Today was another sunny day, and I worked in my workshop all day. Right now, I am making only the 6-sun size boxes. In the morning, I assembled the frame and attached the parts, and after that I moved on to making the Aruki panels.
The panels are a bit large, so there are not many pieces, but the work itself takes time. It seems the weather will get worse tomorrow, so I decided to finish making the Aruki moving panels by this evening. I want to attach them before the humidity becomes higher.
After attaching these parts, the next step is to install the top and bottom panels. However, this time the top and bottom panels are not finished yet, so I will do that work tomorrow. Since I cannot complete everything all at once, today I first shaved the materials I had prepared earlier for the panels and cut them slightly larger than the final size. As you can see in the photo, the poplar wood has two lines running through it. I will add a little more work to this panel and use it to design the top panel for this box.
This time, I want to make the decoration by embedding it into the panel. I will carve a groove and insert another part that fits exactly into that space. For example, the two lines already inside the panel were glued before the wood was made into a panel, so they are part of the panel itself. The solid-wood 3-sun cube I made recently was also created in this same style with two types of wood built inside from the beginning. But this time I will use the method where I carve a groove and insert the parts later, which is something I used to do often in the past.
The difficult part is adjusting the parts so they fit right to the edge of the groove. This needs very careful work because the fit has to be perfect. It is usually best to make the part slightly tight, but when I glue it in, the moisture from the glue makes the part swell a little. If the part is too tight, it becomes impossible to fit it into the groove once it swells. However, if it is too loose, a gap appears between the groove and the part. Glue does not work like a filler, so it cannot hide these small gaps, and even after painting, the gaps do not disappear. As a result, the panel does not look beautiful.
Another problem is that if the part is made too tight, the panel itself will start to warp. When the part is pushed into the groove, it spreads the groove open and bends the panel. This is the difficult part of this method, and it is why very careful adjustment is always necessary. Embedding the parts afterward allows for more detailed work, but it can also cause several problems.
