Project A simple cross

[Fbranco]

A cousin of mine asked me to make him a simple cross to hang in his living room.

Never having made any, I consulted with Peter Trembly our resident expert on all things of this nature. I was mainly looking for a golden ratio between all the parts. I was surprised to find out that there's isn't any and the proportions are open to whatever appeals to the eye of the builder.
Also for design inspiration I looked at this one made by Tom.

After several mock ups, I settled on the following:

Material will be milled to 3/4" thick and 1-1/6" wide
Horizontal pieces: 5-3/4" long
Upper Vertical: 6-1/2" long
Bottom Vertical: 12-3/4" long
The vertical and horizontal pieces will be joined by a four way miter reinforced with a small piece of plywood.
The material will be cherry with curly maple inlay.

1-Mill your wood to the final width and thickness. Mill extra. You will need it for various setups. Since I was using log run cherry, I did some trimming after milling the thickness and width but they are not even close to the final length.


2-Set up your dado blade to mill a dado 1/4" deep to receive the maple, and set your fence so it leaves a 1/4" cherry border all around. Make a pass and rotate the piece 180deg. and make another. This ensures that you dado is perfectly centered on the cherry piece.




3-Mill some maple 3/8" thick and just a little wider than the dado. Trim the width with a hand plane to have a tight fit.





4-Glue the maple and the cherry. Trim the pieces to length. Cut the miters.




5-Cut a dado to receive the plywood reinforcement. I used a tenon cutting jig and a thin kerf saw blade. Since the ply is undersized just make multiple passes until you get a tight fit. Some people have noticed that when using biscuits or other type of joint reinforcement, a divot may develop at the surface. To prevent that, I did not center the dado. If a divot develops, it will show on the underside.




A little dry fit before cleaning the miters up a bit. Not bad.





6-Glue it, flatten it and sand it up. Finish is a few coats of clear shellac.





A little close up of the miter.


And there you have it. Questions, criticisms, comments are always welcome.

[Harry]

I like it. I think it's a little long on all dimensions for the widths, but that's a difference in personal preference. Good job.

[barnowl]

Beautifully done.

[TowMater]

Well done, I think I'd like it even better after that cherry darkens up a bit.

[JJOLD]

Very nice, I like the detail that went into your design.

Only comment I have is the block plain setting on the blade when not in use, I have a habit of laying them on their side to protect the blade, I even do that for my belt sanders. You can blame that on my shop teacher Waaaaay back when.

[cfiddlemls]

Nice work, I will have to keep the design in mind should the need arise.

[WoodDawg]

Nice work.

[John Fry]

Your cross looks very nice, F.

A great job on your four way miter, too.

[CJF]

Beautiful cross and lovely wood selection as well...

Joann

[Fbranco]

Thank you for your comments, folks. You're too kind.