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My two panel saws (one rip filed, one crosscut filed), slip into raised slots at one end, and the handles fit over “French fit” keepers; they are held in place with toggles.
Following my post “Overflow Saw Storage,” a couple readers asked for a better look at my saw storage for those tools that already have a home.
Here’s a detail of a personalized toggle. And for those of you who’ve given me a rash of cr*p about the drywall screws, I changed them to slot screws. Now you can give me a rash of cr*p about the slot alignment instead.
My panel saws are affixed to the underside of my English tool chest top – a location that necessitates sliding the top till to almost center in order to close the lid. That’s a minor inconvenience at best, and it allows more of the floor space of my chest to be used for planes, because there’s no need for floor till. (I did try out several iterations of floor and wall-hung saw tills before deciding on those with which I ended up.)
I decided to hang the backsaws on the front inside wall of the chest, by simply adding a row of slots behind the slotted tool strip that Christopher Schwarz details in his book “The Anarchist’s Tool Chest” and his video “Make a Traditional English Tool Chest.”
Because it puts more stuff on the front wall, it means I can’t slide my tills quite as far forward, but that hasn’t proven to be a bother; I can still easily reach items in the two lower tills. (And in case you’re wondering, that taped-off area in the center? That’s the future location of a Peter Ross “crab lock”…if I can ever manage set aside enough cash.)
my rack for backsaws is on the front wall of the chest, behind the slotted strip for chisels, drivers, Tite-Mark cutting gauges and other round(ish) things. That frees up floor space.
And here’s a look at the interior empty, just after I installed the saw rack and slotted strip.
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And as soon as I’m at home, then I’d like to get about
I like to lie in the bureau drawer
But I make such a fuss if I can’t get out
What kind of work are you using for your front slotted and drilled saw/chisel/other round things rack? Also for the bottoms of the tills? I like the dark contrast look and wonder if it is oak for wear, or another wood for looks (or perhaps one that works for both).
I built the 2-day “Traditional” tool chest as my first woodworking project and I would like to do this but have been hesitant to do so with the fear of the lid not closing. Did you mount the saws and then hope that everything closed, eventually finding the correct position for the top till, or did you have a way to mock the placement that you can share?
Excellent ideas for storage in the chest and beautifully done! Try as I might, when I build storage it always seems that eventually I am lacking. I try to keep my saw collection in my chest just to those I actually need, but there is always one more saw that I can not put down! When I made my ATC, I thought I would be clever and make it a bit longer for that really long rip saw (which I did not have and still do not have yet). However, a couple of years ago I bought a set of H&R (36 planes) and guess what? One plane too many to fit conveniently across the width of the box! I need a box stretcher bad!