One a Day Dovetails

[Mark Dorman]

About 8 months a go I cut my first dovetails just too try and help myself understand what I read about pins first and not laying them out. I thought there was some mystical magic thing to laying them out and here’s a guy eyeballing them (Frank Klauz) and they look great. So the first pic is my results of eyeballing and with no practice cutting a straight line. As sloppy as they are I was happy to know I can do this; and with practice and maybe lines to follow I could do better. It demystified dovetails and showed me that even sloppy dovetails can make a strong joint. So now I’m starting a project that calls for a box joint and I’ll be using half blind dovetails instead so the one a day dovetails begin. This time I’m using a bevel gauge to keep consistency in my angles and to help cut a straight line. I’m still eyeballing the spacing because I like the freedom. Here are pictures of the first four. Starting tomorrow I will back up a step and practice cutting straight for awhile then back to the tails. Advice and critiques are welcome. I figure if the truth hurts; your pride is not properly aligned with your ability.

Thanks Mark

[Dan Karachio]

I am nobody to judge or give advice, because I am not there yet in making hand cut dovetails, but keep at it! and good for you to ask for a critique.

[Casey Gooding]

I have done this several times. Each time my dovetails improve greatly.
It's definitely worth taking the few minutes each day to do it.

[Bruce Whitehouse]

Looking good.

I saved my first few dovetail attempts in a dark corner in the back of a shelf and pull them out every once in a while to reassure myself that I am improving. ;)

Question: What is that monstrously long mortise chisel in the background?

[john brenton]

Looks like his japanese dovetail saw.
Looking good.

I saved my first few dovetail attempts in a dark corner in the back of a shelf and pull them out every once in a while to reassure myself that I am improving. ;)

Question: What is that monstrously long mortise chisel in the background?

[Mark Dorman]

Just a Standard Dozuki. http://www.leevalley.com/us/wood/page.aspx?p=32935&cat=1,42884 with a little reflection off the back. Does look like mortise chisel at first glance.

[Mark Dorman]

Bruce's Quote. I saved my first few dovetail attempts in a dark corner in the back of a shelf and pull them out every once in a while to reassure myself that I am improving. ;)

Speaking of pulling them out; I was thinking I might cut them off the same length from my long boards and use them as drawer pulls/reminders.

Mark

[Charles Bender]

Mark,

Your dovetails look very good. If your photos are in sequential order from left to right, it looks like you crushed your base line a little on day 3. I show in my DVD a little trick that helps overcome that problem. Once you've scribed the base line and sawed out the pins or tails, use a good sharp chisel to remove a small bit of the waste material back to the base line to create a slight shoulder. This way, when you make the chop cut, you've got that shoulder to put the blade of the chisel against and it provides a bit of resistance to help stop the chisel from walking beyond the line.

When I look at the end shot of day 3 it appears to be one of the best. Beyond that, and I'm speaking professionally, you're definitely on the right track. It looks like you just need a little (and I do mean a little) practice keeping square to the face. I know Frank doesn't advocate it but I usually suggest folks use a square across the end grain of their tails to use as a guide. Frank's logic is " Once you draw a line, you'll always draw a line." but I usually reply "But Frank, when you learned to ride a bike you used training wheels, right?"

Are you using a pencil or a knife to transfer from your pins to the tailboard? Just curious.

Oh, and I'm sorry I can't help with your Japanese saw affliction... ;)

[Trevor Walsh]

Charles, I've never met Frank, but something about what I've hear of him makes me think he would say "In my day we learned to ride a bike from fallen-over-laying-on-the-ground... hurmph, training wheels."

Hah.

[Robert Culver]

Charles I have to say I really agree with you on the square trick. I will tell you my experiance. I cut a bunch of dove tails after watching Rob Cosmans video. My first set was a total bust but I kept at it and got better after a dozen or so sets. I always seemed to have a gap how ever in one place or another I was sitting there thinking its not a sqaure cut thats why im getting gaps. Then I had this radical idea run through my head that said come on you cant cut to the line thats ridiculus. But I convinced myself that I needed to try someting else because my hard headed way just wasnt getting me my desired result. So I took the chance of looking like a dork and put a square next to my saw. Boy was I humbled afterwords I guess I really couldnt cut sqaure by no means is my work dead on yet but I was a pretty darn big improvment.

Just my 2 cents.

[Mark Dorman]

Mark,

Your dovetails look very good. If your photos are in sequential order from left to right, it looks like you crushed your base line a little on day 3. I show in my DVD a little trick that helps overcome that problem. Once you've scribed the base line and sawed out the pins or tails, use a good sharp chisel to remove a small bit of the waste material back to the base line to create a slight shoulder. This way, when you make the chop cut, you've got that shoulder to put the blade of the chisel against and it provides a bit of resistance to help stop the chisel from walking beyond the line.

When I look at the end shot of day 3 it appears to be one of the best. Beyond that, and I'm speaking professionally, you're definitely on the right track. It looks like you just need a little (and I do mean a little) practice keeping square to the face. I know Frank doesn't advocate it but I usually suggest folks use a square across the end grain of their tails to use as a guide. Frank's logic is " Once you draw a line, you'll always draw a line." but I usually reply "But Frank, when you learned to ride a bike you used training wheels, right?"

Are you using a pencil or a knife to transfer from your pins to the tailboard? Just curious.

Oh, and I'm sorry I can't help with your Japanese saw affliction... ;)
Thanks for the input Charles, I am using a pencil and I do have a couple differant knifes I can use. The saw is what I have. I bought it at the begining of tool gathering on a tight budget and it works well. But I have nothing to compare it too so maybe it's junk and I don't know it. I'll gladly trade you for a western style dovetail saw though. I'll have to check out your web site. Thanks again.

Mark

[Brian Yates]

Mark,

My first few attempts at dove tails almost made me give up they were so bad. I saw the Frank Klaus 10 minute dovetail video and he did it so effortlessly :eek: that I started swearing at the TV. No lie! I haven't seen Chucks video, I have seen some of his work and it's unbelievable, but I do agree about clearing out a very small amount near the knife line to give you the sharp edge you're looking for. I watched the Cosman video and picked up quite a few tips that worked for me.

Here's a shot of my second project with hand-cut dovetails that I just made. I definitely got better as I went, by the ninth drawer (all 4 joints) I was feeling pretty good about them. This was a tool box for the shop but now I'm going to use them on real furniture projects.

Good luck!

[Mark Dorman]

Thanks for the encouragement. I'll be using a square to check for straight and true and the marking knife for a finer line that I can feel with the saw.
And practice and more practice.

[Steve Branam]

Your dovetails look very good. If your photos are in sequential order from left to right, it looks like you crushed your base line a little on day 3. I show in my DVD a little trick that helps overcome that problem. Once you've scribed the base line and sawed out the pins or tails, use a good sharp chisel to remove a small bit of the waste material back to the base line to create a slight shoulder. This way, when you make the chop cut, you've got that shoulder to put the blade of the chisel against and it provides a bit of resistance to help stop the chisel from walking beyond the line.

That's a nice tip! I have that problem consistently, so I'll have to give this a try. Seems blindingly obvious once you mention it :rolleyes:.

[Mark Dorman]

I agree Steve, For me it beats the clamp a block on the line to guide your chisel method. Then your not messing with clamping and unclamping a guide. That system kind of helped but I just kept think this is taking to much time and there has to be a better way. It's that kind of advice this forum is so great for.

Mark

[Josh Rudolph]

Mark,

Your DT's look good to me for your first couple sets. I am doing the exact same thing right now and can see my progression...it is kinda cool actually. I have 6 large drawers I need to make for my cabinets I am building and want to get plenty of practice before I jump in.
I have the Cosman video and think his method is ok. I saw Frank's at WIA and it made so much sense. Then looking at older pieces, the large majority of DT's really are random in their layout and slopes. So I think I am moving towards Frank's method for drawers, but will do layout for exposed joints.
I have been cutting the shoulder that Chuck talked about and it has helped me quite a bit. I have not tried removing the waste with a coping saw yet, not sure I need to, but I may give it a try and see how things turn out.

Keep up the good work.

Josh

[Bob Jones]

I just almost followed chris scharwz advice. In the jointer and cabinetmaker he suggests doing one a day for 30 days. I did 29 in about 90 days. It made a huge difference. I am now ready to build the schoolbox from the same book. I highly recommend the book to anyone learning to use hand tools. The 3 projects are great and the history is neat.
I will try to post pics of mine when I am at a computer. I have not figured out how to do that from my phone yet.

[David Keller NC]

Mark - As you've found out and noted, dovetails aren't magic - it's just a bit of practice.

Here are a couple of tips that may assist you:

Make sure you have supernova-grade lighting on your line while you're sawing. You can do this very easily and cheaply with an $5 clamp-on aluminum reflector from the Borg and a 150 watt compact fluorescent bulb. Particularly when you're just starting out, this is critically important.

There's a bit of a "cheat" going on in many expert's videos, and you can use it to your advantage. Specifically, the pins are almost always cut in a relatively hard wood, while the tails are cut in a very soft wood, such as eastern white pine, aspen, basswood and the like. What this allows is a certain amount of inaccuracy when sawing the second part of the joint (where you mark from the first half that you laid out either by eye or with a bevel gauge or dt marker). The much softer wood will be crushed slightly when the joint is put together, which ensures absolutely airtight gluelines.

One can't be way off on sawing the second part, obviously, but I can assure you that even experts that have been doing it for years and years are going to have trouble producing an absolutely perfect set of 4 or 5 tails and pins if both parts are sawn in hard maple or a tropical wood. Particularly if they do it as fast as the video demonstrations.

With a bit of practice, you should be able to do something like this in short order:

[Bob Jones]

Check out the latest entry on the chris schwarz blog. Right on topic.

[Mark Dorman]

Mark - As you've found out and noted, dovetails aren't magic - it's just a bit of practice.

Here are a couple of tips that may assist you:

Make sure you have supernova-grade lighting on your line while you're sawing. You can do this very easily and cheaply with an $5 clamp-on aluminum reflector from the Borg and a 150 watt compact fluorescent bulb. Particularly when you're just starting out, this is critically important.
:
David, thanks for the advice. I have a lamp not supernova but a adjustable arm type that is mounted by my saw vise and I think I'll give it a try on the workbench for casting a differant light on things.

[Mark Roderick]

My advice is to not practice cutting dovetails by cutting a full set of dovetails each time. Instead, first put a board in the vice and practice making 90 degree angle cuts, one after another. Then put another board in the vice and practice making angled cuts, one after another. Mark the boards and practice cutting close to the line, time after time after time. Only when you've started to feel comfortable making the individiual cuts should you try to make a whole dovetailed joint. That's how my brain works, anyway.

[Andrew Gibson]

My advice is to not practice cutting dovetails by cutting a full set of dovetails each time. Instead, first put a board in the vice and practice making 90 degree angle cuts, one after another. Then put another board in the vice and practice making angled cuts, one after another. Mark the boards and practice cutting close to the line, time after time after time. Only when you've started to feel comfortable making the individiual cuts should you try to make a whole dovetailed joint. That's how my brain works, anyway.


Mark by know means am I saying your wrong, but I think it is important to not only cut the complete joint, but also cut a 4 joints. there is definitely a skill involved in getting a box that has 4 square corners. For some reason I never spent much time just cutting joints, I had to many things I wanted to make so I just dove in head first.
The more antiques I inspect the more i realise that my joints are right on or above par. I would encourage everyone to pull out every drawer they see and check the DT's. I was in an antique store today and spotted a little candle stand... the kind that hangs on the wall and has a mirror and also a drawer. I spotted that the drawer had been planes (raised like a panel) from across the room. I went over and checked it out and the dovetails on the drawer were nice but nothing to right home about, and no better then the ones on my second half blind project.

[Andrae Covington]

My advice is to not practice cutting dovetails by cutting a full set of dovetails each time. Instead, first put a board in the vice and practice making 90 degree angle cuts, one after another. Then put another board in the vice and practice making angled cuts, one after another. Mark the boards and practice cutting close to the line, time after time after time. Only when you've started to feel comfortable making the individiual cuts should you try to make a whole dovetailed joint. That's how my brain works, anyway.

I went through a few rounds of this before trying to practice actual dovetail joints, and it did seem to help. When I got to the angled cuts, I did more of the "left-hand" ones, sloping down towards the right, as I had more trouble following my line on those (I am right-handed). I probably should have done more than I did, but I was getting impatient.:rolleyes: