BillFitzmaurice.info

Decided on building these on my earlier thread here

Okay, I think I'm ready to go make some sawdust, I need to purchase some wood, luckily there's a specialist timber company about a 10 minute walk away from my house they sell two types of high end plywood, one of which is Latvian birch plywood which costs about £50 per sheet of 8' of 4', they also stock another plywood which is simply described as 'Plywood WBP' which is £33 a sheet, both of these are more expensive than the UK equivalent of Home depot, should I splash out on the more expensive wood? (money is a bit tight) or would it be possible to use the more expensive wood for the exterior faces and a few key components and have some made from the more affordable wood?

All the information given on the website on these sheet materials is minimal, For the Latvian birch it says 'Latvian WBP BB/WG quality' and the Plywood WBP 'Far Eastern fully exterior'

Also, I don't own a table saw, i currently only own a jigsaw (and a few coping saws ) for cutting wood, would it be worthwhile to pick up a fairly cheap one, this seems good for the price

As far as I can ascertain, WBP means "water (or weather) proof and boil proof".
Sounds fine, as long as there is no thin outer ply/veneer on either face.
All the plies must be even in thickness.

"Far eastern", in part, suggests to me perhaps Asian based hardwood as a part component.
I would stick with an all birch ply, so spend the extra money.

I built my cabs with a 185mm circular saw, jigsaw, drill and cordless drill, and a router. The router is the only "luxury" item per se. You can build without one.

If you go with a table saw, you have to know that it will not deviate in cut width. Cheap table saws are not known for high accuracy, usually in part due to less than adequate "fence".
You will also have to spend some time getting it aligned as per the user manual...

If you were to get a tablesaw, I would prefer that you go with the 200 pound one because of the two mitre slots and the wider table (which will help with the longer panels and the tablesaw jig). The one that you gave a link to does not seem to accurate or stable....I may be wrong, though.
Having said that, it can be done with just a circular saw as Grant pointed out.

The diy circular saw sled makes very accurate cutting possible, for next to nothing in materials. Fine tooth blade on the saw!

If money is tight i would go for a good quality circular saw with the sled and a good sawblade
Even the best saw's are crap to work with if you don't have a decent sawblade.
I also think it's easier and safer to cut the larger panels of a T48 with a circular saw and sled than with such a small tablesaw.

Greetz ketoet

ketoet wrote:If money is tight i would go for a good quality circular saw with the sled and a good sawblade

+1. You need a circular saw to cut full sheets of plywood into smaller pieces anyway, unless you have a table saw with a four by four foot table. If you can't have both a circular saw and table saw then the circular saw is what you need. Since you're only cutting 1/2 inch plywood go cordless, 18v or higher, with a 6.5 inch blade.

Okay, going with the top end wood, I don't want to cut corners (hehe), ok, i don't own a circular saw either, How does this look?, If i was buying cordless I'd like to buy new as I want some fresh batteries which won't fade after a few cuts, should i also consider corded circ saws, or will the cordless easily keep up with 12mm ply?

I built mine with only circular saw and jig saw for all cuts. Loved it and super happy with my builds.

Arben wrote:Okay, going with the top end wood, I don't want to cut corners (hehe), ok, i don't own a circular saw either, How does this look?, If i was buying cordless I'd like to buy new as I want some fresh batteries which won't fade after a few cuts, should i also consider corded circ saws, or will the cordless easily keep up with 12mm ply?

Yes it will. And another vote for the circular saw.

My preference is corded....won't run out of power, although others will testify that they have no problems with cordless. If you were to go corded, you would save 30 pounds which could go towards a top quality, fine-tooth blade. MHO.
Whichever route you go, make sure that the plate is absolutely square to the blade. That will save a lot of grief and aggravation.

Just found out my father had a old awesome top end bosch circular saw in his basement, gonna check it out and see if the blades still got life in it, otherwise I believe I should be looking for a blade with lots of teeth and a thin blade? hopefully if the weathers all right I'll go out tomorrow to pick up some wood, I'll be getting the timber company to cut the 8'x4' sheets into lots of 2'x4's simply for transportation and they're used for the sides as well, I had a look at the plans and those panels are the biggest so I should be able to cut the rest of the panels from the other 2'x4' sized panels right?

pro strat. Cut the first 4x8 sheet into 2 24" wide panels, and the 2nd 2 panels into 19" panels. this will leave you with a 9.5" panel as well, but that can be used for brace stock, while maintaining a solid 24" x 48" for the 2 panels that will be used as side panels (attempting to get 4 x 24x48 panels from a 4x8 results in either all 4 panels being an 1/8 short, or 1 panel being 1/2 inch short).

the second sheet will be cut in the same fashion (giving you the 2 sides for the 2nd sub), and 2 more 19 x 48 panels, and another 9.5" brace stock.

The Third and fourth sheets can be cut to 5 19" pieces each with no waste, giving you all the internal panels you need, and all of this can be done at the timber yard If they have a panel saw.

sine143 wrote:pro strat. Cut the first 4x8 sheet into 2 24" wide panels, and the 2nd 2 panels into 19" panels. this will leave you with a 8.5" panel as well, but that can be used for brace stock, while maintaining a solid 24" x 48" for the 2 panels that will be used as side panels (attempting to get 4 x 24x48 panels from a 4x8 results in either all 4 panels being an 1/8 short, or 1 panel being 1/2 inch short).

the second sheet will be cut in the same fashion (giving you the 2 sides for the 2nd sub), and 2 more 19 x 48 panels, and another 7.5" brace stock.

The Third and fourth sheets can be cut to 5 19" pieces each with no waste, giving you all the internal panels you need, and all of this can be done at the timber yard If they have a panel saw.

Very good point sine, hadn't considered that, I think that's what I will do

keep in mind that you might need to stay on top of the saw tech at the timber store... as often times they can get quite lazy with the measurements, but if you are paying attention and they are down to help you out, then you can bypass a lot of work in the rough cut stage.

Arben wrote:Okay, going with the top end wood, I don't want to cut corners (hehe), ok, i don't own a circular saw either, How does this look?, If i was buying cordless I'd like to buy new as I want some fresh batteries which won't fade after a few cuts, should i also consider corded circ saws, or will the cordless easily keep up with 12mm ply?

I have that saw (and the matching LXT drill) and like it a lot.

I found you could find some very nice, older table saws used. I trolled Craigslist for a couple weeks before finding the perfect deal.