Watchmaker Toolbox

So I am a watchmaker and I have a lot of tools. But as it is not my full time occupation anymore, I only need a few of them and decided to make this box to carry them around.

As I'm a swiss watchmaker, I'm not a native English speaker, so please excuse my mistakes :-)

You will need these tools:

A cutting board or a cutting mat,

A razor knife or a cutter,

A pencil,

A ruler,

A set square,

Glue,

Possibly a needle and some sewing thread.

And some material:

Cardboard,

Leather or artificial leather or imitated leather or leatherette or faux leather or what you want :-),

Foam (not shown on the picture sorry but you can see it clearly on step 8).

Size matters, I needed a box big enough to contain my favorite tools but not too big, so that I could carry it around easily.

I reused this one (banana for scale), it used to contain a watch.

I needed 3 trays and I chose to make them in cardboard and then cover them with artificial leather.

Tools are held in place by a laser-cut foam. I drew the shapes of the foams with Inventor and checked the dimensions out by printing them on paper.

Dimensions of the trays should be equal to that of the inner dimensions of your box minus the thickness of the artificial leather and cardboard.

Transfer the dimensions on the cardboard and cut it out.

You can also fold the edges.

Put your precut cardboard on a piece of artificial leather.

Cut the artificial leather a bit larger than the cardboard and glue it on the cardboard (glue the underneath and outer edges).

You can also put a piece of any soft material between the cardboard and the artificial leather. It will make a shock proof back and it could help to hold your tools in place securely.

Cut out the corners as neatly as you can and glue the inner edges. Hold the edges firmly until the glue dries up or place them under a heavy book.

You can skip this step if you have glued the corners together. I prefer to sew them, esthetically nicer.

Cut the foams with your favorite laser machine and glue them in the trays.

Between the foam and the tray, you can place a piece of artificial leather so as to hide the cardboard.

My glue doesn't stick the foam very well but you can find a stronger one!

Oh and also, you can add a languette* on the second and third trays, it will be easier to take them out of the box!

*now you know a new word in french! it is the small appendix that you can see on the trays of the first picture. By the way, if someone could tell me the right English word, it would be great :-) ( > it's a tab, thanks PhxJim!)

You can also wrap up the inside of the box with artificial leather. Do as you did for the trays, cut-out cardboard, wrap it up and then glue it up inside the box.

Put your tools in the trays and enjoy your new toolbox :-D