Drawer Assembly

By simply using a table saw to rip 1/4" grooves into the side panels for the drawer, I am able to assemble the drawer together snugly. I notched the edge of the side panels to create a male piece and then grooved out the front and back of the drawer to create the receiving female part as shown above.



By also ripping an 1/4" groove 1/2" from the bottom of all sides of the drawer assembly I can now easily slide in a panel for the drawer bottom.



Wood glue in the grooves, assemble and clamp to let the glue set overnight.



I picked up some heavy duty drawer brackets from your local-national bulk hardware store and I now have a finished nightstand.

New Nightstand

As you can see from the photos, the close up of the panel on the right is from the new nightstand using 3/4" furniture grade birch ply. The pic below is a close up of a panel from the prototype I built using pine ply with a birch veneer. The birch ply consists of 1/8" sheets of birch veneer glued together to form one 3/4" solid sheet of ply. This is an excellent material for building furniture or cabinets and for my purposes and technique it adds an aesthetic quality.

Finished Prototype for My Nightstand

Here is the final product for my nightstand. As you can see I recessed the drawer instead of my wife's preferred flush mount. It is very sturdy and solid. I used pine plywood with a birch veneer instead of all birch ply since this is a prototype. The next nightstand, which will be my wife's, will be built with an all birch veneer furniture grade plywood. The layering of the birch veneer will give it a bamboo like quality that I am looking for.