Shelf joinery question

[Dave Shawley]

I'm working on a replacement for a "big box store" TV stand that is falling apart. I put together the design in SketchUp and have a good bit of it cut and dry fit already. I'm using plain sawn cherry for most of the construction. I'll probably end up using either cherry plywood or birch with cherry veneer for the side and back panels.

Here's what I am thinking about:

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Now my question is how should I attach the two shelves? My current design has then resting in notches on the legs. The center dividers are housed in stopped dados on the shelves and top so they provide some vertical support to the shelves in the middle. Here's a closer view of the notches:

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The "breadboard ends" on the shelf are there to provide stability to the three pieces of cherry that make up each shelf. I'm still trying to decide where to glue and where not to glue but that is another issue - probably going to glue the center board to the ends and let the others float. I already have these cut and they have a pretty nice fit.

Does anyone think that there are severe problems with using notches in this way? I'm fairly new to this so I don't always trust my first instincts ;)

If you are interested, I've attached one of the many SketchUp files that I have for this little project. Thanks in advance for any words of sage-like wisdom from the masses.

[Chris Friesen]

If the shelves are fixed, I'd probably just mortise a fixed support/stretcher in the sides and sit the shelves on top of it. That way you avoid the breadboard ends. Just notch the shelf panels to fit around the legs and leave a bit of extra room for expansion.

You may want to run your vertical dividers vertically rather than horizontally. That way they'll expand/contract the same as the shelves. You could use a sliding dovetail or just a basic stopped dado for them.

[Lee Schierer]

You may have trouble with your breadboard ends due to seasonal changes in the wood. I would eliminate them and build slat type shelf supports that fit cross wise across your panel ends in the dados or mortices you show in your sketch.

[glenn bradley]

+1 on those breadboards not really helping you. I would be more inclined to build a cleat just below your dado running front to back. That is if you have reason to believe that your glue up will have issues due to your location/weather/etc. I don't get much of a humidity swing where I live so my view on this may be skewed.

P.s. If you've already made the shelves I would go ahead and work the breadboards in. If you haven't I would save the effort.