Wood Boxes

Notes on different ways to make boxes

Joints

• Dowel
• Spline
• Rabbets

I did my first few with miter joints because they are simple and look good... if they line up. Keeping gaps out of the corners was hard. Also as the wood moved, the joint caused the wood to sort of bow. These boxes all ran into seasonal issues with their close fits.

On my small shop boxes, I did rabbets and they came out fine, I want to try this on some nicer boxes. Particularly with a nice dowel or spline, this should be strong and look good. I've done these on the table saw, but if I get the router bench setup, that would be even better. Rabbets also make it easy to do an inset bottom or an upside down box.