George Vondriska

Woodworkers are often stymied by resawing. If everything isn't set up perfectly, it's easy for resawing to go badly. This lesson provides you with two approaches to resawing, including determining and setting a fence for drift compensation. Proper blade selection is also covered, along with a variety of approaches to help you match the height of your fence to the work you're doing.

Handling narrow door and face frame parts on the jointer and table saw can be tricky, unless you know some tricks of the trade that'll keep you safe and accurate. This is a great lesson in ensuring that all of your frame parts are consistently dimensioned, which greatly simplifies crafting the face frame and door.

You'll be amazed at how a simple router bit can transform the look of the rails on your furniture projects. Easy to set up on the router table, the detail added by this cutter really enhances the overall design of the table.

Melamine is in the particle board family, but includes a plasticized coating. It's great for cabinets and shop jigs. If you've only seen white melamine, you're missing out. There are lots of colors and patterns available. This is a very versatile form of sheet stock.

The first step in dimensioning is ripping the panels to width using a combination of jointing and ripping operations. Then the parts can be cross cut to length, and we'll give you some great tips for that. It's critical that the dimensions are uniform, and the correct blades are used for ripping and crosscutting. The Class will help you with that.

The key to this technique is a key. We'll make a simple jig that attaches to the base of your router and includes a key correctly distanced from the bit. Once one groove has been cut, making as many more as you need is a very simple process.

No biscuit joiner? No problem. With the right router bit your hand-held router can easily be used as a biscuit joiner. There are a few things you need to do to make this work successfully, but don't sweat it. We'll show you what you need to know.

Solid wood panels have to be allowed to expand and contract independently of whatever you're fastening them to. A specialty router bit, plunge router and fence clamped to your work will allow you to easily make slots for the screws holding things together. Seasonal change? Handled.

A board foot measurement tells you the volume of wood you're using, not how many lineal feet. It's very important that you know how to calculate board feet in order to determine how much wood you need for your project, and how much to order from your supplier. Another wrinkle...what's the deal with 4/4, 6/4....? Don't worry, we've got that covered too.

George wraps up this class with a reminder to use the processes and skills you learned in making this base cabinet - to help you create virtually any type of cabinet project with more success.