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Rifle Rack Build
I fell in love with woodworking a few years before I fell in love with guns. With no formal training of any kind, I've winged it as a hobbyist over the last 25+ years until most of my stuff no longer leans to one side or gives people splinters. Recently, I built two rifle racks, and figured I'd share the gory details here, over the next couple of posts.
First comes planning. I didn't do much of that. I had a 1 3/4" hole saw, and a 2 1/4" hole saw, and figured one of those would be good enough to drill some holes. I knew I wanted the holes to be big enough to accommodate an AR forearm, as I didn't want the rifles to generically rest on their barrels. I knew from general design principals that I wanted it to be about 28-32" high, and I wanted to keep it under two feet wide. I did some scratch paper math and came up with drilling the holes on 3" centers with about 2" of free space at the end of the boards. Figured I'd need about 12 board feet of rough lumber to do it. I thought I had enough walnut to do it on hand, but I was wrong. However, I had a bunch of rock maple left over for another project, and I figured it would be a nice contrast. I could have just bought planed and surfaced lumber at Home Depot or Lowes, but I have a ginormous jointer-planer who's sole job is to put rough lumber in one end and get milled lumber out the other, so I went with that.
https://www.johnnyego.com/wood/2019P...rackprep01.JPG
Rough cut an appropriate chunk of walnut for the side stiles:
https://www.johnnyego.com/wood/2019P...rackprep02.JPG
Split the rock maple down the middle for the rails. This stuff is very hard, dulls my tools quick, and burns easy, but it is very durable.
https://www.johnnyego.com/wood/2019P...rackprep03.JPG
Next it's over to the jointer-planer, set on jointer mode. I ran the walnut plank across it's face until it was smooth and flat:
https://www.johnnyego.com/wood/2019P...rackprep05.JPG
Then jointed it on the edge to get a flat surface milled 90?:
https://www.johnnyego.com/wood/2019P...rackprep06.JPG
The jointer got it pretty close to square on the edge, but there were some dips and uneven-ness that it didn't come out perfect. I could have taken another couple passes, but that would have taken off more material than I wanted, and I only needed to correct a few areas.
https://www.johnnyego.com/wood/2019P...rackprep06.JPG
So out came the #5 1/2 bench plane. Couple of paper-thin shavings in the spots that needed it:
https://www.johnnyego.com/wood/2019P...rackprep07.JPG
https://www.johnnyego.com/wood/2019P...rackprep09.JPG
And it came out square enough for wood work:
https://www.johnnyego.com/wood/2019P...rackprep08.JPG
Cut the opposite rough edge off at the table saw, and I was ready to go:
https://www.johnnyego.com/wood/2019P...rackprep10.JPG
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You've got my undivided attention. So get busy and post those pics!
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Once I had everything cut and planed to more or less stock size, I started by cross-cutting the rail sections to width:
https://www.johnnyego.com/wood/2019P...ackbuild01.JPG
Then over to the drill press to knock some holes into the upper rails:
https://www.johnnyego.com/wood/2019P...ackbuild02.JPG
I have an inexpensive bench-top spindle sander that is an amazing value for the money, and made short work of cleaning up the holes and rounding over sharp corners. A little before and after comparison:
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https://www.johnnyego.com/wood/2019P...ackbuild06.JPG
I cut the socket for the sliding dovetail using a handheld router. I tried doing it on my router table, but even with a long miter bar, the pieces had a tendency to torque and produce uneven sockets. Using the router on a rail and ganging the sides together produced very consistent sockets. I hogged out most of the material with a 1/2" straight bit, then followed up with the dovetail bit at the same depth.
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https://www.johnnyego.com/wood/2019P...ackbuild04.JPG
The dovetails themselves were done on the router table. Unfortunately, I didn't take pictures of the operation, but it was way less tedious than cutting the sockets. Cut the dovetails upright against the router table fence. 5 minutes of work.
Decided a 15 degree lean angle would be pretty good, so I cut an assortment of bevels into the walnut stiles on my tablesaw:
https://www.johnnyego.com/wood/2019P...ackbuild09.JPG
And gave everything a gentle rounding-over at the router table:
https://www.johnnyego.com/wood/2019P...ackbuild08.JPG
Carved out the hinge mortises with a bench chisel. Made sure they were flat with a small router plane, which is awesome. As primarily a machine tool user, I could have routed them out and had them be dead flat in about 30 seconds with the router. But it would have taken me about 20 minutes to set the router up for it. So for four mortises, it took about the same time to do it by hand, and I didn't have to wear ear muffs or breath in a lung full of sawdust.
https://www.johnnyego.com/wood/2019P...ackbuild05.JPG
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At this point, I had all the pieces, I could slot them together, and call it a rifle rack. But there was still one more thing I wanted to do. I wanted to put in a slip rail on the bottom of the rack. Not that I was worried about rifles slipping off, so much as for the added rigidity to the stand. Wanted this thing to sit with confidence, and not slide, lean, or shake when bumped into. I also thought this would be a good opportunity to practice hand cutting mortises. I have wanted to do more traditional woodworking for the last year now, and have slowly been building up the tool kit and the willingness to hand-slaughter some wood. Plus, I just got a new set of Ray Isles traditional mortising chisels, also known as 'pig sticker chisels' (true) that I really wanted to try out. I practiced a couple mortises on a piece of scrap. First one split the scrap in half. Second one looked like it was done by drunk Ray Charles. Third one looked ok. Good enough for the practice, I suppose! Let's get chiselling:
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Tape marks the depth you want to cut to. These chisels are not meant to be delicate. You set it with two light taps of the hammer, and then whale on it until it reaches the desired depth. Lever forward, then lever up. Move about a quarter inch forward and repeat.
Make sure you hit your depth:
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Feel pretty good about yourself:
https://www.johnnyego.com/wood/2019P...ackbuild15.JPG
Move on to the next one, and cut the mortise on the wrong side of the line. Dammit. Not enough wood to start over, so it will have to be salvaged. First, I widened it:
https://www.johnnyego.com/wood/2019P...dutchman01.JPG
Then, I cut a plug for the hole, also known as a 'Dutchman':
https://www.johnnyego.com/wood/2019P...dutchman03.JPG
A little glue, then hammered it in place:
https://www.johnnyego.com/wood/2019P...dutchman04.JPG
Will get planed flush, and then recut the mortise.
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Got the dutchman planed down, and filled the seams with sawdust and glue. It was on the inside corner and would mostly be covered by the tenon shoulders. I patted myself on the back for salvaging a bad situation with a reasonably discrete fix:
https://www.johnnyego.com/wood/2019P...dutchman07.JPG
To avoid this sort of mistake again, I carefully marked all my remaining mortises on both sides of the cut and shaded them in:
https://www.johnnyego.com/wood/2019P...ackbuild12.JPG
Now I was moving. My mortises were going in a lot cleaner and faster. I had confidence with each swing of the hammer. Things were looking good, and I put my previous mistake well behind me. Until it turned out I had marked and then cut a perfect mortise on the wrong side of the board this time. Sigh. Cut another dutchman.
https://www.johnnyego.com/wood/2019P...dutchman08.JPG
https://www.johnnyego.com/wood/2019P...dutchman09.JPG
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Nice job. Instead of using a square for depth check. The guy down the road, uses gauge blocks, next time out you need to meet him. Look forward to your completed project
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Chimeric ends are good at doing that. I've made a similar mistake too.
Not convenient no, but when else would you hone your dutchman skills? : )
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Finally got most of the parts in the configuration they needed to be in for assembly. If a messy desk is the hallmark of a creative mind, I'm Shel Silverstien.
https://www.johnnyego.com/wood/2019P...ackbuild19.JPG
I do try to square things away every night, or as I like to call it, resetting the shop. But middle of the day, stuff is just everywhere there is space to put it.
Quick rubdown of the inside parts of the stiles with Watco Dark Danish Oil. You can put multiple coats of the stuff on in an hour, and wipe off the excess. The wood absorbs what it can, and you don't have to worry about uneven brush strokes or building a finish. Dries to the touch in another hour, to handling in 8-10, and a full cure in about three days. I like it a lot. I try to do the insides of stuff before I assemble, just because it is easier than trying to get into tight corners and mask off different-colored stuff.
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Clamps, glue, and water ready to go. Assembly goes very quick.
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Book-matching of grain pattern came out decent as well:
https://www.johnnyego.com/wood/2019P...ackbuild22.JPG
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This is a different stand than the 'spare' you brought Sunday yes?
I seem to remember cross lap or maybe dovetail cross lap on @ least one.
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You have some serious wood working skills. Are you gonna make a few to sell? I can use another one that has 3 slots on each side. Let me know.
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Nope, primarily because the last thing I want to do is turn a hobby into another job. That said, if you wanted to come over one Saturday, I could help you knock out a slightly simplified version in about three hours. Chick Norris also makes these out of Trex, a weatherproof composite material, and may be able to knock something out for you on commission if you don't have the time.
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Thanks for walking us thru that. Very nice!
