Repairing joints on bench and chairs

[Dan Karachio]

Hi All,

My wife picked up some beat up mahogany (I think) outdoor furniture for free from a neighbor. It actually isn't bad looking stuff, but on these benches and chairs almost every joint (mortise, tenon with small dowels) is very loose (thus, the free part). Short of rebuilding these I was trying to come up with some ways to repair these joints and have it look nice. Of course I could drill and drive deck or lag screws in from the outside, but that would look awful. One idea I had was to glue a thin piece of wood to these tenons, chisel/sand it down for a tighter fit, then re-glue, but that may be more work than I am looking for right now (I had some other projects lined up and now I have this "honey-do" thing!). Any tricks of the trade out there that I might apply?

EDIT P.S. At the risk of looking like I am wussing out, I am now open to repairing the mortise and tenon joints properly. As I think about this, it might be a good learning exercise for joinery. Still looking for tips and sources please.

[Mike Henderson]

If you can get the joints apart, you can re-glue them with epoxy. For joints that are held together with dowels, I use a thin saw to saw the joint apart, then drill out the old dowels, then re-glue with epoxy. You can go up one size (1/16") with the dowels. I wouldn't saw a real mortise and tenon joint apart however.

If it's mostly dowels, you can do them pretty fast.

Mike