to run that way.

So I know... this would be my face, face, and on the end here I'm going to mark the mortise of this leg.

And I'll make a tick mark on the top of both corners where I want a mortise beneath.

Here's my face.

So I'll come down from that tick mark, make a scribble for that mortise, come down from that one, and make a scribble here.

Now we have to define the height of the mortise.

And to do that, I'm going to use the width of our apron stock.

I like to just set up a square to be exactly the width of the stock.

Then we can set it on the top of the leg, and with a sharp pencil, make a defining mark under each of the mortises.

Now, we're going to have these mortises step down from the top, so it's not a weak leg.

We don't want the mortise to run all the way up the top.

So I've set another square to five-eighths of an inch.

And we'll come down and make another mark on top there.

So we'll carry this through all four legs, and then we're ready to cut them on the mortiser.

♪ ♪ So we're all set with our mortises.

We've got one little detail to clean up at the bottom of the mortises, where the mortiser doesn't quite reach.

I'll come in and just chop those fibers at the very bottom.

Now it's time to lay out our tenons.

To do that, I'm going to first mark our faces on all our apron stock.

I chose this face on this long rail because of the way the grain arched.

I'm going to go through all four rails like that, choosing the most pleasing face.

Once I've got the faces designated, I'm ready to set up and mark my tenon.

Take the actual apron piece and set it on one of my legs.

And I could cut this so that the surface was flush.

But I want to have a little offset to give us a shadow line.

To do that, I'll set it back about three-32nds of an inch.

I can come to the end and make a pencil mark right there, and then right there.

And that's it.

I don't need to mark all the rest, because the fence at the table saw will take care of that.

So at the table saw, we're going to cut our tenons.

I've got this homemade tenon jig clamped to a crosscut sled.

The jig is really simple.

It's just a square box put together with a vertical fence.

Now, to use it, I'll take my apron piece, orienting the face against the fence, and I'll bring it forward and make one of my cheek cuts.

Now, I've got this handy little thickness spacer, which indexes the piece over just enough to cut the five-16ths thickness that will fit my mortises perfectly.

All I have to do is flip it around end for end, keeping the face against the fence, and I'll run it on through.

I'll continue through all four pieces, then we'll be ready to make our shoulder cuts.

♪ ♪ So now that we finished making our cheek cuts, it's time to cut our shoulders.

Let me show you how I changed the setup.

I took off the tenon jig, and I've added this end stop, so that when I bring my piece up, it'll index off the stop, and give me my one-inch cut for the shoulder.

And I've set the blade height to cut to this side of the tenon.

I'll run them all through at that end, and then I'll flip and lower the blade a bit and come back and hit all the other-side shoulder cuts.

♪ ♪ So we're at the bandsaw now that we've got our tenons cut.

We have one last step in order to make this tenon fit.

You have to notch the top of the tenon in order to fit into the mortise.

Now, to do that, I'm setting a fence on a bandsaw.

I could cut this by hand, but the nice thing is, you mark one, and you can go ahead and cut them all efficiently.

I've set it to cut to my line, and I'll saw just shy of my shoulder.

Then I'll reset and make my shoulder cut.

♪ ♪ Back at the bench, we're ready to clean up the little bit that was left behind when we made our table saw cut and our bandsaw cut.

I'm using a sharp chisel, and indexing the flat back of the chisel against the shoulder.

And then I'll chisel down about halfway, and then come back from the other side.

Clean off that debris at the bottom of the cheek.

And we've got a nice, crisp tenon.

Now, the last thing we have to do is miter the inside corner of our tenons, because our mortises meet down in the leg.

So we'll have one tenon coming in from this side, and the other coming here.

And if we didn't miter the inside, we'd never get it to seat up to the shoulder.

So we'll just make a simple line on our other piece.

Making sure we're doing this off the inside, I'll take a rough measurement with my finger as a stop, and then draw a line that's approximately a 45.

Now, remember, in tapering, you always want to remove your taper from underneath the mortise.

I'm just going to make a little guideline so I don't get confused as I lay these out.

I want to take that end tapered, and then I'll be tapering off underneath this other mortise.

The first thing I need to do is lay it out.

Now, I'm going to cut these on the table saw, so I don't want to try to cut right to the mortise.

I'm going to drop it down about three-quarters of an inch, make a little indexing mark there.

Now, my leg is going to taper this way, and I want to be left with a five-eighth-inch-wide foot at the bottom.

So I'm going to measure from the outside, and come over on five-eighths and make another tick mark there.

Now with a straight edge, I'm going to connect the dots and I'll get a good straight line here.

So that's what we want to remove, is this area right here on the leg.

I built this jig with some special stops.

Our blocks here are indexing the leg as stops, so that when it nests against the bottom here, the part we want tapered off is overhanging the edge, so when I make a rip cut on the table saw, our taper will be sawn off.

We have these nice hold-downs that keep it firmly in the jig.

And safely, our hands will be away from the blade.

♪ ♪ With the legs all tapered, we've just got this table saw markings along the taper that we've got to remove.

It would take a long time to do this with sandpaper, so we're going to use a hand plane.

We'll also refine the taper to have it begin closer to the mortise.

So I'm going to make a scribble mark just below the mortise.

And when I see that scribble mark disappear, it's time to stop.

And I want to double-check that I'm maintaining square as I plane through all four legs.

When I begin, I want to keep firm pressure on the nose of the plane, so it's indexing off the slope of the taper.

(plane scraping) Whew!

That looks sweet.

Now we just have to plane through all four legs, and we'll be ready to cut our pocket holes in our aprons.

Now, the only screws we use on this project are to attach the top to the apron.

We'll do that by these hidden little pocket holes on the inside of the rail.

But I like to use a straight chisel and spend a little extra time and create this inverted pyramid that shows you took a little extra care in attaching the top.

Now, to get started, we have to make our back cut that defines the depth of the screw.

I want to be at a bit of an angle, because this screw is going at an angle.

So once we've got our back line chopped, we're ready to start paring the V. Now, I'm going to start with the corner of the sharp chisel on the center line, and leaning it forward a little, and just make a very light cut.

And I'll do the same on the other side.

Once I've established a little foothold for the V, it becomes easy work to just follow that as a guide.

♪ ♪ Now we're ready to glue up our base.

We're going to start with our ends first.

And to do that, I want to preassemble and bring it over to the bench, and then disassemble in an orderly way.

Now, I want to take it apart so the mortises I'll be spreading glue into are facing up.

Once I get that set, I'll run a little glue down one side of the mortise and then the other.

Just a small bead is enough.

The other one.

And I'll get a little bit on the tenons.

Once I've got that, I can spread the glue on the inside of the joint with a flat stick.

Then do the same on the tenon, both ends.

And we're ready to assemble.

And I've got them facing up, so I shouldn't get too confused.

And I'll set it in.

Now, just work it in flush with the top of the leg.

And I'll do that all around, and my table will sit level.

Now, that feels good.

Now I'll just get clamp pressure.

I don't need a huge clamp for this.

And I'll snug that up.

You love to see that shoulder come right up.

Beautiful.

Now we're ready to glue up the other end.

♪ ♪ Now we're ready to set our pegs just like these.

I used walnut for a stronger contrast here.

These pegs are actually functional.

We drill a hole, we drive the peg right through the tenon, right into the other side of the leg, so it adds a mechanical strength to the joint.

It's really overkill with modern glues, but it makes a nice decorative effect.

To lay them out, I use this little template that has an indication of where I want my pegs.

And now I can just puncture through my pattern.

Now with that, I'm ready to drill a quarter-inch hole.

I want to hold it as perpendicular as possible.

(drill whirring) That looks nice.

Now I'll just sand off some of that fuzz around the hole, and we're ready to set our pegs.

To do that, I'll put a drop of glue into each of the holes.

I can hear it seat right to the bottom.

Now, you really don't have to wait any time to trim them off, because they're not going anywhere.

I'm going to use a piece of 150-grit paper with a hole in it as a spacer between my flush cutting saw and the leg.

I'll start sawing it around.

Take your time, keeping the flush cutting saw flat on the paper.

Nice.

Now, what having that paper in there does is, it leaves the pegs a bit proud, and with some 220-grit paper on a block, I can knock them down.

And they end up slightly domed, and they feel like pegs that have popped or aged, so it gives the piece a little more texture and antiqued feel.

Our ends have been all glued up and pegged.

Now we're ready to glue in our long rails.

♪ ♪ Now we're ready to measure the diagonal to be sure that we're square.

40 and five-eighths.

The opposite corner.

40 and five-eighths.

Clean off our glue, and then we'll be ready to make our top.

So we have a really nice piece of cherry to make our top.

It's wide enough to have just one seam.

I've already cut it in half, we dressed it to thickness.

Now we have to decide how to orient the boards.

This side of the board has this nice linear combed grain.

If I just bring it around, it'll match up along the seam and create a nearly invisible join.

I want to mark it so I don't forget how I had it set up.

I just have to take it to the joiner and make it good and straight so we can glue it up.

I've got the boards oriented on top of my clamps.

I'll just flip up one side.

And I just have to glue one edge.

Now, I don't have to smooth this out, or brush it out, because it will smear and even out when I lay it down and set it in and create this rub fit.

And I'll get the clamps tight, and I'm going to feel for flush on the top as I snug up the clamp.

If it's uneven, you can just work it up a little bit.

Get this last clamp.

That feels good.

Now I'll do a quick clean-up of the glue.

Just scrape off the excess.

And then with a wet rag I can get most of it off and save some time later.

So it's been a couple of hours.

We're going to set our top down on the bench and clean it up.

Now, I like to use a hand plane to remove the mill marks.

(plane scraping) That's looking great.

You can really see now how the seam just disappears as you clean down the top.

Well, we've got it to this point.

It's time to take it to the table saw and size it up.

♪ ♪ It's time to work on our undercut bevel for the top.

Take a look at this.

It's subtle, but it lightens the look of the top just by creating a lighter edge.

So we're going to flip our top to work on the underside.

And I've set up my square to mark the length of the undercut bevel on each end.

Now I'll change squares, because my undercut bevel is a little less on the front and back.

Now we'll mark the edge to leave our half-inch thickness.

Now we'll reposition our top and mark the end.

With all our marks in place, we're ready to plane our undercut bevel.

♪ ♪ So I've centered the base on the underside of the top all around, and I'll make some index lines in the corner, opposite corners, so I can keep it in place.

With that done, I'll use the awl to make an impression through each of the pre-drilled holes.

That's it.

Now we can remove our base and pre-drill for our screws.

I've got a bit set up-- short, so I don't overdrill.

(drill whirring) I'm holding the drill at the same angle as our pocket holes.

Now we're ready to put our base back on and screw it down.

(screws grinding) That's it-- we're ready to turn it over and take a look.

It's so great to have it to this point.

And before we apply finish, I like to break all the edges with 220-grit paper.

Especially paying attention to softening the corners so they're inviting to the touch.

On cherry, I like to use an oil-based varnish.

Danish oil is a great choice, and we put it on the entire table.

But to finish the top, I always like to end with a more durable finish, like a urethane or tung oil varnish.

Oh, that looks beautiful.

Now, two or three coats of Danish oil followed by one or two protective coats on the top, we'll be ready to rub it out with fine steel wool, a beeswax polish, and you're done.

I think you're getting a feeling for how this is going to look, and it's going to look beautiful.

For more information on this project and finishing, go to FineWoodworking.tv.

Join me next time for more great projects, right here on Classic Woodworking.

>> Closed captioning is provided by AWFS, the Association of Woodworking and Furnishings Suppliers.

Funding is provided by... >> Woodworking is a passion.

Woodcraft understands that.

We offer name brands and tools for fine woodworking.

Woodcraft, proud sponsors of Classic Woodworking.

And by Felder.

>> It's not only about work.

It's about fun and success.

We are with you.

Felder Group is your partner for your woodworking projects.

♪ ♪ >> And by SCM-- a rich heritage of woodworking technology since 1952.

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And I want to double-check that I'm maintaining square.

♪ ♪