In this video I make a wooden YouTube Play Button, because I hit 20k subs and 100k subs (which is when YouTube will present an official plaque) seems quite far away!
I chose mahogany for two good reasons - firstly, it has a reddish tint and secondly I had some small scraps of it to use up! These pieces came from some reclaimed wooden hat and coat stands - the pieces I used were the feet that supported the upright piece.
I started by ripping them square on the tablesaw, to remove the tapered face.
Then I jointed one side and ran the other through the thickness planer.
I glued the pieces together and clamped them with bar clamps
When the glue had set I used a hand plane to clean up the faces of the new block.
Then I trimmed the excess off each end.
I used a pencil to mark up the play icon, and a round object to round over the corners, and then cut the edges on the bandsaw before refining the shape at the belt sander.
Next I drilled a recess in the play icon using a forstner bit on my drill press table before routing out the rest of the icon shape. I then needed to chisel out the rounded over corners to form the triangle.
I made a rubbing of the shape on a piece of paper, and then stuck that piece of paper to a piece of poplar which came from a pallet collar. I chose poplar as it is pale in colour and will contrast well with the mahogany.
I cut out the shape on the bandsaw and I could then glue it in to the recess.
I used the bandsaw to trim off the excess material (as the poplar was quite thick).
Then I used the hand plane to get the inlay flush with the mahogany face of the block.
I tilted my tablesaw blade and cut bevels on all 4 front edges of the block and used a hand plane and orbital sander to smooth over the bevels.
I used teak oil to finish the play button. I'm really happy with how it turned out.