Hand Cut Dovetails

[Gil Knowles]

Well I have finally decided to purchase a Veritas dovetail saw and try cutting dovetails by hand.
I would appreciate some advice on a couple of things.
1) I thought I would also buy 1 or 2 dovetail chisels and wondered what are the most popular sizes and brands.
2) I thought I would buy a book. I am considering "The Complete Dovetail" available from Lee Valley or Rob Cosman's.

Any advice will be greatly appreciated.

Many Thanks

[Sean Hoag]

Nothing better than the handcut dovetail! I cheat a little by clamping a block of hardwood to my dovetail saw at the exact depth I need for the cuts. Rather than sawing down to the line, I make my marks, layout my pins, scribe my tails and start cutting away. As for the dovetail chisels, I'm always partial to the Lie-Nielsen handtools, mine take and hold a fine edge and the smooth grind on the shanks just feels better between your fingers than a painted or rough ground one on the cheaper models.

The best advice is simply practice, practice, practice makes perfect! Good luck and post some pices when you get comfortable with your work.

[Rick Erickson]

I would by the Cosman dovetail series BEFORE you buy any tools. It is superb.

[Sean Hughto]

Do you have any chisels? If so, they will probably be fine.

Instead, what you might need is some layout tools like a wheel gauge, marking knife, small square and bevel gauge or dovetail marker. If money is and issue, an xacto knife will do and a dovetail marker can be fabricated from scrap wood.

[Tom Stovell]

Any advice will be greatly appreciated.

Many Thanks

Make one of these from 'In the Woodshop':
http://www.inthewoodshop.com/ShopMadeTools/ANewJigforParingDovetailBaselines.html

It makes a difference.

Tom

[John Keeton]

I would by the Cosman dovetail series BEFORE you buy any tools. It is superb.Good advice!! Buy the set of three, with the book. Then, if you wish, you can sell the 3 DVDs for $50 -60, and keep the book. Craftsman Studio is a good source.

[gary Zimmel]

One more vote for the Cosman DVD's.
And the shop book he has for reference while in the shop.
They will let you know what tools are needed.

Good luck with the handcuts Gil.
Let us know how you are coming along with them.
Nothing beats a tidy handcut 1/2 blind dovetail.... With tiny pins....

[Pam Niedermayer]

Before getting bogged down in dvd's and books, why not try walking up to a piece of wood with saw in hand and cutting the tails free hand. All measurements/marks for the matching side is taken from the first side, so it's really pretty easy.

Pam

[Dave Beauchesne]

Gil:

Another vote for the Cosman system. Get the book as well!

I have mostly LN tools, and I really use a 3/16'' chisel alot, it just seems to be the right size when doing tight tails in 3/8 or 1/2 '' stock.

Practice, practice and more practice - I built a Tansu in Bigleaf Maple last year that consisted of 104 tails - this was my first all ' hand cut ' no - jig project - by the 100th tail, I was just about at no trimming - so don't be discouraged -

Good luck -

Dave Beauchesne

[Graham Hughes (CA)]

I personally am of the opinion that too much is made of cutting dovetails. Mortise and tenon joinery is much more exacting and much more difficult, IMHO. You may (and probably do) disagree; fine. I have a lot of books that talk about a lot of things and my favorites are (in approximate order)

Frank Klausz's short article in Hand Tool Essentials (a surprisingly good book, the graphic design left me expecting something much less useful). Frank is of the pins first persuasion but his methods work fine for tails first. He emphasizes practice and points out that a lot of what we fetishize and do (dovetail markers, laying things out to be perfectly even, etc.) is really not that important. Keep the dovetail angle within a few degrees of 80° and don't make the tails too small and you'll be fine.
Roy Underhill's books give several different techniques—the stuff I saw him do at WIA is best represented in "The Woodwright's Apprentice", when his newest book is more broadly similar to conventional mark-to-within-an-inch-of-its-life wisdom. He also points out that we fetishize the angle gauge too much, although he does use one; he sets them for whatever looks good to him and uses them more to ensure consistency, which I can respect.
Tage Frid's books are generally excellent, although he leans more toward the ceremony with the 1:6 ratio etc etc etc that I have come to believe is nowhere near as important as it is made out to be.
Kirby's "Complete Dovetail" is not a bad book, and it might help you out if the above books are too high level; I just don't find it useful for reference.

Hayward is very brief on the subject (although a surprisingly good book); he assumes you can saw straight at the point that you're starting DTs and chisel straight and that plus marking is all through dovetailing is. Moxon is silent on the subject as befits an author talking about joinery.

Really, the thing that is the most influential for my style of dovetailing was watching Klausz's 3 minute dovetail video. I can't cut dovetails in three minutes. Nor do I have a special bowsaw. But he doesn't need them to get tight joints, and I assert that neither do you.

I have not read Cosman's book, nor have I watched his DVDs save the snippets on YouTube and his 3 1/2 minute dovetail. It garners good reviews, it's probably excellent. But I think the best way to learn to cut a dovetail is to learn to saw well and to learn to chisel well and then practice, and no magical video or book can abbreviate that process.

Chris Schwarz has a bit summarizing what he learned about dovetailing, but I can't for the life of me remember where it was. The lesson was something like "cut it, if it holds it together it's good, slap moulding over it until you're pleased with the results".

[Graham Hughes (CA)]

Found the Schwarz article; interestingly enough on Rob Cosman's site. http://www.robcosman.com/01_0809WM_OTL.pdf

[Rick Erickson]

Graham,
I agree there is no magic potion hidden in the pits of a Cosman DVD but for someone starting out that has never done it before this is a great place to start (even Chris's article states this is the place to go). I made several attempts at cutting them (without success) before I bought the DVDs. I introduced several bad habits and frankly just bad technique without this instruction. After watching them and with some practice with his step by step methods I am able to churn out some pretty respectable dovetails. I know this is a pretty religious topic and there are several approaches that will get you to the same end results, but IMO Rob's is the best method to TEACH someone how to do it.

[Jacob Mac]

Rob gives a easy to repeat process in cutting dovetails. It is not the only way to do things, but if you are just learning, and have no one else to show you how to cut them, Rob's process is really nice.

What John said is right, if you buy the dvds, you can sell them and not lose much money. I think they are worth it for teaching a methodology that will produce nice DTs. After that, you can explore on your own. JMO

[Graham Hughes (CA)]

Certainly the best way to learn to do it is to have someone look at you and say "stop! Your elbow is wrong etc etc etc". I'm hesitant to recommend something that I haven't used and that is very very specific to one joint—I'd hesitate to recommend a mortise & tenon video or book too—but it sounds like Cosman also talks about cutting posture and the like, which is very important and a very general skill.

I guess I'm reacting to what I saw at WIA, watching people spend like half an hour to dovetail two 2" pieces of pine. I shaved my own time by a third by putting the marking gauges aside and just going, and got just as good a result.

[Don Dorn]

I personally have married what works best of several people that I admire. Not having any luck with Cosmans tails first because of what is inaccurate marking on the pin board for me through narrow tails, I continue to use Frank's pins first approach. I have gone to the very narrow pins though and find it easy to do.

I have also had trouble cutting the waste just to the line after using the fret saw so I re-establish the line with chisels first - takes a little l longer but I get good flat bottoms.

When feeling lazy, I even use Marc Adams approach of using the bandsaw to cut the tails to the line - I'm assured of a 90 degree cut and it's worked out very well too.

I've done the same thing with sharpening and I'm convinced that a person shouldn't simply mimick another persons approach but develop what works best for them - then stick to it, because it just gets better over time.

[Robert Rozaieski]

I personally am of the opinion that too much is made of cutting dovetails. Mortise and tenon joinery is much more exacting and much more difficult, IMHO.

I couldn't agree more. We tend to make way too big of a deal over dovetails. :confused:

Here's my advise, for hand sawing any joint, not just dovetails. Learn to saw to a line. This is the single most important skill you can learn for improving your hand sawn joinery.

To get better at sawing any type of joinery, be it mortise & tenon, bridle, half lap or dovetails, you need to learn to saw accurately. Want to learn to saw accurately? Put down the dovetail and/or tenon saw and pick up a long rip saw. Take a 4' piece of 1 x 12 pine from the BORG and using a marking gauge, mark a line parallel to and about 1/2" to 3/4" from the edge. Saw the strip off with the rip saw, concentrating on tracking the line and keeping the cut plumb. When you have finished, plane the edge straight, mark another line and do it again. Keep doing this until you have a bunch of small strips (cross cut them and use them as stickers for your lumber pile). By the time you've sawn the entire board into 1/2" wide strips, you will have vastly improved your ability to saw to the line.

I'm convinced that the reason most folks have so much apprehension and/or difficulty hand sawing joinery is their lack of practice sawing. Most people use tablesaws and bandsaws for the "rough" work and do the joinery by hand. I think those of us who do at least some "rough" sawing by hand have an advantage when it comes to accurately sawing joinery because we simply do more hand sawing and have more practice sawing to a line.

I'm not saying anyone should go sell their table saw or band saw for a nest of hand saws :). I certainly don't enjoy ripping tons of oak or maple by hand. However, woods like pine and poplar, which are popular secondary woods for things like case backs, drawer sides and drawer backs, are very easy to rip. So on your next project, try hand sawing the secondary woods for parts to size instead of using the table saw. It will give you practice sawing to a line for sawing your joinery but won't be an exhausting undertaking like hand sawing the primary wood can be. Plus, your cuts will be cleaned up with a plane so if they're not perfect from the saw it's ok.

I gaurantee if you practice hand sawing more often, such as hand sawing these secondary woods, your joinery will improve as a result. ;)

[Pam Niedermayer]

Graham,
I agree there is no magic potion hidden in the pits of a Cosman DVD but for someone starting out that has never done it before this is a great place to start (even Chris's article states this is the place to go). I made several attempts at cutting them (without success) before I bought the DVDs. I introduced several bad habits and frankly just bad technique without this instruction. After watching them and with some practice with his step by step methods I am able to churn out some pretty respectable dovetails. I know this is a pretty religious topic and there are several approaches that will get you to the same end results, but IMO Rob's is the best method to TEACH someone how to do it.

I bought and watched Cosmo's Drawer dvd's and found the dovetail method way too fiddly. As it happens, I have all the tools he calls for, but it's unlikely someone starting out would have them. So, yes, his method works; but no, I couldn't recommend that a beginner do them his way.

Pam

[Dan Barr]

I agree with that. the ability to handsaw can set you up for an almost finished joint or a joint that still needs lots of work.

If youre really good with the saw, you can make dovetails that don't need any paring. They are not going to be "machine quality" or perfectly geometrical. But, you can make solid joints with just a couple of saws and chisels without tediously and meticulously wasting your time.

watch this guy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GZ8fSSKn0Ls

He's pretty quick. There is another guy who whips out a set in less time than this. I tried to find the video clip but could not.

Cheers,

dan

[Pam Niedermayer]

Great video, Dan, only thing I'd add to it is that it's a good idea to mark the waste area with an "X" or something similar before starting to cut.

Pam

[Rick Erickson]

I bought and watched Cosmo's Drawer dvd's and found the dovetail method way too fiddly. As it happens, I have all the tools he calls for, but it's unlikely someone starting out would have them. So, yes, his method works; but no, I couldn't recommend that a beginner do them his way.

Pam

Interesting Pam. I was a beginner and found his method fullproof. He has tought thousands of people (most of them beginners) with this method. I've attended several of his classes and am amazed at what beginners produce after just a few hours of instruction. To each his/her own I guess.

[Pam Niedermayer]

Well, yeah, Rick, if you're attending a dovetail class everything I said about beginners is bogus. In the class beginners have access to the tools and personal instruction. I was talking about beginners out here in the hinterlands trying to learn on their own.

Pam

[Rick Erickson]

Well, yeah, Rick, if you're attending a dovetail class everything I said about beginners is bogus. In the class beginners have access to the tools and personal instruction. I was talking about beginners out here in the hinterlands trying to learn on their own.

Pam

That is how I learned Pam - out in the hinterlands on my own. I was cranking out some very nice dovetails long before I took the class. I bought the tools (or versions of) recommended on Rob's DVDs and went to town. I would say 4 or 5 practice boards into it I was cranking out some nice joints. I'm not here to derail this thread. The gentleman was looking for suggestions and I provided one. Others seem to agree with this recommendation. However, one size certainly doesn't fit all.

[Pam Niedermayer]

....Others seem to agree with this recommendation. However, one size certainly doesn't fit all.

Oh, right, how silly of me to forget.

[Gil Knowles]

Many thanks to all who replied a lot of good advice.
Dan the video was great, the fellow really knows what he is doing. I was very impressed.

Gil

[Gil Knowles]

Many thanks for all the quick replies.
I am going to order the micro adjust gauge.

Gil