Replies

1. 
   booch | Oct 15, 2002 07:49pm | #1

   Cut every piece square, Dead square.

   Plane all faces the same thickness, plane all sides the same thickness.

   Mark sides as to top & bottom. Use a soft pencil and write directly on the wood. You'll sand the joint anyway.

   Keep the jig secured to your bench as well as the fingers in the jig.

   Use a shorty square to check out the square cut on the ends of the drawers & faces. This is where the racking occurs.

   I don't remember the rest but make yourself some notes on the first successful one and have at it.

   OH ... yes one more thing, use 2 routers. One to cut pins, the other to cut tails. I know you can change the bits and blah blah blah. but it is slow, inaccurate, and you lose the rhythm of the assembly operation.

   This is not a joyful tool in my world. Yes the results are fabulous but it is talking to a part of my brain that normally is incommunicative. I avoid dovetails. I avoid them for the bother, the waste of materials, and just the tension in doing it. I guess practice makes perfect. I have the same number to make up as well. You building a kitchen cabinet set? I've got that and a series of bookcases over cabinets.

1. 
   RSRose | Oct 16, 2002 01:28am | #2

   Chiefsfan and Booch,

   Have you seen the table saw method of cutting dovetails here in video form. I have used this method ever since coming across it in FWW many, many years ago. I think it's as fast or faster than a router jig. It completely eliminates the shortcomings of router-cut dovetails. It can be set up for production work to make many drawers fast, and with the use of spacer blocks it is the most accurate method I've come across.

   For one drawer, hand cut is faster to set up, but beyond that it is faster than hand cutting.

   It is the equivalent of hand cut joints, using a power driven blade instead of a handsaw.

   Rich