Routing a Kitchen Draining Board

It's been about  two years since we did the kitchen. Since then my mental to do list has had on it "Route some drainage grooves in to the worktop. For various reasons (mostly that I didn't have the balls to) I've been putting this off until now. Eyes right and you'll see I managed to get it done.

At first I'd thought I'd need a jig to do this. The only one I could find was on Screwfix and cost £90. For something I'm only going to use once I couldn't bring myself to spend that much and have been looking for a cheaper alternative ever since.

Having not found one I decided there was only one thing left for it - take the advice given to me in this USENET post and make my own jig. Turns out it wasn't all that hard and was also fun to boot!

Here it is:

You can probably tell that it's made out of a piece of door frame casing I had left over. The two pieces are set apart by the exact width of my router and then were clamped and screwed and glued together with the bits of wood you see at each end.

On the under-side it looks like this:

 

The bits of plastic you see are joist spacers and are colour-coded by size. The red ones are 5mm high. The blues are 3mm and the yellow 1mm. The are spaced so as to give an even rise of 5mm over the 500mm length of the groove.

I'd setup the router beforehand so that at the far end of each groove it just touched the worktop. This means the grooves go from being 5mm deep to a nice flush finished where it come out at the other end.

In the photo above you can see Karen is standing on the other end. As we could only work in-situ this was my only way of "clamping" both ends.

Here's the work in progress:

Note that I'd worked out beforehand how to space them all and had started on the centre one before working outward in each direction.

All that was left to do was a light sanding and a few coats of Danish oil before it looked like this:

In a few months the sun will have darkened it to the match the surrounding wood and all we be good.

I write this blog post for a few reasons:

1. It's been way too long since the last entry and high time I started posting regular updates.
2. I want to show-off at what a clever boy I've been.
3. To help others. This is the main reason why and the reason I write most of what I write on the web. In doing this I couldn't find any other guide (no matter how short) on doing this. So, by writing this I hope somebody else will Google it one day it will give them the courage to do it for themselves. If I can do it, so can you.

Obviously this is a short entry and doesn't cover everything I did. What I should mention I did (and strongly advise you do) is practice. Practice, practice and then practice some more. I had an off-cut of the worktop that I could mess about with.

Do not try your jig out on your worktop until you're happy with it!

Good luck. Any questions, let me know.

Comments

[David Wall]

Is it me or are the images to this article not there when I double click on a image it comes up with http://6a.typepad.com/images/missing.gif.

David

[Jake Howlett]

Bloody Typepad! Only went and deleted all my images didn't they. Long story, but their system thinks it's cleverer than it obviously is.

Thanks for letting me know David. Back now.

Jake

[Marcus]

Nice tights Jake, combining two hobbies in one job. Like your style.

[Paul]

My wife would have killed me if I'd even attempted working on the draining board without moving the fruit and crockery away from harm!

[Deb the makem]

Hi Jake, just to say, you are a very clever boy, could do with you at my house to work through my mental list. Didn't think my brain could hold a list as long as mine! Just need some advice if you can help. We have similar benches from Ikea(the cheap ones). I have given them 3 coats of Junckers Rustic Oil but after 2 weeks the benches that get the most traffic needed oiling again (I did rub the oil in afer painting it on). The finish on your benches looks far superior. 1-Is the colour of your benches due to the Danish oil or the type of wood(they are much darker than mine)? 2-If I used Danish oil on mine would I have to sand the Junckers off first? 3- Do you paint the Danish oil on and leave it to dry or rub it in? 4- How many coats to get the finish you have achieved? Thanks Jake and send my love to everyone,Deb. ps Karens choice of hosiery, pop socks or Janet Reager lace tops? Hope for your sake it's the latter.

[Jake Howlett]

Hi Deb,

I can't remember exactly, but there must be getting on for a dozen coats of oil on it. It was bear wood at first.

I rubbed a coat of Danish oil on using a soft rag, left it a day, lighly sanded it and added a new coat. Repeat the process each day for a week or so.

It's lasted almost two years now. Worth trying!

jake

[Peter]

Just found your blog, spent hours reading it, totally hooked now.
Great to see someone else doing a building blog.
Peter

[wood floor guy]

Used Overmat hardwax oil for mine - made in Holland by floor service. sell it at work for flooring, but only 2 coats needed on a solid beech work top and it lasted 2 years. Also used it for exterior decking and teak furniture, but only good for one season.

[kongomush]

Great guide.... I'm about to do the same to my worktop, I'll let you know how I get on. By the way, what did you use to cut out the section for the sink, jigsaw?, router?

[Jake Howlett]

Hi Kongo. If I remember right it was a jigsaw.

[amanda]

thank you so much for this really excellent and helpful post, saved us from a lot of trouble and expense

[martyn]

hi jake
stumbled on your draining board article,when searching for a cheap template to route my draining board.and there it was the only solution was to make your own,so i copied your idea even bought the joist spacers,a very clever way of getting the perfect fall.i think the hardest thing was plucking up the balls to attack a rather expensive piece of wood.am going to treat this drainer with ronsil floor varnish.as this is a mark two drainer can`t afford to mess this one up.p:s hope those tights conform with the stringent elf and safety regs.thanks jake you are a clever boy.

[Jake]

Hi Martyn,
Thanks for commenting. It makes my day when I hear that I've helped others!

[Sam]

Hi, im very impressed with the jig you have made and the results, im in the process of making a similar jig
i stumbled across this while looking for advice on the cutter i should use
could you advise me on the cutter you have used to produce the cut
thanks sam

[Jake]

Hi Sam,
When you say cutter do you mean the piece I had in the router?
It was a "round" one like this:
http://www.toolstoday.com/p-4969-core-box-router-bits.aspx

[Sam]

Yes that right, can you remember what size you used?
thanks

[Jake]

Can't remember exactly but it was probably 12mm or 1/2" or thereabouts.

[Penelope]

I just stumbled on your blog. I am about to attempt to make a wooden draining board and have been wracking my brains on how to rout the drainage chanells. Thank you so much for posting this. I am currently awaiting both the wood and the router, and when they arrive will take your advice and practice, practice!

As an aside... I have used Danish Oil on the floors in a house I renovated. I would recomend very little oil at a time, and do it many times. The first lot we did, we put on too much and it took two years to dry properly!

[Don Lanyon]

Well done Jake, I have to say that it is far better than paying out 90quid for something that you would probably only use once.
Any idea where I can get the plastic spacers ?
Thanks

[Jake]

Hi Don,
They were an impulse buy at the counter in Jewson's. I bet Screwfix sell them too though.
Come in handy all the time!
Jake

[Don Lanyon]

Thanks Jake, I'll give them both a go.

[Don Lanyon]

Thanks Jake, I'll give them both a go.

[Don Lanyon]

Hi Jake, no luck with Jewsons and Screwfix do not export.
I wonder if you would post some over to me, I will of coarse pay for
Postage and inconvenience.
All the best,
Don.

[Don Lanyon]

I take that's a no then?

[Jake Howlett]

Sorry Don, didn't see that last comment of yours.
Where in the world are you? My guess would be that posting them would make them very expensive bits of plastic. Prohibitively so.
Not sure when I'll find the time for a visit to the screwfix and the post office though. Sorry.
Can't you find something of a uniform thickness (2mm?) and layer it up in strips to make the various spacers?
Jake