Has anyone made a planter for a 3.5" pot? I need to make 4 for Mother’s Day. I tried making a box and input all the info and cut it twice. Neither box will stay together. Perhaps someone knows of a foolproof way to cut and assemble a small planter?
why can’t you use glue? I’m assuming you’re just doing a press fit currently?
I tried. It just collapses. I also tried gluing them flat and tried to get it to work that way. No good.
what material are you using and what kind of glue?
can you share a picture? I’m going to be leaving my computer 
soon for my daughter’s tennis match. but I’m sure somebody else around here can get you going in the right direction!
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So I have a 4" box with an open, straight edge for 1/8" material that looks like this. How is what you are trying different?
when I cut that I have to move one piece and when I actually cut it the pieces won’t stay together even with glue. I tried 1/8" baltic birch and proof grade
draft board. No luck getting it to stay together. The draft board was better but still won’t stay together. Something is happening I think when I move the piece. I check the ruler for each piece and it says they are the same but they aren’t.
Using proof grade draftboard and wood glue. I also tried 1/8" baltic birch and scotch high performance and e6000 glue. The draft board came apart with the stronger glue.
The proofgrade hardwoods don’t like glue. Something about how they’re finished. Hot glue won’t adhere well at all. Cyanoacrylate has trouble soaking in to the wood, and also results in weak joints. In a few instances, I resorted to Epoxy (and I don’t want to talk about the material I wasted making a box from Delrin, which is well-neigh impossible to glue). I lightly sand the inside edges of the box joints before gluing and that seems to help quite a bit with adhesion.
Glue has a shelf life. Are you sure your glue is good? Draftboard is like a sponge when it comes to glues, if even they didn’t stay together, I’d be looking pretty closely at the adhesive.
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What size box are you trying to make?
4"
I’ve tried white board, draft board and baltic birch. None of them stay together long enough for me to glue them.
The glue came from Home Depot yesterday. The hot glue just dissolved the draft board into mush.
My suggestion would be sand the pieces that will be fitting together with some heavy sandpaper. The goal is not to remove wood but to remove finish and “scuff” the wood a bit. For glue, use tightbond red or blue. Let it dry at least 30 minutes before fiddling with it. Rubber bands can help keep things together if you don’t have clamps.
After 30 minutes you can remove the clamps/rubber bands and check how thing fit. The piece should take reasonable handling at this point. Let the glue dry 24 hours then sand and finish to suit.
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If you mean so that it’ll fit onto the GFUI, do you know you can hold down shift and then the rotate key will rotate 45º at a time? Then there’s no chance of accidently resizing. Also, when you build the box in the generator it defaults to 3mm thick material, but what you’re using may be smaller, which means the holes will be larger than you need. You could try measuring your material and entering that value in the thickness field.
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Thank you! I hadn’t tried sanding them.
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Amazing. No I didn’t know about the rotate key and resizing the holes. Thanks so much!!!
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I hate to say I told you so. but hey i told you so. we have a lot of smarts around here.
if it wasn’t for this brain trust what Iittle time I have with BEAMER would be a source of frustration instead of JOY.
Also one thing for assembly. BLUE PAINTER’S tape and WAX Paper sheets.
I have laid boxes down on a small piece of wax paper, glued up the joint. put the joint(s) into position and used painter’s tape as a clamp so to speak around the box. the wax paper keeps the tape from sticking. you can even tape the wax paper with the painter’s tape and then spread the glue.
get everything into position and add some more tape.
Glad you are making progress!
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Quick note - I’ve had good luck with PG and Gorilla Super glue. Not sure why, but I’ve made several tabbed boxes and have had good luck with their thicker gel super glue with a brush. Not saying it’d work for you, but it’s worked for me with no issues.
That is good to know. thanks for the tip.
Nail files or emery boards are really good for sanding tabs and slots for finger joints. Easier to keep the sanding action to just the tab vs using a sheet of sandpaper.
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