Office Name Plate Holder

[harryball]

These have been done for some time but I'm just getting the time to post.

Here are the photos...

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I'll post more about the process shortly.

/RB

[wberminio]

Really nice work,Robert


Erminio

[harryball]

The holders are cut from cherry. I started with rough lumber, planed it, cut blanks, rounded the edges slightly and sanded them down to 220 grit. They only needed the keyholes, logo and top slot.

I then applied a single coat of polyurethane to the blanks. Followed that with a 220 grit light sanding and applied a walnut gel stain, waited about 3 minutes and wiped it off evenly. I took this route to keep from darkening the grain too much but still bring the overall color a little darker. Then I applied 2 more coats of poly. This was all done to the prepared blanks.

I created the hold down jig you see in the photos. The jig is screwed down and the blanks are placed into the slots for each machining portion. The keyholes are cut on the back in the same slot used to cut the logo on the front. The other slot is where the top groove to hold the plate is cut. I used no clamps for cutting the top groove. If the fit wasn't tight enough I found a post it note wedged in when I inserted the blank did the job.

The keyhole cut is done with a regular keyhole bit. The top groove was cut with a 5/32" straight cut in 2 passes. the top slot is not a straight slot. I left slight .005" bumps inside the slot when cutting. The logo was cut with a .01" flat tip engraving bit.

Once the botting was completed I wiped off the blanks and used black artist acrylic to paint the logo. Since the blank was finished the only place the paint wouldn't wipe off with a damp sponge was the logo. Once that dried I then lightly sanded the face with 220 grit to remove in last black resedue and coated the entire product with one last coat of poly.

The acrylic plates were provided and that is what I based all the dims on. The names are applied using a vinyl cutter (a cool toy).

I got $100 each to make them, deliver and install them on each door.

For the installation I took one of the samples/test products and drilled holes though it where the screws would be when it was hung properly. I then put the screws through the front of the blank and let them protrude slightly from the back. The point of the screw was sticking out right where the head of the screw would need to be once the holder was placed on the wall and the keyhole slid over the screw heads. I carefully placed and leveled the installation blank, the pressed hard againsts the wall. This left two divits where I put the screws and hung the final product.

/RB

[sawdust535]

Nice work! Did you clear the keyhole slot first with a straight bit, or did you do it all with just the keyhole bit?

[harryball]

I did the entire keyhole with the keyhole bit. The Z speed was .5 ips and the move speed was .75 ips

/RB

[paco]

Nice and simple JIG Robert!

[butch]

Nice job Robert.
I like your jig.
Butch

[harryball]

Thanks guys. I tried to keep it simple. You'll noticed I vcarved the offsets from the 0,0 corner and added notes, Front / Top to it. It really kept me straight as I did this over time.

The hold down tabs are hard board strips with a small rubber foot under each one. When swung into place and let go they acted like springs holding the work in place.

I found that some of the blanks were a little loose (though not much) and some post it note paper for a shim was just right. I was very careful during the blank creation to make them all the same. When I cut the jig I used the "sneak up on it" method. I cut the slots intentionally slightly small then kept running the bot adding .005 each time to the size, it took 3 passes for a snug fit. I later had to make one more pass at .002... after the blanks were finished, I found the poly added thickness making the fit a tad too tight again!

/RB

[ljdm]

what was the purpose of the .005 bump in the slot?
Oh yeah, meant to mention - nice work!

[harryball]

The blanks I cut all the same size, very carefully. Then I measured them and intentionally cut the slot .01" too small. This was an attempt to make sure I didn't cut the slot too big ( = loose fit) and have to start over.

I tried to fit the blank in, too small, enlarge by .005, too small but almost, enlarge by .005 until it slipped right in. Since the fit had to be perfect and my measurements + tolerance in the machine etc... MAY compound errors I wanted to make sure I got it right regardless of any of those errors.

I didn't mind spending a reasonable amount of time on the jig to get it perfect since I was going to be processing with it 150 times or 3 fits for each blank (the top groove, the keyholes and the logo). Besides, I may make some more of these too.

/RB