[ Power saw whirring ] [ Mid-tempo music plays ] Hi, I'm Phil.

Welcome back to the Woodsmith Shop.

On today's episode, we have a pretty cool project.

It's this stackable bookcase made up of four independent pieces that you build and then put together practically in any configuration that you want.

Even better, though, we have a special guest, Char, who's gonna show us how to help other people get involved with woodworking as we build this project.

Even better yet, about how to get kids involved with woodworking on appropriate tools and skills and lessons to learn along the way.

Great project, great lessons here.

If you're ready to build along with us, the plans for this bookcase, they're at our website -- Woodsmith.Shop.com.

Let's build.

Announcer: Major funding for "The Woodsmith Shop" has been provided by... Old Masters -- offering wood stains and finishes for the woodworking enthusiast and professional.

And by... Kreg -- from the first cut to the final assembly, providing woodworkers with products that help to simplify woodworking challenges.

Kreg.

Additional funding provided by... ...Titebond Wood Glues -- the pro's advantage.

And by... ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ You know, it's always fun when you can open up your workshop and share it with somebody else and build a fun project along the way.

Today we have a special guest, Char.

You're gonna be joining us as we build this bookcase project.

Yes.

And I am so excited to be here with you, Phil.

Yeah.

So now, you've been woodworking for a while, but you've made a pretty quick transition from woodworking, which we all love building the projects, into passing that on to other people, teaching.

How did that happen?

Yes.

So I've been a woodworker for about 20 years.

About five years ago, I joined a makerspace in Atlanta, Decatur Makers, and I was offered a teaching position.

So I decided to dip my toe in it.

The first night that I taught a class, I realized that I had found my true passion in woodworking, and that was teaching other people.

It is a lot of fun.

And in this episode, we're even extending that because there's a lot of people talk about how do we pass on woodworking to another generation?

We're gonna do that literally.

Yes, we are.

And I'm so excited to be able to teach young people.

They're moldable.

They understand things differently.

And the first time you see a young person use a saw, it's just an exciting feeling because you know that you've passed on the knowledge and the training to the next generation.

They say, "Oh, you know, woodworking -- It's not popular anymore."

Guess what?

I'm bringing woodshop back to the schools and back to young people.

That is my contribution.

Okay, so why did we choose this bookcase project then?

Well, we chose this bookcase project primarily because it's an easy build.

It's a great project for anybody building something For the first time.

Millie and I used pocket-hole joinery, which is a step up from butt joints, but it's also much stronger than butt joints.

And we incorporated some other joinery in here as well.

But for someone who's never done mortise-and-tenon joinery before, worked on a table saw or a router, pocket-hole joinery requires no fancy tools and no prior knowledge of woodworking.

Yeah, it's a really great step in to the field of woodworking and getting used to using tools.

Along the way, Logan is gonna build a couple of the cases using a table saw and some rabbet joints.

I'm gonna show how to assemble one of the cases with dowels.

It's a really fun project.

There's a lot of good things to learn, no matter where you are on the woodworking journey.

But all of these are good steps to begin somebody new in the whole process.

So let's get you and Millie building something.

Let's go.

Millie, I'm so glad that you're in the shop today with me.

We're gonna build something.

Do you know what we're making?

Yes.

What are we making?

A bookcase.

A bookcase.

Have you ever used any tools before?

Yes.

What?

Like, a drill and a hammer.

A drill and a hammer.

And what did you make with the drill and hammer?

A treehouse.

A treehouse.

That's a great first project.

How old are you?

9.

9.

And you're already using power tools.

You are awesome.

Give me five.

Alright, so we need to get started on our bookcase today, and I don't think we need it to be this long, so we need to cut it.

Right?

Mm-hmm.

But before we cut it, what do we need to do first?

We need to measure it.

We need to measure it.

And we're going to use... A tape measure.

You're right.

A tape measure.

And you've studied fractions before, right?

Mm-hmm.

Okay.

So our first cut needs to be at 22 1/2 inches.

So let's measure that first.

So we take our pencil and we'll make a mark at 22 1/2.

22 1/2.

Very good.

And just for safe measure, let's make another mark down here.

Good.

And we need to connect these two marks to make sure we have a straight line.

Very good.

So we'll use our square.

And I love these because it has this nice little ledge that will balance here to make sure that we make a straight line.

So I'll hold it up here while you make your line connecting the two dots.

Awesome.

Now I know exactly where to cut.

This is 22 1/2 inches, so I'm gonna take this over to the table saw and make a cut because the table saw is sort of an advanced tool, not one that we're ready to introduce to kids yet.

So I'll make the cuts and you do the drilling.

Sound like a deal?

Yep.

Alright, let's go.

Pocket-hole joinery is a great first step when introducing woodworking to kids.

Today, Millie and I are working on our bookcase, and since she's never done any extensive woodworking, I want to introduce something that's easy that she can repeat at home.

Now, we can start off with something more intensive like mortise-and-tenon joinery.

But today we want to make sure that we get this bookcase done.

I really like pocket-hole joinery because all you need is a pocket hole jig, a drill bit and a screwdriver bit and some good pocket-hole screws.

So we're gonna work on this.

I'm gonna show Millie how to use this very quickly, and then she's gonna knock out our pocket holes for us.

And the other thing is that pocket-hole joinery is very strong.

It can withstand 700 pounds of pressure, which means whatever you make with pocket holes, glue is optional.

You don't have to worry about your wood moving.

Okay, Millie, let us put this in.

Okay.

So a couple of things that we already set up with the jig.

This one automatically snaps to the width of the wood.

This particular piece of wood is three quarters of an inch.

Okay?

And I've already set the drill bit with this collar to make sure that it's also at... Three fourths.

Three fourths.

Exactly.

So I'll give you the drill.

I'll hold on to the wood.

Okay?

And it goes right there in that hole.

Both hands.

And whenever you're ready... go for it.

Good job.

Now we can release this piece and slide it over.

Very good.

That's a good point.

We should empty out the sawdust before moving on.

Way to go, Millie.

You are ready to be a woodworker.

Excellent.

So this will be the top of our bookcase for the section that we're completing with pocket-hole joinery.

So we want to make sure that we have pocket holes on both the top and the bottom of this piece.

Millie, you did a great job getting this clamped up together using these corner clamps.

And we've got our two pieces.

We've got our side and our top clamped to the workbench.

And one thing to remember when you're working with pocket holes is that both pieces of wood are the exact same thickness.

Right?

We've already drilled our pocket holes, which you did a great job at, and now we have these pocket-hole screws that you get to put in.

So we have two on this side and two on this side and we're using a square-head screwdriver bit.

I'll hold on to the wood while you hold on to the drill.

Make sure you're at an angle and we're gonna put your left hand on top of the drill and drill when ready.

Very good.

So once you start to hear that sound, you know that it's in far enough.

And because we chose the right length of screw, we know that it's not gonna go through our workpiece, right?

Is that good?

That's great.

Good.

Alright, let's see how this worked out.

What do you think so far?

I think it went good.

It looks good.

Let's see how strong it is.

It's pretty strong.

If we clamp it up here, it'll be good.

Right.

You ready to do the other side?

Yep.

Okay.

Last one.

Awesome.

We're halfway there.

You ready to put the rest of this bookcase together?

Yep.

Alright, let's do it.

Maybe it looks like...

There.

There we go.

I heard you say that you like physics.

Have you ever considered a career in carpentry or woodworking?

Yeah.

What sorts of things do you think you would like to make after this project?

Um, maybe like a shelf or something.

A shelf for your room?

Yeah.

For books?

Okay.

A little tighter.

And then when we screw it, it'll bring it together some more.

Okay, Millie, we've got this clamped, so we're ready to put the final two sides together.

Because of the angle of this, I'll be your clamp because we can't really attach it to the table, so I'll hold it steady for you.

So if you pick up a screw and... That's a great technique -- putting it on the end of the bit.

I like that.

Make sure we have it in at the right angle.

That good?

That is good.

Put your hand on top to make sure that it doesn't move.

Is that good?

That's great.

Okay, one more.

Right?

Oh, I'll take this off for you.

You're getting good at these pocket-hole screws.

We'll unclamp, and let's see what we have.

There.

You did a great job, Millie.

What was the best part about putting this together?

Um, the pocket holes.

The pocket holes.

Because you learned a new skill, right?

You learned a lot of things about screwdriver bits, pocket-hole screws, how things come together.

And we made our first box.

And one thing that I like to do is check to see if it's square.

We use a carpenter square to make sure that nothing is out of alignment, to make sure that we have a perfect square.

Right?

And I believe that we do.

So we'll check that and we'll move on to the other pieces and we'll have a nice tiered bookcase.

Thank you for coming to the shop today.

I enjoyed working with you.

Me too.

Good job.

So while Shar and Millie are working on their case, I'm gonna work on the next box up.

And for that one, I'm gonna use a little bit different Joinery technique.

For this, we're gonna use rabbets.

Now, to cut the rabbets, I've already set up a dado blade in the table saw.

Dado blade is a series of blades stuck together and it makes an extra-wide curve.

And I've also set up an auxiliary fence over top of the dado blade.

This allows me to bury that blade in the fence, and I can cut a 3/8-inch by 3/8-inch cut in one pass.

So what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna use my pieces against the miter gauge.

I'm gonna use this miter gauge to guide the workpiece through the blade.

I've also taken the time to set up a fence on the back of the miter gauge.

This is gonna help avoid any chip-out on that back edge as we're making these cuts.

So I'm gonna go and cut a rabbet on both ends of the top and bottom and the sides.

Once those are done, we can go over to the bench and assemble it.

So now with our rabbets cut, we can go ahead and assemble this.

Now, the way the rabbets work is they create a little ledge that the two pieces, the side and the bottom or the top, they lock together nicely.

It's a semi-mechanical joint that offers a lot of purchase for glue.

But I am gonna go ahead and use some pin nails just to hold everything together while the glue dries.

Once I get it all stuck together, I'll use a couple of assembly squares just to hold everything square while the glue cures.

Okay.

There we go.

Now, we'll let this glue cure, and then we'll go ahead and route a rabbet for the back panel once it's all dry.

Whenever I teach classes introducing people to the craft of woodworking, I always like to give opportunities to find excellence and success right away.

And that means, for me, dividing up projects into small tasks that we know we can get done.

So that's what we've been doing with this bookcase project, where we've been able to focus on a couple of things.

Cutting your parts to size accurately.

Boom, take care of that, and then we can focus on the joinery aspect of it.

Now, whether it's pocket holes or rabbets, we can do that quickly and easily.

Another one that I really like is using dowels to reinforce the joints.

That's what I'm gonna show on this top section, the smallest of them here.

But just because it's the smallest doesn't mean that dowels are wimpy.

They can actually do a great job of holding project parts together.

The reason that I like it is that we're focusing on one particular skill and that's drilling accurate holes.

To do that, we need a doweling jig.

Now, the one that I'm gonna be using and demonstrating here is pretty simple.

It's got a steel block on this side with a couple of holes that will guide the drill bit so that it's gonna drill straight into the workpiece.

When we're drilling into the faces of our two side pieces, it's a little bit of a challenge working with this jig, but I found one kind of clever way to do it and get this process moving along relatively quickly.

So what I have is I've clamped the jig in the face vise of my workbench here and tucked the side piece right underneath it so that it's held -- so that the jig itself is held by the face vise.

One thing that you'll know is that you can try and measure and line things up, but I found that your fingers are really sensitive enough to be able to determine whether those surfaces are flush.

It's a great little skill to develop.

So now with everything all set, I'm gonna drill a pair of holes here, release the clamp, slide it over and drill holes on the other side, and then you can kind of see where this is going.

And I'll drill the remaining holes on the other side piece as well.

Alright.

For the next part of the joint, we're still drilling holes, but for here, we're drilling into the end grain of our top and bottom pieces.

Now, because we're doing that, we want to drill the holes longer in order to accommodate the rest of the length of the dowels that we're working with.

So let's just look.

Here is the doweling jig, and I've adjusted the stop collar now so that we're looking at about an inch and a half that we're going to drill into there and that's gonna take care of the rest of that 2-inch-long dowel.

Now, again, I've clamped the workpiece into the vise this time and the jig will get clamped to the workpiece, making sure that we're flush along one side.

I'll drill the two holes, slide it over, do the same thing, flip it around, and we'll take care of the other end.

And then we're almost ready to assemble.

We're ready to assemble already this case because of how easy the dowels make things work.

What I'm gonna do is I want to put the glue in the right spot here to avoid it, squeezing out where I don't want it to or getting scraped off the joint altogether.

So I'm using some cotton swabs and I'm just gonna apply glue to the inside of the dowel holes here.

Now, it's a little fielder's choice if you want to run a bead of glue along here.

It's an end-grain joint that isn't all that strong.

But if you feel a little bit more comfortable putting glue there, you certainly can.

I'm just gonna press the dowels in place and I'm focusing just on the two side pieces here rather than try and glue all the parts of the joint together at the same time.

So we'll just keep going here with the process of applying glue.

Then I'll add the dowels.

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

And then what we'll do is add the glue to the top and bottom.

Alright.

Now that I have the sides taken care of, I can concentrate on getting the glue into the much deeper holes that are in the top and bottom of this particular case.

Again, I'm just gonna work with the swabs here just to run that glue into that joint.

I know that once I start sliding the dowels into place, it's gonna press any glue near the front towards the back so I can use the dowels to help spread glue and not feel like I have to concentrate too much on getting full coverage all the way down.

Alright.

With this half set, I'm ready for assembly.

Now, what I've done is I've marked with an "X" what's gonna be my outside faces.

I have one, hopefully.

Yep.

Right down there.

So I know that the two sides are gonna line up and go where they need to, so I can put that together... ...and that together.

Eventually I'm gonna use clamps.

But a mallet drives the joints home.

So what I'm gonna do now... same thing with glue on this side.

Then we'll get the clamps in place.

Alright.

The glue and the dowels went together pretty snug.

I'm gonna add clamps anyway, just to keep the joints tight while that glue sets up.

Alright.

There we go.

After a little about half an hour, we'll come back here.

We can pull the clamps off, route a rabbet on the back and attach the plywood back for these cases.

And we'll just about have this project wrapped up.

Watching as Millie and Shar built the first section of our bookcase took me back to the first projects that I built as a woodworker and the time I spent in my shop with my dad.

And I'm sure that if you think about the early projects that you made, no matter how they turned out, there was a lot of enthusiasm that built up to a great hobby and craft that I enjoy in woodworking.

Now, if you're ready to build a bookcase like this one and maybe introduce it into somebody who's never tried it before, the plans are at our website, WoodsmithShop.com.

It's also the place for some great inspiration for woodworking.

Whether you're looking for videos on new skills, project ideas that you can build in your shop, or other ways to just connect with woodworking and building stuff, the skillful use of tools.

And then we'll come right back here to build another great project in the Woodsmith Shop.

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Every week, you'll receive an e-mail with a video tip to get more out of your table saw, router table, and more.

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Everything in today's show comes from the newly expanded Woodsmith Guild Edition with shop projects, plans, tips, and techniques.

To get a free preview issue of the Woodsmith Guild Edition and a free Woodsmith book, go to WoodsmithShop.com.

In addition, past seasons of "The Woodsmith Shop" are available on DVD, or you can watch them online from your computer, tablet, or mobile device.

For more information, go to WoodsmithShop.com.

Announcer: Major funding for "The Woodsmith Shop" has been provided by... Old Masters -- offering wood stains and finishes for the woodworking enthusiast and professional.

And by... Kreg -- from the first cut to the final assembly, providing woodworkers with products that help to simplify woodworking challenges.

Kreg.

Additional funding provided by... ...Titebond Wood Glues -- the pro's advantage.

And by... ♪♪ ♪♪