Building a Complete Chess Set Start to Finish (educational woodworking)

Chess, a game where you exchange problem solving and foresight for friends and the ability to comfortably hold a conversation. Are these skills applicable to everyday life? Sure. Is it interesting to spectate? Absolutely. Is it entertaining to watch somebody build a chess set? Well, let's find out. Today, we're going to be building a chess table and a complete set of pieces.

a chess set? Well, let's find out. Today, we're going to be building a chess table in a complete set of pieces.

This is a bit of a long one, so take a few Benadryl, kick back, relax, and I hope you enjoy.

In order to avoid the monotony of building the table and then all of the pieces in a row, we're going to split up the tasks in a more digestible and quite frankly more entertaining manner. We're starting by breaking down the material

In order to avoid the monotony of building the table and then all of the pieces in a row, we're going to split up the tasks in a more digestible and quite frankly more entertaining manner. We're starting by breaking down the material for the chess pieces. We're going to make our blanks here out of this hard maple and bot.

I was a little hesitant when choosing these two woods because I didn't know if they'd contrast enough. But it turns out when you put finish on bee, it's dark enough to have its own water fountain.

I was a little hesitant when choosing these two woods because I didn't know if they'd contrast enough. But it turns out when you put finish on bot, it's dark enough to have its own water fountain.

And this is me making essentially what are the blanks. My fence on the miter saw station only goes to around 15 and 1/4 in and up. So I'm just using a piece of cherry here to extend my stop. If I need 3-in long

So all the worrying was for nothing. I ripped down the maple to be inch and 7/8 by inch and 7/8 so it matches the bot. Once I have it ripped down, I'm just here chopping it on the miter saw.

I'm really hoping bot is how this is pronounced because I heard somebody at the store say besote and I know that's not correct. And my Spanish friend said bot. I don't think he has a choice but to say it that way. Although it is from

And this is me making essentially what are the blanks. My fence on the miter saw station only goes to around 15 and 1/4 inches and up. So I'm just using a piece of cherry here to extend my stop. If I need 3-inch long pieces, I set my fence to 19 inches and use a 16-inch spacer. And that leaves me with 3 inches of maple left over.

the piece in your hand, ones that are weighted feel a lot more luxurious. I've decided to use magnets as weight for the chess pieces. And there's multiple reasons for that. First and foremost, when you flick these pieces, they don't

I'm really hoping bot is how this is pronounced because I heard somebody at the store say besote and I know that's not correct. And my Spanish friend said bot. I don't think he has a choice but to say it that way. Although it is from Central America, so maybe maybe he's on to something. Now that we have all of our blanks cut, it's time to add weight to them. If you know anything about chess or you've played before, or you've even just held the piece in your hand, ones that are weighted feel a lot more luxurious. I've decided to use magnets as weight for the chess pieces. And there's multiple reasons for that. First and foremost, when you flick these pieces, they don't fall over. They're like upper class weebles. I don't know if you know what weebles are. If you do, you're probably not good at chess like myself, but that's the main goal of these weights is to keep the pieces upright. The other reasons I used magnets will be shown later in the video, so I'll explain that as they come up. You saw me taking a marking gauge and just rolling the center for each of these. That gives me a nice cross to use a center punch here.

reasons I used magnets will be shown later in the video, so I'll explain that as they come up. You saw me taking a marking gauge and just rolling the center for each of these. That gives me a nice cross to use a center punch here.

And that gives us two good dead center marks for the head and tailstock of the lathe. This will not be surprising to any of you seasoned professionals out there, but I am completely new to the lathe. I got one about 3 weeks before this video, and the chessboard you saw in the intro, those pieces were the first thing I ever turned. And I did that just to learn how to do it so I could make this video. One of the first things you learn is making sure your center marks are dead center on either side. It prevents it from wobbling. It makes it easier to work your material down and it's just good practice to have things square, have things balanced. So, that's a good place to start if you're going to get a lathe. As I said, that board in the intro was for a client, and they had asked me if I could make a set, and I said yes, even though I never have. And that afforded me to be able to buy this lathe and all of these chisels. I took some scrap wood from other projects, and I made this tool cart here for the lathe. On that first build, I found a few features that are nice to have on hand, and I'll show you those later in the video.

this video, and the chessboard you saw in the intro, those pieces were the first thing I ever turned. And I did that just to learn how to do it so I could make this video. One of the first

Getting back to the blanks, the hole that I drilled in the bottom fits over this piece of walnut that I made. That piece of walnut is attached to what they call a faceplate. And there are many different shapes and sizes of these. And this just allows me to be able to take each chess piece off of this piece of walnut and put it back on, and it'll still be dead center.

that's that's a good place to start if you're going to get a lathe. As I said, that board in the intro was for a client, and they had asked me if I could make a set, and I said yes, even

Being that the pawns are the portly civilians of the chessmen and therefore assumingly the most relatable to you and me, that's where we're going to start.

first build, I found a few features that are nice to have on hand, and uh I'll show you those later in the video.

The number one question when you're making pawns is how do I duplicate these? How do I make them identical? And the answer is you don't.

this just allows me to be able to take each chest piece off of this piece of walnut and put it back on, and it'll still be dead center.

The thing about a handmade chess set is there's always going to be variation and it just depends on how much time you want to spend and how much attention to detail you're willing to pay. With having just started out doing this, there's no way I'm getting it as close as a machine or an Indian gentleman sitting on the floor with no shoes.

The number one question when you're making pawns is how do I duplicate these? How do I make them identical? And the answer is you don't.

That's what most of the videos I saw were at least the, it seems the best ones have no shoes on and they're sitting on the floor cross-legged.

there's no way I'm getting it as close as a machine or an Indian gentleman sitting on the floor with no shoes.

I have a conspiracy theory that sitting like that cuts off the blood flow to your feet and legs and reserves it for your brain and hands and that's why they're so good. In reality, they probably don't have shoes or chairs and that's just me coping with my opulent lifestyle. I like to incorporate a little bit of each color on each side of the board. So once I had the sizing of my pawn worked out, I mounted up my four-jaw chuck. And this is just to hold the material to make the cap out of. You'll see I use the tailstock here in the center hole that I made on the end to get it centered up before I crank down on it.

I have a conspiracy theory that sitting like that cuts off the blood flow to your feet and legs and reserves it for your brain and hands and that's why they're so good. In reality, they probably don't have shoes or chairs and

Whenever I use this four-jaw chuck, I run it a little bit, turn it off, and tighten it one more time because all of that movement kind of jostles your piece loose a bit.

this is just to hold the material to make the cap out of. You'll see I use the tailtock here in the center hole that I made on the end to get it centered up before I crank down on it.

And now it's time to make this piece round, which essentially is the entire point of a lathe. I'm using a midsize rougher here. And this piece is a little too long. I end up cutting it with my parting tool here in a moment, and that's because there's a lot of vibration on that right end, the end furthest from the chuck.

And now it's time to make this piece round, which essentially is the entire point of a lathe. I'm using a midsize rougher here. And this piece is a little too long. I end up cutting it with my parting tool here in a moment, and

All of that vibration will lead to chatter and it'll leave marks in your piece, and you don't want that. So, use your tailstock or cut your piece down to a manageable length. These caps were only 3/8, maybe half an inch long, so I really didn't need that much material to begin with. This is why I personally didn't use the tailstock. I needed the end to be accessible to the tools so that I could hollow it out. Give it a little bit of a bowl shape. All of the work you're seeing me do here on the lathe is completely improvised. I had no ideas in mind beforehand. I just wanted to mount the piece and see what becomes of it.

All of that vibration will lead to chatter and it'll leave marks in your piece, and you don't want that. So, use your tailtock or cut your piece down to a manageable length. These caps were only 3/8, maybe/ inch long, so I really

Once I had my caps done and finished, I made sure to drop it near my very powerful dust collector, which thankfully didn't suck it up. And I took it over to the drill press. And this drill bit is the exact same diameter as the stem of our pawn. I used a little bit of CA glue here to attach the cap to the pawn. And I'm just by eye adjusting it. I'm spinning it around. And once I had it where I liked, I sprayed it with activator. Once that's on, all that's left is to sand and put some finish on this. For the pieces, I decided to use a finish that smells unbelievable. And my only gripe is it doesn't come with a spoon. OD's oil. Fantastic stuff. Yep, there's the spoon. Funny stuff. I like this stuff so much because you can apply it in a dusty shop and it will not affect the finish. You can also reapply it down the road once your friend's dirty fingers have ruined the top coat.

bowl shape. All of the work you're seeing me do here on the lathe is completely improvd. I had no ideas in mind beforehand. I just wanted to mount the piece and see what becomes of it.

On the jar, it says to apply it sparingly, which I don't listen to. I really flood the pieces. I want it to penetrate. And I'm using these white Scotch-Brite pads to really buff it in, push it down into the grain.

the stem of our pawn. I used a little bit of CA glue here to attach the cap to the pawn. And I'm just by eye adjusting it. I'm spinning it around. And once I had it where I liked, I sprayed it with

Once I'm convinced I've thoroughly coated and evenly buffed each piece, I wipe off any extra finish with blue shop towel. These don't have a lot of loose fiber in them, so they're great for wiping off extra finish.

there's the spoon. Funny stuff. I like this stuff so much because you can apply it in a dusty shop and it will not affect the finish. You can also reapply it down the road once your friend's dirty fingers have ruined the top coat.

If you've owned a chess head

Once I'm convinced I've thoroughly coated and evenly buffed each piece, I wipe off any extra finish with blue shop towel. These don't have a lot of loose fiber in them, so they're great for wiping off extra finish.

If you've owned a chest head before, you know that the pieces have felt on the bottoms usually. I'm more of a leather guy myself. And here I've put some transfer tape on the back. Transfer tape is essentially just a sheet of

double-sided tape that in conjunction with this leather punch give me nice little pucks to put on the bottom of each of these ponds. With the magnet already installed, we put the leather on. And now you're going to see the

second reason why I use magnets for the weights. It's so that I can stick it to the machine itself and have a visual representation horizontally, of course, of what I'm trying to replicate. This makes it much easier along with the

calipers to get each piece almost identical, dare I say, to the original. This maple was infinitely more pleasant to run on the lathe than the Bote was.

For the more simplified chestmen of the bunch, I'm going to show you me making one in each color. For the harder ones like the knight and the king, we'll only do one color. With that being said, I think it took me a total of six real

life hours to get all of these pawns completed. One of the earlier projects on this channel was a chessboard, and I had a lot of requests for drawings of that.

So, I made some for this one here. This one's very similar to that one. And if you buy the drawings, you get two sets, one in imperial and one in metric. I'll leave a link to those in the description

of this video. Those cover the chest table. And as far as the pieces go, here are the dimensions I grabbed.

After balancing the head on this maple pond like a newborn baby, it's time to put some finish on and wrap up our first set of pieces.

Although the pawns are the easiest piece to make, they are the most daunting because there's 16 of them. But with those wrapped up, it's time to move on to the chest table. I ended up choosing walnut for the main structure of this

table because I wanted it to stand out from the chessboard and the pieces. I didn't want them just blending together, and I wanted to make sure there was clear contrast between everything. I'm cutting down this walnut to make the box

or the main frame of this table. We have a bunch of box joints to run in the corners, so I went ahead and I put some paste wax on my table saw. If you're ever about to run a lot of material or

you're using a sled, this is very helpful. It cuts the resistance and the friction down significantly.

This sled is a lot smaller than most standard sleds you'd see somebody build on YouTube or wherever. And I did that just for box joints.

This type of joint is relatively straightforward. It's basically interlocking fingers in the corner. My dado stack being a little older is not quite the dimensions that it's supposed to be. I went for 9/16 on the width of these and it's a little bit

off. So, by the time you get to your last finger with this stack, at least it's not quite as wide as all the other ones, which was fine. I left some room in the design of this table so that I

could cut that off. You can see there, the top one that I was talking about, it's thinner than the other ones, but a quick rip resolves our issue.

Now it's time to glue this thing up. And I'm using a walnuts colored glue. This is just to obscure any of the joints that might not be as tight as you'd like. Although these ones ended up just fine.

There are several intuitive hot spots that you need to apply glue when it comes to a box joint. And uh that's where you see me putting it here. I didn't want to overdo it and have a ton of squeeze outs, even though I had a

bunch, because sanding this in and outside and around all these nooks and crannies is a real pain.

After adding a few more clamps in the other direction, it's time to move on to the tabletop. I decided I wanted it to be quarters, which if you don't know what that is, the easiest way I can describe it is when your board is lying

flat on your table and the wood grain is vertical. Vertical meaning the grain runs face to face, not edge to edge. I didn't have a piece of cordisson, so I'm making one.

Cortison wood is very stable, meaning when you put it in a new environment, it's not going to move that much. This table top is not going to be mechanically attached to the base, as you'll see later in the video. I ended

up using magnets because I wanted it removable, so you could take the board and place somewhere else if you'd like.

If I were to fully glue this table top up, it would not fit through my planer.

It only accommodates 13-in wide material. And this is around 25 or 26. That's why you see me gluing it up in two halves here. I can send these pieces through and then glue those together at the end. That way I have one joint down

the middle to worry about. While that's left to dry, we're going to move on to the chessboard. The 64 squares that make up the actual game.

The method I used is very unorthodox and that is because I did not have access to any more bukote than what I had already.

Normally you would rip down some blocks, some big rectangles. You would glue those together, obviously opposing the color each time. And then once that's dry, you would cut those and then you would alternate those and you would glue

them together and you would send it through a planer, maybe a drum sander. I didn't have enough material to do that.

So here I'm just gluing these thinner strips together and I'm using caution when I send it through the planer and the sander.

Being that these two species are so contrasting, which is the entire point, I used a transparent glue. This way, if, god forbid, there's a gap somewhere. It isn't a dark or a light or a yellow color. It's just clear.

And that's it for the glue ups. We're going to set all those aside for 24 hours and shift our focus to the next piece.

There's a strong argument that the Rook is the second easiest piece to make. For some reason, they all look like steam vents at a nuclear power plant, but I guess it's as complicated as you make it. I'm using this carbide tipped

midsize rougher to get the curvature of this piece and then a square ruffer, which is the other one you saw, to kind of get my lines and dimensions. The carbide tip on the chisel with the orange handle has a width of 7/16 in. I

use that dimension on the height of the base of each of these pieces, and that makes it so I don't have to pull out my ruler and make markings.

In my eyes, the slimmer the midsection of each of these pieces, the more elegant this set is going to look. I'm not fat shaming, but I think I made the right call when I made these pretty thin in the center. I think most of them are

around 5/16 in diameter. The combination of hard lines from the bevels I'm adding now and the transitions from the curvature I added earlier is really what's going to set these pieces apart.

The first of each set always takes the longest and that's because you're figuring out what looks good. And one of the beautiful parts about woodworking is you get to dictate that. It really is completely up to you.

One feature that every piece has in common is a bevel on the bottom edge.

This helps each piece transition into that pad of leather on the underside. I decided to use a 7/8 in forstenner bit for the relief in the top of these rooks. This in combination with the notches around the top edge, which

you'll see me add in a moment, makes this thing look like a tower. To get a consistent depth on all these rooks, I took a permanent marker and I just marked the depth from the first one.

That way, I know where to stop on the next three. I made this simple jig to run the notches around the top of all of these rooks. I'm using a/4in round nose bit because I didn't want to do these by

hand. I did the last set by hand and I figured this would be more consistent and clean. If I were to do this again, I would rework this sled in a manner that lets you attach the rook to the sled

more solid. Other than that, I'm happy overall with how that worked. And now it's back to the lathe to make sure all of our proportions are correct and where we want them. And also final sand with this sponge sandpaper.

Now, if you're thinking to yourself, "That looks like a dumbbell with an ashtray on top." You're absolutely wrong. It does not. Later in this video, I go out of my way to scientifically prove to you and my subconscious that it

does not in fact look like an ashtray. So, stick around for that. This is by far for me the most satisfying part of making these. When you finally turn the lathe off at the end and you see what you've unearthed

with your chisels in these blocks of wood. If you thought I was going to leave the indent from the forstenner bits in the top of these rooks in the final product, I'm slightly offended.

And there's our first rook. I'm actually very happy with the first rendition we have here. And uh it doesn't look like an ashtray. Don't forget that part.

Well, isn't that just lovely? With our rooks completed, we can shift our focus back to the glue-ups.

With these pieces being so thin for the chessboard, I like to give them extra time to dry. I want that glue to absolutely cure, adhere, and bond.

After sending everything through the planer, I can glue up our chestboard and tabletop down the middle like I spoke about earlier. And on this time around, we just have to worry about one joint in the middle. So, I spend extra time and

care making sure that it is nice and flush. When you clamp something this thin, of course, there's going to be flex between the clamps. Here, I am just making sure it stays flat. Normally, I would use a domino to glue this tabletop together,

but I didn't know my final width, and I didn't want to risk showing the domino in the edge once it's cut to size.

And once again, we'll set those aside to dry and shift our focus back to the box.

I'm running a rabbit in the top and the bottom of this box. This is where the top and bottom plates are going to nest into. I wanted the top to have a reveal and the bottom to nest up in flush. When

I say reveal, I mean the upper plate will stick up about an eighth of an inch around the rim of this. And the only purpose of that is to add some dimension to the design.

I'm using 3/4inch plywood for the top and the bottom plate. And I'm using that specifically because plywood is more stable than solid wood. If I were to use solid wood, it could warp or twist or cup and over time make the tambouris not

operate. At no point in this build will you see that plywood edge because, as I said, the top plate that does stick up a little bit is wrapped in fabric.

While I was at it, I cut down some 3/8 inch MDF for some patterns and templates that I use later in the video.

It's time to square up the corners of those rabbits I just ran. I decided not to square up the bottom side and leave them round like you see here because I didn't want to get too close to those

box joint fingers in the corner. I wanted to leave some material there. And the bottom plate is what holds all the weight of the chessboard and transfers it down to the base. So the more material the better. In the end, I don't

think it really matters. And it did make it a lot more challenging for me to keep the corners round on the bottom plate and wrap them in fabric. But much like chess, problem solving is what this channel's all about.

After taking a toothy sander, I dial it in by hand with some hand sandpaper on a block. You can have all the tools in the world, and nothing's quite as satisfying as doing it by hand.

After we verify that we have a nice snug fit for the two plates, we're going to take the top off, take a pencil, and mark the inside of the box to see where it actually rests on this plate. This is

so that we can properly lay out where the tambour track goes. It cannot go beyond that mark towards the edge or otherwise it'll pinch the door.

I'm using a/2 in pattern bit for the tambour track. This is so that I can have an actually substantially thick door as opposed to the 3/8s I normally use.

You can still see my pencil markings from where the case rests on this plate.

I subtracted/ an inch from that line on all four edges, and that gave me the dimensions for this big block pattern you see in the center.

Normally, I would use double-sided tape to hold this pattern to the piece. I went with pin nails on this one because there is more force involved being that the track is a lot longer than normal, and also the sticky residue left behind

would mess with the finish I put on it. I had mentioned earlier not attaching the top to the base with a screw or any kind of mechanical fastener. And I said I was going to use magnets. That's what

these holes here are for. This is the bottom side of the top plate. And these correspond with magnets on the underside of the tabletop. Now, you would think that these aren't strong enough to hold it down in case it starts to flex or

warp, but these are extremely strong. If you're just watching and you don't do woodwork yourself and you don't know what plywood is, all it is is plies of wood, aka thin sheets of wood, with the grain running in the opposite direction

each layer. If you were to put the grain in the same orientation for each layer, it would bend very easily in one direction, which is how they make bendy plywood. If you don't know what bendy plywood is, there's some on the screen

here. And it's one of the things that does exactly what its name is. It bends around corners.

I'm mixing up some Rubio chocolate for the interior of this box for the top and the bottom plate. On the first rendition of this chessboard that I made a few years ago on this channel, I put fabric in here. Although I didn't hate that, I

did not like the transition from the tambour track to that fabric. So, I decided to go just solid here with some finish. With those thoroughly coated, it's time to move on to our third chest.

And earlier, when I said I improv these pieces, I kind of just come up with them on the spot. Here's proof of that. What a tragically unappealing piece and an insult to the game of chess. Thankfully, I knew my own limitations, and I made

that out of maple, which I had a ton of sitting around. Sometimes self-doubt is a good thing. You just have to know when that is.

When attaching the maple blocks to that walnut base, I don't pre-drill because it's in the end grain and the screw is not that long. However, when it came to the bote or if you're using any other hardwoods and you're doing this,

definitely pre-drill the block because you can split it, which I did on one of the pawns.

This specific chisel has what's called a negative rake on the tip. And that is the beveled back edge of the cutter.

Normally, it's just a flat disc with a very sharp edge. This one, having it beveled back is much less harsh on your piece.

I drilled an 8 in hole at the top, and that is for the spire. The traditional shape of these is a teardrop with a notch taken out, but I wanted to go with something a little different.

I've always been a fan of rowd iron gates and what I went with here ends up looking like a cap on one of those which I was very happy with. Working with exotic woods like bot who have a lot of

oils and tannins gums up your tools. Thankfully, a little bit of acetone cleans that up no problem.

I like to make the spindle thinner than the rest of the piece. So, there's a little lip there for it to drop into the body and all sit at the same height. It is important to prioritize parts of each

of these pieces being that the spindle is so thin. If I want to work on the upper half, it's much harder now because you saw the flexion there when I was putting the tool against it, it bends and it wants to snap. So, make sure you

do most of your work on the right hand side before you thin it out.

And there you have it. That's much better than the first one. And we can move on to the darker coat. The darker one. I guess it's not much better. We can all agree that didn't look great. It was too thick compared to the rest of

the pieces I've made so far. And uh thinning it out a little bit. It's pretty nice. That base was a little crazy. It looked like these stairs at a courthouse.

After some reworking, we went from courthouse stairs to peppermill at an olive garden. Beautiful.

It's much more risky with these taller pieces to stick them to the lathe like I did with the pawn in order to replicate it. Here, I just glued a magnet to the underside of the dust hood. It's not

quite horizontal, but I'll figure that out on the next run of pieces. For now, having it in front of me vertically is enough. Heat. Heat.

With those finalized, we move our attention back to the chessboard. I took my tracksaw and I squared up the end grain edge. And this is the edge that's going to run on the fence on the table saw.

This part was a little nerve-wracking because I had no extra material as I've stated before and I had to hold this thing flat against the fence and flat on the table. I did have one extra row of width to go with if I messed this up,

but I didn't thankfully. I wanted to use a fresh blade for this, so I got crisp, clean, non-burned cuts, but this blade was still sharp, so all I did was clean it up and it cut these just fine. I'm sure many will be upset

that I'm not using a push stick here. But as I just said, this needed to be perfectly flat against the fence and the table. And there is wiggle room when you're using a push stick. You do not have complete control with this method.

I do. And I've been doing it for 16 plus years at this point. So, I think I'm allowed to do what's comfortable for me.

This is not me advocating for you to do it this way. Obviously, you should wear your glasses, wear your dust mask, use a push stick, pop a condom on if you're extra concerned. Just be safe in general.

Normally, this is a very weak method of making a chessboard. I would never make that this thin. And if I did, I would do it the proper way, which is with blocks.

As I said before, this is getting inlaid into a larger piece of wood. So, for structure, it doesn't matter that this thing is pretty flimsy. Once it's glued in the table, it's not going anywhere.

We're back to the box and we're cutting holes for the drawers. I wanted nice rounded corners on these. I didn't want it to be square, so I'm going to use this flush cut bit here. First, we have to drill some forstenner bit holes. And

this is so I can get the jigsaw blade through. We're going to cut it rough inside the line so that there's some left over and then I can flush trim that for a nice clean finish.

Now we have plenty of space between the opening I just made and the pencil mark from the template. Now it's time to dial it in on the router table. Doing it this way requires a little more effort. You

have to make a template like I have here, but it leaves a much cleaner edge and it requires minimal sanding when finished.

I used pin nails on this part instead of double-sided tape to attach the template to this because I didn't want it to warp and there's a lot of pressure on that bearing at the top. If this opening was

inconsistent, there's no going back from that. Quite often when you're pulling pins or nails out of a board, they don't come out and they snap. So, I'm just preemptively snipping these off and I hammer them flat. This is on the

interior and as long as it's not scratching anything like the door that slides by, we're fine.

I have a quarterinch round over bit in my router and I'm using that to ease this outside edge. This gives you a nice smooth rounded edge to rest the drawer on when you're lining it up with the slides that I put in later.

With the opening done and dusted, it's time to move on to the tambour door. I have a couple offcuts of walnut from another project, and we're going to cut these down into the slats that make up the sliding door.

And as you'll see here, I am using a push stick. So, there is a time and a place where precision and maybe a dangerous cut with your hand after, as I've said, almost two decades is necessary. This is not one of those

cases. Always use a push stick. If you've seen other videos from this channel before, you know we've done quite a few tambour doors. We always add a bevel or a round over to the edge of each slat, and this just adds some depth

and dimension. If you leave them flat, it doesn't look great. So, I'd suggest always putting a profile on the edges.

If you're new here and you're wondering why there's so much music and not that much woodwork noise, it's because I use an air conditioner and a dust collector usually, and when you speed those up, it's just a high-pitched whistle.

I wanted to put a joke here about my voice being a high-pitched whistle, but it sounds like I've been smoking for 250 years.

This one's for all the people with a Festool vacuum out there. I don't want to hurt any feelings. People get emotional when they see this brand for some reason. But the Fest Tool boom arm that holds your vacuum hose out of the

way is $400. I found a way to do it for 50 here. I got some fence post from Home Depot and some PVC fittings. This is a very simplified solution for an expensive problem.

A little note for if you're making a tambboard door, always run your slat material long like this. wait to cut it down until you've got your finish on it and everything else is done. If you cut each piece to its final size, it's much

harder to do all of that and it's a lot more pieces to manage. So, just leave it long. Cut it when it's done. If you're wondering why this is getting finished before everything else, these need to dry and cure before we can attach the

leather to the back. I also avoid, if I can, getting any of the finish on the back so that the wood grain is still exposed and can receive the adhesive.

It's important with Rubio to get every drop of the finish off because it'll leave an uneven sheen and it won't look great.

With these slats finished and set aside to dry, we can move our focus to the queens. You can see the two pieces of bot in the front are lighter than the rest that you've seen so far. That's because those blanks came from a piece

of burlote. I had one piece of that burl and I used it to make the two queens and some of the pawns just add some variety.

The only idea I had in mind when going into making these queens was naturally I wanted them to have big bottoms and I didn't want to overdo it. Some chess pieces out there have a lot going on.

Some would say too much going on. I am one of those people and I wanted the majority of the focus to go in the crown on the very top. I am a firm believer that less is more. So with that in mind,

I'm going to shut up for a few minutes. I'll be back in a bit.

Heat. Heat. N. Heat. Heat. So far, we have the peppermill from Olive Garden, ashtrays, and now we have an acorn cap from the looks of it. So, that's good. A lot of variety here.

With this piece being so small, I knew it could not handle the router table with the roundnse bit in it. So, I decided to use this file, which ended up being way too aggressive. So, naturally, after 10 minutes of trying this, after I

acknowledged that it's not going to work, I pulled out my Dremel. I have this little bit in there that's the perfect shape for the indent that I wanted in this crown. And it's just a little bit of definition to this thing.

Doing this part by eye ended up being surprisingly and significantly more precise than using the router table like I did for the rooks. And looking back, I wish I had done this method on those.

After dialing in these notches, making sure they're all the same depth, I went ahead and attached it to the queen. In the final shots, you're going to notice the beode queen has a much taller crown, and I ended up going that direction with

these ones as well. So, after I filmed the whole video, I took these off, but here's a picture on the screen to prove that I did in fact raise these up as well.

At one point in time, the dye to make the color purple was more expensive than gold and therefore reserved for royalty.

I'm going to keep up that tradition, and we're going to use some purple leather for the bottoms of the queens and the kings.

Absolutely splendid. Those are my favorite pieces yet. With those completed, we're once again going to shift our focus back to the box. And here I'm just measuring for the top. I wanted there to be a little bit of a lip

around the perimeter when the tabletop is on that you can still see of the box underneath. This again just adds dimension and layers to this build.

If you're like me and you don't have the space for a sliding table saw to make cross cuts on with plywood or something like this here, this is what I do. I take some insulation, whether it be 1 in

or 2 in thick, and you just lay that down on the table, and that acts as a sacrificial surface. You can plunge your saw into it, and it doesn't matter like your tabletop would.

After squaring up the end grain and taking it to the table saw and running it through, pretending I didn't forget to record me actually running it, which is why you see nothing being cut off here, it's time to inlay the chestboard

into the top of this thing. There's the reveal I was talking about. It's nice when you look down and there's just different layers and levels to things. I didn't want this thing just being too boxy, and that's why the corners

actually hang out like they do. When it comes to reveals, details, and things like the edge profiles, I like to keep a specific theme throughout. If it has a bunch of squares, like a chessboard does, this piece is basically square

themed in my opinion, which means most corners are going to come to a point, and I'm going to add a bevel as opposed to a round over to them. And if I do use a round over, it is so minute and

minuscule that it actually still looks square. So, round to the touch, square to the eye.

To make this pattern, I just cut these scraps of MDF and I buttered them tight up against the edges of the chestboard and I glue the joints together. I use super glue on those. And here I'm putting double-sided tape on the

backside. This gives me the exact outline of the chestboard. And once I get this positioned on the top, I can run a router around the perimeter with a pattern bit. And that just ensures I have a very crisp, clean edge for the

perimeter. I pulled out my corner chisels for this because these are very prominent and in your face and I wanted them to be perfect.

I nested it into the corner and this transfers the lines from the pattern straight down to the wood. So after removing it, I dial it in with a very sharp chisel.

Now that we have our perimeter set and we have a little moat to tell us what not to go beyond, it's time to remove all this material in the middle. The way I'm doing it here is not the way to go

because the further you get into this process, the less surface you have to rest your router on. And at a certain point, it becomes a balancing act. If you want the correct way to do this, look up how they flatten slabs. There's

a little rig that slides across the top but doesn't actually touch the piece. That's the way to do this. If you do want to do it this way because you don't want to spend the time making that, just

start in the middle and work your way to the outside. That way, you at least have the perimeter to rest your router on. If you've done your pattern right, this is the type of fit you can achieve.

I've again chosen to go with the translucent glue I used to glue the chestboard up. This stuff does a wonderful job of blending things together if there is a gap or a visible glue line.

Once I had the board seated into the tabletop, I ran a bead of glue around the edge. And that is because I knew that this was going to get routed again and flushed up with the top of the

walnut. I added that piece of plywood there to evenly distribute all of this weight across the top of the chestboard.

After letting that sit for a full 48 hours, I went ahead and bought this router bit, which is going to make quick work of planing that flush with the walnut.

Once again, this would probably be a perfect time to make a slab flattening sled, but uh I just went ahead and did it this way. So, say what you want. I probably agree with you at this point, but this worked. And that's because I

trust my intuition and skills. Confidence can take you pretty far. What a phenomenal place for voice crack.

And I'm leaving that in because that's hilarious. Once I'd gotten the chestboard within a 16th inch of the top of the walnut, I just went ahead with my sander and some 80 grit and I flattened things out. If

you take a ruler or a yard stick or anything flat really and you run it across the top, it'll show you where your high spots are. The key to getting a perfectly flat surface is to not spend too much time in one area and do even

passes. Naturally, sanding creates heat, which made the top of the table expand and warp a little bit. To resolve that, I clamp two flat blocks, one to each end, and I let it sit for about a week. Now,

a week may seem like a long time, but as your glue cures, it's going to seep out of the cracks a little bit, and there's going to be a rigid feeling on the top of the board. This time allows both of

those issues to be resolved. That gives us plenty of time to finish up the rest of this project. Here is all the material for the drawer housing and the drawers, and that's what we're going to start on now. as it goes with most

figured wood. The grain is going in all kinds of directions and some of the grain comes forward out of the face. And when you send that through a planer, it creates what's called pitting. Now, to resolve that, you would just send it

through a drum sander. But being that I don't have one, I'm just going to use this for the inside. This was only about half of the board that I had. And once I saw the stuff with finish on it, I took

the rest of it to a friend who has a drum sander and I had it milled down to a proper size.

Here I'm drilling a hole into the back wall of each side of the drawer housing. This hole is for the push to open mechanism.

The fronts of our drawers sit up against the back side of the tambboard door and these make it so we don't need handles on those drawers.

Even with the weight of all the chest pieces, the mechanism is very strong and pushes that drawer forward no problem.

I was initially going to just use walnut on the drawer boxes, but I found this piece of purple heart that I had laminated up previously and uh here I am just res-sawing that, repurposing it.

I'm going with box joints on these drawers and using these as the sides will add a bit of flare from the front of the drawer when you look inside.

If you didn't know what I meant by drawer housing up until this point, this is what it is. This gets sandwiched between the top and the bottom plates and it holds everything together. This is also what the drawers are going to be

sliding into. And that's the hole for our push to open mechanism. Now that our pieces are milled up, it's time to run more box joints. It's the same process as before, just a little more satisfying being that there's two

colors involved here. While Buddy takes that saxophone on a walk, we're going to take this forstenner bit and drill a hole in the front of each drawer. This just gives us another option on how to open it without

impeding on the door. Once I had our box joint sanded flush, I took it to the router table and ran a slot down the side of each drawer.

Before the recent spike in hardware and the accessibility to it, this is how drawers were made for hundreds of years.

I decided to make the bottoms of these flush out with the bottom of the drawer.

I did this for two specific reasons. First reason is we need enough depth for the chest pieces to not hang out. And secondly, when you pull the drawer out and you set it on the tabletop, I didn't want it to be wood on wood. I ended up

covering the underside with felt and that acted as a good buffer. Using such a simple rail system like this means that maintenance is basically non-existent, minus the waxing every few months or so. I'm using a spacer block to make sure our rails are mounted at

the exact same height. Keep in mind if you're making one of these that this opening right here is what dictates the height of your rails.

And just like the last chest table I made on this channel, we're going with leather on the inside and felt on the bottom this time.

Here I am just dicing that up. And we're using some spray adhesive to attach that to the 1/4in MDF that I used for the drawer bottoms.

Once I sprayed the adhesive on the felt, it became very hard to cut. So, I took this wood burner with a flat head on it and I melted the ends closed so there's no more fraying. For obvious reasons,

we're going to wait until the end to attach the bottoms inside of the box.

And with that being said, that's the next step for these. So, we're going to set these aside and put our focus on the hardest piece of all the chestmen, the knight.

To keep this as simple and cohesive with the rest of the chestmen as possible, I just made the base of the knight the same form and size as the pawns. The base of the knight only takes up about a

third of the actual form and height. So, that's why these blocks are substantially shorter than the rest.

These chisels chew their way through that maple with ease. But with this pote being as grainy as it is, I like to take my time when I'm roughing these in.

As I said, I'm just mimicking the base of the pawns. And that also means we get the exact same details. The only difference in these is that it steps down because we want a thinner piece you see me sanding there at the top to slip

inside of the head of the horse. After working out a shape for the head of the horse, I made this template. And this is a reusable one. I used this on the first set that you saw. And I think

after this video, I'm going to change it up and make this a lot larger. So, this will be the last time I'm using this shape. In comparison to all the other pieces, the knight ended up sitting a little low, and I don't like that. It

should sit up nice and high because it is more valuable than other pieces, and it's just about/ in taller than the pawns.

Once traced, it was time to take it to the band saw and cut it out with a blade that's much too large. Normally, I would swap the blade out there for something thinner that can bend around a curve

easier, but I only had a few of these to cut out and uh quite frankly just didn't want to do it. So, we've all been there.

I'm sure you understand. And now it's time for a bunch of sanding. That's what most of these knights are, is sanding, looking at it, and then resanding. Here, I'm putting two marks. That is the final width I would like the head to be. And I'm just

adding a rounded curve to each side of its head. So, from front to back, I do a curve. And then from top to bottom, I do a curve. And that gives you an interesting looking shape when all is

said and done. I also use the belt sander to taper from the top of its snout. I guess I don't think horses have snouts. Beaks. It's not a beak. I don't know what it is. I taper from the eyes

down to the tip of its nose because they do have a funnel-like head. Once I had it roughed in, and by roughed in, I mean basically molded to the shape I wanted, it's time to attach it to the

base. And that just gives us something sturdy to hold on to while we final sand it. To do that, I just drill a hole the same diameter as the neck of my base in the bottom of the head. And I attach it

with some CA glue. When I put the head on, I actually spin and twist. And that's so the glue gets in the cracks and crevices and creates a very strong bond. As you'll see, we're about to take it back to the lathe. And

this needs to be a very strong joint. My goal on the lathe at this point is to very gingerely taper the head into the base. I use my negative rake round chisel here. As I've said, it's much less aggressive on this and it leaves an

almost finish ready surface. After a touch of sanding on the base, it's time to take it into our hands and sand for about 30 minutes and dial in all of the details.

A horse without hair is just a slow motorcycle. And fortunately for these ponies, they don't have alopecia. So, it's time to give them some proper plumage.

The main on these matches the base, and the base dictates which side of the board these pieces go on. The first set I did with this rasp or this file. I don't know which this would be considered. It's kind of aggressive, so

I'm more inclined to call it a rasp. It can be a challenge to get a perfectly straight line with a rasp started on a flat surface. So, I took an X-acto blade and I just made a little guide. After a

few minutes of not getting much done, I pulled the Dremel out because this bit makes quick work of this part of the process.

To get the hairpiece to nest in properly, I kept tracing the backside of the head and removing the material until I got to a certain point that it just fits right in.

Once it's seated properly, or at least to my liking, I go ahead and give myself a line about 3/16 inch from the top of the head, and I cut it off there. And we leave that long, as you can see, because

we're going to sand it in once the glue is dry. After final sand of the main edges, it's time for its finish. And this one gets it applied by hand.

And after a fortnight of effort, we're done with the nights. And it didn't take a week. I believe that's what a fortnight is, but it felt like it. We can set those aside. And now we're going to put the fabric on the top and the

bottom plate. This is some gray faux leather I have left over from a banquet bench job that I did. I'll put that on the screen. And I'm using this to just add a little bit of variety. I like different textures,

different materials, different colors. If you go back and watch through this channel, that's kind of the theme.

These rounded corners ended up being a real pain, and I did this to challenge myself, and it did work out in the end.

You don't see any of the fabric sticking out in the corners. So, I did get the job done. I know there's professionals, maybe one or two, by chance watching this, who do fabric for a living, upholstery that is. And I'm sure this is

infuriating to you, but the end result ended where I wanted it to, and that's all that matters to me.

When it came to the square corners, it was much easier. And I should have just done this with the bottom. Uh, I accepted the challenge and I did it, but I wouldn't do it again because there's really no benefit. These ended up being

pretty snug, and I felt great about them. With the fabric portion of the plates wrapped up, it's time to scratch our magnets, creating cracks and crevices for the epoxy to hold onto. We're using epoxy instead of a screw, because what's

left of the plywood at the bottom of that hole is about an eighth of an inch thick, maybe less. Using the epoxy lets us be as close to the surface as we can, so it still interacts with this magnet

on top without having a screw pop through. After getting the magnets placed properly, corresponding to the ones underneath and applying some glue to these rings I made on the lathe, we can place our board exactly where it goes. And now we know exactly where our

magnets go. This is a much easier way than doing it with measurements. We're using a real world interaction to figure out where these go. And that's how I like to do things.

If you've forgotten already, these feet are here so that we can take this board off of the base and take it to a table if you want to play chess somewhere else besides the chess table itself.

These get covered with a little pad of leather, so you're not going to see any of this.

Now that the tabletop's done and ready for finish, we're going to move over to the tambboard door. The trick to these is to get every single slat the exact same height and make sure your saw is square. If you do both of those things,

the door is going to operate very smooth. With both doors included, there are 34 slats, and that includes these stops, which prevent the door handle from jamming into the box and leaving marks.

Another important step to making a very smoothly operating tanboard door is making sure the pieces are square when you attach your fabric to the backs. I set up this simple jig in about 30 seconds, and this just ensures each slat

is perfectly square and parallel to the one next to it. On my first version of this chessboard, the handle was a peg that stuck out. I wanted this one to be a little more elegant and flat. So, I

took our second slat, being that the first one in the row is going to be our stop block, and I ran a cove slightly offc center down the length of it, and that is for this brass to go into.

Before applying the adhesive or the contact cement, whatever you use, I like to put some tape along the top and the bottom. This is a spot where I know the leather isn't going to touch, and it's nice to keep it free and clear of

anything sticky. These parts being the ones that slide around in the track, they need to be as glossy and as slick as possible. And having the adhesive on there could prevent that.

If you, like myself, don't have an expensive band saw that can cut metal, I use this cable management strap here to hold the trigger in place. And this allows you to make two-handed cuts on smaller pieces like this one here.

I cut these brass pieces just shy of the opening that we have in the box. I scuff the backside with sandpaper. And here I'm using epoxy to attach it to the slat. If you're somebody who doubts the strength of this epoxy, it's pretty

affordable. Grab some yourself and give it a try. Once you do, you'll realize that this stuff can fix just about anything besides your marriage.

And that's the last of the fabrication for this build. Now it's time to apply some finish. We've got Rubio Monaco Pure. This stuff's easy to apply, easy to maintain, and it just looks great overall.

There's not much to say while I'm putting this finish on, so I'm just going to pipe down for a little bit and let you enjoy. I'll be back in a few moments.

Well, wasn't that lovely? I hope you enjoyed the slight reprieve from my voice. But now I'm back. And once I wipe all the finish off the tabletop here, it's time to move on to the hardest thing to put finish on, and that is this

case. The box joints in the corners make it very hard to apply and wipe off every last drop. I believe this case took me 45 minutes.

Now, a spray finish would be more convenient for something like this, but you still have to knock the grain down with sandpaper at some point during that process, and it would take just as long, I'd imagine.

With the finishing done and dusted, we're going to let it sit for 72 hours until it's cured. And we're going to shift our focus to our last piece, which is our king. In a set of chestmen, there are only two kings, one in either color.

That leaves me with less work. So, I wanted to spend extra time making sure that these looked the exact way I wanted them to. Obviously, I wanted it to be the tallest piece on the board with the most robust base. Besides those

guidelines, everything else was left to improv. I'm using my negative rake chisel here on the end grain and that's what those are supposed to be used for. I created an indent in the top of the king or a

bird bath, whatever you want to call it, so that the cross isn't just sitting on a flat top. As I've said, this gives it dimension. The more small details you stack on top of one another without making the project look corny is what

sets it aside from everything else. I've got my four jaw chuck set up here with maple, and this is what I'm going to turn the cross on. I'm using a very interesting method and it can seem a little bit difficult, but if you're

decent with sandpaper and a belt sander, it's not too tall of an order. I spent some time shaving down the blank to round and cutting the end off because I had too much material on there. And then I laid out some lines for my cross

and I used the square rougher to shape it in. I again step down the base of the cross so it fits the diameter of the hole in the top of the king. And that gives us a nice little junction where the cross

meets the top. When it comes to pieces like this cross, there is no right or wrong way to do it.

It's however you want to. And as long as you're having fun and the outcome is what you wanted, then that's the way it should be done. You could probably make the vertical part and drill a hole in it

and put the crossmember through and that way you have two perfectly rounded pieces, but that would take away the character that this has. In the corners where these two intersect, there's little stress marks it looks like, and that just shows it was done by hand.

With a little glue and some twisting and gyrating to make sure the cross lines up with the grain, the king is basically done and it's time to apply the finish.

I know what you're thinking. That looks like a piston from a 2004 Ford Taurus.

And no, it doesn't. I mean, it does a little bit, but that wasn't intentional.

And that's a wrap for the chestmen. With all of our pieces completed and our table components cured, it's time for assembly so we can see the fruits of our labor.

It's always a good idea when doing tambour to do a couple of test runs and some dry fits. When you've beaten the concept into the ground, like I have on this channel, you can afford not to.

The drawer housing only gets attached through these pocket holes into the bottom plate. It doesn't need to go into the top plate because all of the weight bears down on top of this and gets evenly distributed into the base. The

top plate does however get attached to the box or the body of the table. And you'll see how I do that here in a moment.

Now, I know I said L brackets are not classy, and I still agree with that, but this is the only way I could think of having a mechanical fastener attaching the top to the table without having it be visible. In the corners where the

tambour door slides by, I put little L brackets so all four corners have some sort of support.

As we normally do on this channel, I'm putting paste wax in the tambour slot, and that helps everything slide frictionlessly and uh smooth. This is a non-negotiable part of the process for me at this point because I've seen these

doors without it and this is just completely superior to that. After testing once both plates are on that were not getting squeezed so that the door is able to move freely. We're moving over to punching some holes in

the bottom plate and using some trim head screws to attach it to the base.

And I also added these brass feet so you can remove the entire tabletop from the base and treat it as a separate unit.

These push to open mechanisms have a little steel plate that's magnetized to the front of the mechanism and it has a sticky back so you can have it on the back of the drawer and it'll hold it in

place. That way it only comes fully out when you want it to. And just like that, we're done with this build. I'm going to let you enjoy these shots of me setting this up. Yap free, and I'll be back in a moment. Enjoy.

Well, isn't that quaint? Overall, these turned out great, especially for a noob like myself.

There are a few things I would do differently, but for the most part, I am very satisfied.

To further prove an argument that I've been having internally this entire video, if these rooks did in fact look like ashtrays, wouldn't these little cigarettes I made look right at home?

Point proven. I'm actually going to leave these in the drawers, and you can put them in your opponent's rook as an intimidation factor.

Well, that was quite the journey. I hope you enjoyed yourself. If you did, please subscribe. That's very helpful. Leave some comments. And uh thank you. Thank you for being here. I appreciate you dearly. And I will see you in the next

video. Love you. Good night.