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Fitting the Lid Hinges

I was fitting the butt hinges to the top of the lingerie chest, and thinking “Do I really need all these tools?”.

Actually, there is one more, a wide chisel.

Take note of the sacrilege – I hollow grind Japanese bench chisels … but, oh, they get so sharp, and hone so easily, and I have never chipped an edge in using these over about 15 years or more.

These hinges are square ended Brusso butt hinges. The square barrels create an automatic stop at 95 degrees. They install the same way as other butt hinges, with the exception that the whole barrel must project for the stop mechanism to work.

First step is to lay out the hinge mortice. The square/knife lay out the sides, and the cutting gauges lay out the further side and depth.

Start by chopping 45-degree kerfs into the mortice. These kerfs will extend about half the depth, and stop about 2-3mm from the inside boundary line.

Use the wide chisel to pare away the waste. Stop short of the inside boundary.

At this stage I use the router plane to level the floor and take it down to the scribed line. Again, do not go clean up to the inside boundary line. That is the last task that will be done.

The router plane is pushed like a butt mortice plane. Use the depth stop to pare incrementally …

Lastly, pare away the boundary line.

The next stage is to fit the lid and align the mortices. Begin by temporarily screwing in lower set of hinges, and then laying the top over this. The rear of the lid and base must align …

Mark the outside edges of the hinge on the base, and then you can mark the hinges and remove the waste as before.

Just use one screw in each hinge leaf until you are happy with the fit. This looks good to me. I’ll finish it off now.

Regards from Perth

Derek

June 2016