Shopsmith Forums

First, thanks to those that offered advice on this project. At this point I am considering all options.

My first attempt was with a blank that measured about 1.5" thick by 3" wide. This is about the dimensions I had planned on. The final length I expect will be about 12''.

I used my router and stop blocks to gradually rout a groove in face of the wood leaving 1.5" at each end. The groove finally got to be 1.25" deep, which was plenty good for house keys but about 1/4" short for car keys. (By the time I get this finished, car keys may be extinct ) The groove was also 1/4" wide which was too wide unless I add the metal inserts.

My next attempt will be to try Roy's suggestion, or go with my thought of cutting the two end pieces and gluing them back on.

As for hanging, I will try both holes drilled through, or keyhole slots on the back.

An interesting aside, is that the wood I'm using to practice is a 2 x8 plank I got from my uncle's place about 25 years ago. It has been in my unheated garage since then. I don't know how long he had it. When I cut into it to make the blanks, I was amazed that the pine smell was still very strong and the pitch was still fresh.

More to come, I just don't know when.

John

I know what I would do, but I have a regular table saw. I'd clamp the piece to the rip fence, then elevate the blade. Then flip the piece, repeat from the other side. Then drill mounting holes at the end of the slot (the drill removes the curves at the end).

Or just use a 'hand' saw to cut out the ends.

Still working at this.

My latest attempt was to follow "rcplaneguy's" advice and use the table saw blade. It worked to a good depth, but of course the slot is not straight right through, deeper in the middle, shallow at the ends due to the shape of the blade. I was hoping to avoid going right through the wood so am now trying to find a router bit that might do the job.

Another thought I had and might try is to use the saw blade method on a thinner blank, go right through, and then glue a second piece on the back to give it the overall thickness I want.

One of these days I will have to decide and just go with it.

John

john wrote:Still working at this.

My latest attempt was to follow "rcplaneguy's" advice and use the table saw blade. It worked to a good depth, but of course the slot is not straight right through, deeper in the middle, shallow at the ends due to the shape of the blade. I was hoping to avoid going right through the wood so am now trying to find a router bit that might do the job.

Another thought I had and might try is to use the saw blade method on a thinner blank, go right through, and then glue a second piece on the back to give it the overall thickness I want.

One of these days I will have to decide and just go with it.

John

Roto-Zip makes an inexpensive spiral up-cut bit that could possibly be adapted for your project, John. I have the 5/32" diameter version of this bit. It could cut to 1.5" deep, but I'd want to do it in many light passes. It's made for "sawing" sideways, but has two potential problems for your application.

Problem #1: It doesn't have a shank that will fit a standard router collet. I have the Roto-zip tool with a router-base attachment, and the 1/8" bit should also work in a Dremel tool with a router base. I suspect that you could also simply chuck it up in your Shopsmith collet. It would cut slow due to the low RPM's, but I've gotta believe that the Jacobs chuck can handle a lot more side-load than a 1/8" bit can take!

Problem #2: The bit is intended to pierce all the way through the material like a drill, before "sawing" sideways. Thus it has a chisel point on the end of the bit. A few seconds at the grinder should take care of that. I'd grind the end flat, or slightly concave. At about $2 per bit, you can afford to experiment.
Overall length of my 5/32" bit is 2-9/16". Total flute length is 1-5/8", although the chip discharge area starts to decrease after 1-1/4". From the Amazon reviews, It appears that the 1/8" diameter bit is the same length.

The bits are available from both Amazon and Home Depot.

http://www.amazon.com/Roto-SC4-8-Inch-P ... roduct_top
http://www.homedepot.com/p/Rotozip-1-8- ... escription

On second thought, if you grind the chisel point off of the bit, you would no longer be able to "drill" with it (unless you also grind on an end-cutting feature). So you'd need to drill an entry hole at one or both ends of the slot, before milling out the slot with a modified bit.

Or, you could first mill out a pocket in the backside of the key holder, leaving about 1" of material thickness for the key slot. Then you wouldn't have to modify the bit. Once the key holder is mounted, that pocket would never be seen. As a side benefit, if any debris ever gets into the slot, the pocket would give it somewhere to go (pushed by the keys) without jamming up the slot.

Well I'm back. I have been working on a couple of designs that cheat a little but I hope will give me a nice finished project.

The first was to use two boards, drill the mounting holes through them and then rout a groove through the face board and only part way through the back board. As you can see by the picture, even though my test piece had the groove centered, as I went deeper on the real pieces it got off center to the mounting holes. I'm not sure if I can salvage this piece but I will try.
The second project uses a contrasting wood to be sandwiched between the two main pieces. The contrasting wood is cut out to form the groove to receive the keys. The glue ups are done but not perfect so I now have to do a bit
of fine tuning to get it right. Hopefully I will have final project photos of this one soon.

I had to leave my previous post before I was finished, to watch the hockey game between Montreal and the "Big Bad Bruins" from Boston. I'm happy to say we won (Montreal).

One of the other thoughts I had for the key holder project was to put a sort of bull nose on the face. I tried it on a sample and I liked it. Then I realized that the slot in the face is not centered horizontally so I have to rethink this idea.
I also found a new best friend in the shop. We had bought two of these to give as gifts, but I needed good light to oil a recirculating pump motor so I tried one out. It worked so well I thought I could use it in the shop. Due to a combination of poor lighting and aging eyes, I don't see as well as I used to. The headlamp worked great.
Finished projects to come, I hope!

John

I finally finished this project. The combination of walnut and maple matches somewhat the valet tray I made for this same grandson last year. The depth is about 1/8" less than I had hoped for so car keys don`t go in quite as far as I would have liked,(next time). I also learned by mistakes that I hope not to repeat in the future and make life a little easier. It is finished with six coats of wipe-on poly. Too glossy for my liking but I could not find any semi-gloss wipe-on. In addition to the installation holes on the front, I routed a couple of keyhole slots on the back as an alternative installation method
In future editions I might eliminate the screw holes in the front and only go with the keyhole slots, though they do add a bit of a design element.

The other piece I was working on could not be salvaged but did serve to practice my keyhole slots and will also allow me to practice putting a rounded face on the front.

Too bad my pictures are not too good. I`m sure it would have looked better on a wall

Have fun!

John

Looks nice John, he should be happy with that!