Pet Casket - Part One

Sometimes you find a delicious piece of wood and just hang on to it, waiting for the right project. This piece of mahogany fits into that category.

Along came the perfect project - a small casket to hold the cremains of two beloved pets, as well as some of their toys, tags, and collars. On one hand, it's a shame that this will eventually be buried up in the ground. But there is something vaguely rewarding about the perpetuity of this.

I usually do my resawing on the tablesaw, but this board was too wide. So - of course, I called my buddy Dan, and borrowed his bandsaw. In a perfect world, I would own a Laguna bandsaw. But it's not, so I don't.

Because I'm so used to fighting my bandsaw when I resaw, I scored the board on the tablesaw. Scoring it gives the bandsaw blade a nice channel to follow.

I even scored one end of the board, so that I could start the cut more easily.

Damn that's a nice bandsaw, even if it rocks a bit. It is more steady than it looked in this video.



Once the boards are cut open, I let them acclimate in the shop. It's best to store them on edge, to get some air circulating around them.

The top and bottom panels were bookmatched from a single piece.

And finally, the wood is ready.

I squared everything up - the wood and the tablesaw.

People say that good miters are tough to accomplish, but there really are only three things you need to have - a perpendicular miter gauge,

a 45 degree angle on your blade,

and a stop block to ensure that your pieces come out the proper length. Follow those three rules and you can't screw it up.

I decided to make a raised top panel for this casket, so I tilted the blade to around 12 degrees and cut all four edges.

Always do a dry- fit, to make sure everything is perfect. Always.

Then - assemble your weapons - get your strap clamps ready

and lay out your boards.

I used some blocks on the corners, so that the clamps wouldn't dent the sharp edges.

Next stop? Cut the box open and install the hardware. This is where the fun begins...