Finishing the Cabinet

For arbitrary and capricious reasons (mostly laziness, I suspect), I elected to use tung oil to finish the cabinetry.  I mostly wiped it on with a lint-free cloth.  This first picture shows the difference the tung oil makes on the wood.  Since the Flemish harpsichords I built had painted cabinets, I was totally inexperienced with finishing nice wood, so I was really surprised at how much the tung oil darkened up the cherry.

Here I am applying tung oil to the clavichord stand.

This next shot shows the various parts of the lid which are drying.  I took extra care to avoid getting the oil on those areas of the lid's frame that will be glued.  The center panel needs to float with the humidity and is not glued into place, but is simply held by the lid's frame.  Since I have no way of truly knowing if the center panel is fully dry or not, the possibility exists for it to shrink in size a little, thus exposing more of its unglued edges. By finishing the entire center panel before assembling it with the fourth side of the lid's frame, I will prevent an unstained edge from appearing should the wood ever shrink. Look at that glow!

Here's a little fine brushwork on the soundboard molding.  I stuck down two widths of masking tape on the soundboard in case I got a little sloppy.  I removed the tape very quickly after the second coat of tung oil was applied to prevent any sticky residue from making itself too comfortable on the soundboard.

Two coats did the job with a 24-hour drying period in between.  The second coat took about half the time of the first coat.  Tung oil sure stinks, but I'm really pleased with the results. 

As promised...the music desk

I've removed the butterfly hinges in preparation for applying a nice finish to the cabinet, but you can see how the desk looks sans clamps.  Next time you see me, I'll be covered in tung oil.

The Music Desk

This was pretty simple.  With the lid opened, I measured the keyboard opening, found its center and marked it on the inside lid about an inch up from the bottom.  I then measured the length of music desk, found its center, marked it.  After marking 1" up from the bottom of the lid in several places where the desk would be placed, I applied a generous amount of glue to the desk and matched the center mark for the keyboard opening with the center mark on the desk, being careful to line up the bottom of the desk with the 1" marks so the desk would be level.  I clamped it on both ends, mopped up excess glue that squeezed out, and called it done.  

Of course, it is possible to glue the desk on incorrectly, but I managed to get it right.  The stack of National Geographic Magazines was eventually piled on the center since I only had two clamps handy.  Had my life partner been around, he might have suggested Karl Barth's Church Dogmatics, but the magazines did the trick.  

From another angle:

Next step is to stain the cabinet.  I'll post a few pix as it progresses.

Over-think much?

And now for the butterfly lid hinges.  

I live in mortal fear of drilling a hole in this very expensive clavichord case and then having to fill them, only to have my goofs stand out like a sore thumb.  So installing these hinges took me a while.  I turned those suckers every which way, trying to make sense of it, trying to make them look balanced.  I even called in consultants - both of whom were equally clueless, but between the three of us, I think we got it right, even though it looks wrong.

Of course, I had to turn those hinges every which way because I didn't have any decent pictures to check my work.  Should any hapless (and equally confused) builders happen upon my rantings, I hope at least my photos will be helpful.

The hinges are attached to the outside of the spine of the case and the inside of the instrument lid, so according to the manual you have to take the hinge apart and flip one side for that to work.  I'm not a cabinet maker, I'm not a carpenter, I don't build hinged boxes on a daily basis, so I just did like I was told.  The pretty hinges were suddenly unbalanced.  Wonker-jayed, if you will.  (I just made up that word, I think.)  We thought it had to be wrong.  They reminded me of a shirt that's been buttoned up one off.  Here's a shot of the left hinge as you're looking at the back of the case (which, in reality, will be the right hinge when you're seated at the instrument).

See what I mean?  Wonky.  Yuck.  I suffer from positional vertigo (and sometimes worse), so anything this crooked doesn't help.  And I wanted both hinges to be mirror images. Unfortunately, they're going to be parallel because there's no way to do what my all-things-in-balance self wants.  So be it.  

So, now, lots of pictures starting with the hinge on the right (which will really be on the left when playing the instrument). 

To get to the point pictured above, I positioned the hinges three inches from the edge of the lid and drew circles where I was going to drill pilot holes for the screws.

Next, I tapped a small nail set with my hammer to start a hole so the drill bit wouldn't skidder (another word I just made up) all over the place.

All this was done on the spine as well.  Of course, the directions said to measure and mark the lid to make sure it was perfectly centered over the case.  I didn't do that.  I went by feel, which for me was much easier and would be far more accurate, made my marks, tapped, drilled.  Taped a little flag on the drill bit to ensure I wouldn't drill too deep.  My lid is dead on!  

We tightened down the hinges on the lid, screwed the other half of the hinge to the spine, tested for smoothness of action and made sure the hinge wasn't chewing up the cabinet.  It worked.  I don't understand it, but that's okay.  I don't understand discrete math either, and I've survived.

Not too shabby, huh?  Now, I know some of you are going to say, "Hey, you put the lid on in reverse.  That should be on the outside."  Nope.  The beautiful beveling in the wood should be seen when the case is open, not when it's closed.  These little instruments are not meant for performance.  They were designed to be practice instruments.  No one was going to see (much less hear) the instrument in a concert setting.  And when the instrument wasn't being used, it was most likely stored under a bed or somewhere else out of sight.  Fancy case as a piece of furniture not required.  Flash forward to 2013.  If you want to be authentic, you put the plain side out so that you open up with the pretty side facing you when you're practicing.  And even if you don't agree with my logic, there is actually one decent picture of the instrument supplied with the manual that clearly shows the lid attached as I attached it.  

Finally, I drilled some pilot holes for the little screw eyes that will be used with cord to hold the cabinet lid open.  I figured out the placement without too much hemming and hawing.  The cord is a piece of crap that unravels without any encouragement.  Zuckermann could save itself a penny or two and just leave it out of the kit.  I'll be buying something much more appropriate for permanent use.

Manual review for this section:  Include a lot more pictures from different angles because the written description about the hinges is clear as mother's milk, and the final look of the hinges is just wrong to my eye.  I've never seen hinges on a lid like this, but then I've never attached hinges from the outside to the inside before.  The hinges on the harpsichords were all on the outside, logical, a piece of cake.  Nevertheless, this appears to work despite being counter-intuitive to my artist's eye.

Next time I check in, I'll show the little music desk glued on.