My favorite part of the box are the dots on the outside:
I made them with a soldering iron. Can you guess what they are for? They are actually a Quinary life counter.
Each half of the box represents one quinary numeral. You put them together to make a number.
Take this orientation for example:
The three dots on the left are the quinary number 3. Since that is the left most numeral we multiply 3 * 5 to get 15. The dot on the right is the quinary number 1. So the above orientation represents the number 15 + 1 = 16. This box can count all the way up to 24--pretty cool!
The bezel is made of brass.
I tried making boxes with wooden bezels, but the problem with that is that they squeak and wobble.
I also tried making a box entirely out of brass, but the problem with that is that the box is too heavy and also too wobbly over all, since thin metal is not very ridged.
The design is simple, but you need to make sure that the top of the bezel is perfectly flat otherwise you'll get squeaks. Takes a bit of trial and error.
The wood is 1/16th inch thick Cherry. I applied three coats of shellac to the interior of the wood to protect against acid off gassing. The shellac should last about the 20 years it will take for the wood to deplete all its acid.
Overall I don't really like this design that much because the lid tends to wobble and the metal is rather heavy... back to the drawing board for me.
