Mini-Anarchist Tool Chest (ATC) - Materials and Pre-Work

For this project, I went into it knowing I was going to paint it.  As such, I wasn't going to build it out of hardwoods.  Since I don't have an easy way of reducing thickness of wood by hand, I wanted to use what I could easily find.  At the time I was looking for wood, the local company that will mill wood to my specifications was closed due to Covid.  So, off to Lowes I went.

Figure 1 What the final tool chest looks like.

For the main carcass, I chose 1x12 "pine" that was 3/4" thick.  The boards they had weren't quite as good as I would have liked but they were suitable.  I picked up 1/2" thick 6" wide poplar for the skirting, bottom, interior drawers.  A few poplar boards had some nice mineral streaking which I really like for a project such as this.

Figure 2.  I bought wood of desired thickness so I didn't need to bring out "Mongo".  I can hand plane wood  to thickness but it takes a lot of work.

I knew for the inside lid, I wanted something that would be nice and I had some scrap cherry and a 1x1 of ebony.  If I needed any other wood bits, I would just scrounge through my scraps and cutoffs.

When I finish a project, and before I start a new project, I like to clean up and then sharpen up.  I sharpen my three primary hand plans (#4 for removing bulk, #5 for finishing up, #3 for smoothing), my four chisels, and any other tools that saw use in the prior project.  It makes me feel really good when everything is in order and nice & sharp & ready to go.  I am by no means fast at sharpening but I feel good when it is done.

Fig 3, 4, 5. My go to hand planes and sharpening up to get ready for this project.