How do you cut dovetails?
- By hand, pins first
- By hand, tails first
- With a router and dovetail jig
- I don’t use dovetails in my joinery
- Other
You will not be able to change your vote.
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Replies
What kind of dovetails, Ruth, through, half blind, french, lapped, drawers, carcasses, boxes, framing? Some I do by hand, some with a router, some with both hand and router, some with a jig and others with a dedicated machine.
Beat it to fit / Paint it to match
I can't not tell one of my favourite stories here.
One day, a fellow signed himself up for a seminar at the local Lee Valley to learn how to hand-cut dovetails. He showed up for the class, which ran for, say, 6 hours. When the class ended, he bought the Leigh D4R and walked out happy.Chris @ flairwoodworks
- Success is not the key to happines. Happiness is the key to success. If you love what you are doing, you will be successful. - Albert Schweitzer
Ruth, shop drawers get routered DT's on a cheap off shore type jig with alunimium templets or box joints. Nice things may be routered with an old variable jig or by hand with a very nice saw made by Mike W. Pins or tails first is a factor of the piece or how I feel that day. Paddy
Edited 12/31/2007 6:19 pm ET by PADDYDAHAT
Dear Ruthy,
I voted "other" because I do not do them the kosher way....
But normally in answer to that question I say "carefully".
I had to choose other, because no one answer is correct. I do by hand, I do with a router. Circumstances dictate.
In the future, please give us some combination answers.
Alan - planesaw
find it much easier to lay the cut pins on the end of the other piece to lay out the tails ...just a personal visualization ...don't remember if that's left or right brain ...but did manage to teach my daughter in law this method in 3 weeks and we made a very nice dovetailed blanket box tohether last winter...keep chopping ///dave
Ruth,
How do I cut dovetails?
1) I look at my sketch of the final piece.
2) I decide on the placement and sizing of the dovetails.
3) I mark them carefully with a fine marking knife.
4) I go over the knife cut with a pencil because I can't see the knife cuts.
5) I check to see whether the day of the month is even or odd. If even, I cut the tails first. Otherwise it is tails first. Unless I feel otherwise.
6) Normally, I use a backsaw, chisels and a coping saw, but not in that order.
7) If during the process, I don't like what I see, I change the design and process.
8) After doing the cutting and fitting (if necessary), it is time to glue. I use glue sparingly and only on the long grain.
9) Then I plane the joints smooth.
10) I sit back and admire excellent work.
11) I show it to my wife, and she always says something nice. I do the same for her quilts.
But I left out a lot of details. For example, when planning your process, you need to know whether you want the tails to stick up a bit, which will require planing them down, or whether you want the tails down a bit, and then you plane the sides down to meet them. Of course, sometimes, I like to shoot for the moon and see if I can get them exactly right. Never have been successful at that though.
Also, I didn't mention the Jack Daniels, which is often useful when cutting dovetails.
Actually, with the above, I was trying to make a point, using my long-winded obtuse style. My belief is that far too much is made about dovetailing in the magazines. Dovetailing is not difficult, but it scares many woodworkers. I would love to see FWW write an article called, "The last article ever on dovetailing". The purpose of the article would be to convince woodworkers that dovetailing is just something you practice for a while, and then you do it without any worry. You just do it. If you are thinking too much about your dovetails, you are not sufficiently concerned with the overall effect of the piece. Thinking too much about dovetailing is like the guy who waltzes with his girlfriend, and counts the steps aloud as he dances, "One two three, one, two, three, one, two , three."
Taunton has already published far too much about dovetailing. I Haven't seen anything new in dovetailing in a long time. Let it go. Or to make a point, you could have an article entitle "The last article ever on dovetailing, and then have a story which is nothing more than a reference to Tage Frid's books and to his video tape on dovetailing.
I recommend that FWW do more on the joinery of Kintaro Yazawa. Indeed, I beg you to. I will pay more for my subscription if there is an article on Kintaro Yazawa's woodworking in each issue.
If you don't enjoy my suggestions, please let me know, and I will stop immediately. In a previous response, I offered to help you put together future polls. But my input would always be to NEVER limit the input of the respondents by asking them to choose one of four or five choices. I would leave them places to put in their suggestions and paragraphs on what is important and unimportant and interesting and uninteresting on this topic.
Hope that helps.
Happy New Year.
Mel
Measure your output in smiles per board foot.
Mel,
"The last article ever on dovetailing, and then have a story which is nothing more than a reference to Tage Frid's books and to his video tape on dovetailing."If you were tho have just une last article, I don't think I'd recommend a bowsaw and a hammer. I speak from personal experience here.But as a more general point, what could be more central to woodworking than joinery? And what is most everybody's favorite joint? Having just learned to cut them by hand, after having done so with a Leigh jig in the past, I really appreciated the countless articles and discussions on how to do it. I searched far and wide for the method that seemed to fit my style, and ended up with Cosman, which is the same as the method detailed in the recent FWW series on a shaker wall cabinet. This is like the discussions complaining about FWW going south. As you get more advanced, you want more on design and less on technique, and some of the articles which would have thrilled you as a beginner, bore you. It's not the magazine, it's the woodworker. In my quest for methods and skills I've read the old FWW articles in the archives (Tage Frid, etc...), and I've read the new ones. There's no comparison, FWW is much better now.I'm with you on the request for more on fancy Japanese joinery.
Pedro,
THE BOWSAW IS THE BEST WAY TO CUT DOVETAILS!!!!Mel
PS: it builds character :-)Measure your output in smiles per board foot.
Mel & Ruth,
I used to cut them by hand with a dovetail saw very carefully for a piston fit, after precisely marking them during layout. The more I practiced the better they were. It just took me too much time and when you get to my age, time is very important.
I have since taken to cutting them with an axe. It goes much faster and makes for some very interesting designs. Ok, so some of them tend to be a little sloppy. When that happens, just use the other side of the axe a beat 'em together. The misaligned pieces get sheared off when you bash 'em together anyway thus resulting in tight dovetails.
If there are gaps I just apply Mels award winning water finish and the wood swells together and voila, they're done!
Regards,Bob @ Kidderville Acres
A Woodworkers mind should be the sharpest tool in the shop!
I believe Mel prefer's using an Adze for his dovetails.
Hi Mel,
You wrote: "THE BOWSAW IS THE BEST WAY TO CUT DOVETAILS!!!!"Trying to drive another thread over 1500?
---Pedro
Pedro,"Trying to drive another thread over 1500?"Pedro, are you a mind reader?
MelMeasure your output in smiles per board foot.
I am, and I am clairvoyant. For example, right now you are sleeping.
I agree that dovetails are interesting and challenging as well as central to fine furniture such that new articles are always welcome. Funny thing about the articles to my mind is that there is rarely discussion of some of the most subtle points you run into when really doing it. For example, when you cut yours on the love box, did you find that tail cuts (perpendicular to the face but angled) were easier than pin cuts (straight but angled to the face). Did you find that left and right hand versions of each type of cut were equally easy or challenging given the differing posture required and ability to see the lines, etc.? Did you find that marking out itself is a challenge to do well - accurately wrapping the lines around multiple faces; transfering board to board, etc.? Did you find the need to make corrections mid-cut by, for example tilting the saw. ? Did you find that careful paring to inscribed lines can make up for a multitude of sawing sins? ;-) And on and on.
A recent effort on a carcase:
Samson,
I agree, the details are often missing. I find the fret saw is very important, not just an afterthought. Getting good blades from Tools for WW made a huge difference. Overall I find the tails to be the easy part. Cutting the pins is much harder for me. Until I had the good fret saw blades clearing out the waste was the bad part, now I find making the right-hand cut on each pin is the toughest bit. For some reason my cuts are slightly off-perpendicular on this side about half the time. More practice ought to do it. I've followed Cosman's advice and now saw in front of a window which reflects at night. Seeing my arm motion helps tremendously. No problems marking, the only joints that don't fit are those that are off the mark.
Best,
---Pedro
I find the fret saw is very important
That's the other thing - how many ways there are to skin this cat. I never use a fret saw. I make a few relief cuts (often practicing duplicates of the actual cuts) and then chop it all out in short order.
As far as marking, I find it can vary considerably depending upon the scale of the work as well as the relative size and scheme of the tails/pins.
Wood species is another big variable. Poplar, for example, has nice compression characteristics that make it rather forgiving. Maple, not so much.
Speaking of wood, I found learning on scrab red oak that I had lying around a big mistake. Seems to love splintering. Everything was much easier on polar, maple, and rosewood.
that bench in your photo is way too clean! come on man, show some chips, sawdust, scraps of paper, dirty earplugs, mostly empty coffee cups, chisels dinged from hitting the floor, etc.
I had to shopvac the area of chips and chunks from making the dts in order to test fit them. A wider angle shot would show the mess. LOL
Even so, the photo you posted in the other thread (showing the mess to the right of the dovetailed carcase) demonstrates that so far you've only mastered the art of 2-dimensional messiness. Eventually, you'll be able to accomplish 3-dimensional messiness, where the mess is piled several inches deep.
-Steve
Ever go to the shop because you want to be there, but you know you're in no shape (too tired - wrong frame of mind, etc.) to try anything serious on a project? When that happens to me, I use the shop time to clean up a little. And with the size of my shop, 3D messiness would be hazardous. But I get there now and then anyway when the plane shavings fly or - shudder - I use the router!
5) I check to see whether the day of the month is even or odd. If even, I cut the tails first. Otherwise it is tails first. Unless I feel otherwise.
Mel
I love that one.
i cut them poorly :)
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