Doh!

[Greg Deakins]

Don'tcha hate it when....

So I am edge glueing some blanks, and putting dowel pins in specific places so as not to be cut through and exposed. Four blanks, to make two wine racks, from an eight foot piece of mahogony. After sanding the joint, and tracing the template, it becomes a mystery which way my dowels are orintated unless I keep track of the way I set the pieces down, (or immediately mark the bottoms, a step I regrettabley skipped this time). Well I thought I had placed them down in a stack all the same, but after cutting the parts out, and sanding on the spindle, I see a big fat circle right on the inner edge of the part, yep, I traced the blank upside-down. Generally with my system I dont buy extra material, because its so simple, it is hard to screw up, then again... So with that blunder it is back to the yard. Rats...

Marking the orientation of glued up blanks, ITs one of those simple steps that can avoid a lot of hassle and grief, that I will never
disregard again.

Anybody else shoot themselves in the foot this weekend?

[Dewey Torres]

Anybody else shoot themselves in the foot this weekend?

Yep...I did! Check this out (http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showpost.php?p=1118020&postcount=314):mad:

[David G Baker]

Dewey, you are not alone. :D

[Steve Rozmiarek]

I'm just leaving for the shop to fix the drawer intereferance issue I created last weekend. Grrrrr.....

Kind of neat to see the top drawer open the next three down I guess.

[Jason Hanko]

Kind of neat to see the top drawer open the next three down I guess.

Thats a neat feature! I usually charge extra for installing the auto-open system....:rolleyes::p

[Steve Jenkins]

Unless you REALLY need them to pull badly waped boards into alignment leave the dowels out. A good gluejoint in long grain is stronger than the surrounding wood without reinforcement. It sure saves a lot of headaches if you can leave them out.

[Ron Dunn]

Keep using the dowels - it can make alignment so accurate you no longer need to plane away problems - but mark an alignment "V" in chalk on the boards.

[Larry Fox]

Anybody else shoot themselves in the foot this weekend?

Yep. Made some nice tiger maple veneer and pressed it onto some BB ply that I assumed was 3/8" but turned out to be 1/2". Turns out I had another sheet in mind and forgot I had bought this particular one in 1/2" (yeah - didn't measure). I was making a box so this made the pieces too think and things looked "bulkier than I like". Oh well, press on as I am sure there is something to be learned on this project. Anyway, I get the pieces all cut, mitered, dry fit, sanded and ready to go. I did a dry run of the glue up to make sure everything would go smoothly. Started applying the glue and it took longer than expected due to the surface and the splines. Well, the glue started to set and I didn't make it.

I was so mad that I hurled the whole thing into the bed of my truck and closed the shop. So, no - it's not just you. That was some pretty tiger maple too. :)

[Steve Rozmiarek]

Thats a neat feature! I usually charge extra for installing the auto-open system....:rolleyes::p


LOL! I bet the rest of you guys will agree, there is nothing more humbling than pulling one of these slick moves. Kind of makes you second guess EVERYTHING that you do the rest of the day.

[Chip Lindley]

I totally agree with Steve! A long time ago, I found that aligning dowel holes (yes! even using dowel-centers) a very time-consuming, and unnecessary step in panel gluing!! Even though biscuits are faster, and more forgiving of alignment, they also are unnecessary! Freshly jointed boards will glue up as well OR better than those dowelled or biscuited together.

By the time you are applying glue to dowelled joints, I am almost ready to take my glue-up out of the clamps!

[Greg Deakins]

Larry, that sounds like a familiar reaction unfortunately! IN the case of the dowels for my blanks, I use them because after the cut-out, I am left with only about an 1-1/2" of contact at the joint in two places, due to a center cut out, I hide the dowels in those two places. Without them, I can snap the cut out in half at those points easily. I'll whip a few pics up here when I get a chance to show what I am writing about.

[Steve Jenkins]

Understand now.Dowels or domino are certainly called for in your case.