Effective way to make this cut

[Jamie Schmitz]

So I am looking at making a wine rack and was wondering about the most effective way to get nice crisp cuts. I was of course thinking of dado cut but it seems as though it might round the bottom of the piece even if the blade is raised all the way.
251517

[Lou Ortiz]

What are the dimensions of the cut? Also, not sure why a dado set would round anything. Did you want to make this by machine, hand, or mixed?

[Dave Richards]

By "round the bottom" do you mean it would be concave? Something like this? My sketch may exaggerate it.
http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8501/8391184993_7df1e7a194_z.jpg (http://www.flickr.com/photos/8294157@N08/8391184993/)

I expect Lou is thinking you'd stand it up on edge like you'd do when making box joints. Maybe your notches are deeper than the height of the dado set can reach?

You could turn the work over and run it into the blade again which would leave you with a ridge in the middle that could be taken off witha few swipes of sandpaper. I would be inclined to make the parallel cuts on the table saw to define the width of the notch and take the bottom out with a chisel against a guide clamped on top of the work.

[johnny means]

Router and a template would give you a nice clean cut. Of course, you would need to square out the corners by hand, easily done with a Japan saw or chisel.

[Larry Browning]

It is not clear as to the scale of his drawing. Is that a large panel where each cutout is 4 or 5 inches wide? Or is that width the width of a 3/4" board? A drawing is nice, but a little more detail is going to help a lot. Also, a little more context as to what part of the wine rack we are seeing would be helpful as well.

[Prashun Patel]

Which way is your grain running? If it's running perpendicular to the 'fingers' then (heresy alert) you might rip the bottom piece away from the finger section, then cut rectangles for the fingers and finally re-glue. After sanding, the joint will likely disappear.

[Sam Murdoch]

Jamie - not that you are asking, but my thinking is that most often people over complicate wine storage. Unless you are living on a boat there is no need to hold wine bottles by the neck or otherwise try to keep them from escaping your cabinet. Bottles come in so many different sizes and so your design should be flexible.

Here is an example of shelves in a cabinet (the door is not included in this view). If you decide later that you don't need the divided shelves simply turn them over.

251529

And here is the real world use after we decided to use the end cabinet differently - You can see that this is an open cabinet.
Bad photo as it was super cropped from a bigger photo but you get the idea.

251530

To the specifics of your question, if these cuts are intended to cradle the neck of a bottle a round bottom to the cut would be nice. Though, I agree with Larry, it is not quite clear what you are intending to do. Having said that, if I understand what I am looking at - using plywood or solid lumber - this would be a difficult and dangerous cut on a table saw. A band saw or a router with a template, finishing up with a hand saw or chisel are the best options

[Peter Kelly]

251532

As above, just make the fingers from separate pieces and glue back together keeping the grain running the long direction.

[Lou Ortiz]

Sam's point is best. If this is deeper than the height to which you can raise your dado, you should bandsaw it, route it to a templat and then finish off the corners. On the design though, if it's going to be cradling a bottle why square this off? It seems to me that a rounded profile would suit much better for that purpose.

[Jamie Schmitz]

Hey guys thanks, and sorry for not being clearer in my post (pet peeve) any ways, I am wanting to make a half lap joint. This is something that I would hope could be done without using hand tools, mechanical to me seems more of an exact science. This will be made out of plywood so chiseling might be difficult. Dave Richards got my initial point about a dado blade setup concaving the bottom. Also one would have to come up with a way to create a stopping point as you cannot see the bottom when cutting. Cut depth would be deeper than height fully reached by 8 in. dado setup so standing the piece up would not work. How would a production shop make these?

251553 251554

[Dave Richards]

For something like that it won't make a whole lot of difference if the ends of the slots aren't perfectly flat but there wouldn't be much involved in cleaning them up with a chisel. Setting a stopping point wouldn't be difficult with a stop block and you could use something akin to a box joint jig for registration.

How about doing something like this? You'd get stronger joints and it wouldn't matter what the ends of the notches look like because they wouldn't be visible at all. You could cut the through slot with a router or a bandsaw

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8077/8391997277_2af2415531_z.jpg (http://www.flickr.com/photos/8294157@N08/8391997277/)

[Sam Murdoch]

Now we see. :D Sorry for oversharing. OK, but the depth of cut is a problem. This isn't a table saw type finger joint. Additionally using plywood with a dado blade for this is heading in to tear out city. I think your 2 best options are routing with a template or as Peter Kelly wrote - rip and glue. The latter would be very safe and pretty fast for one wine rack and made even more sturdy and exact if you have a Festool Domino. Also this would give you the option to be more decorative as you could mix and match species. If you are intent on using plywood how will you deal with the exposed laminations? Dave has illustrated a very rugged set up but you still have the basic problem as to how to make that deep cut.

[Lou Ortiz]

Dave's solution would work well - much, much stronger joint. If you have a router table you can use cut the dado with a straight bit and then use a spiral bit with a stop on the fence to route out the slot. If you have to use a jig, route the dado and use a bit and bearing on a separate jig to cut the slot. Obviously, you would need to be mindful on the set up for the jigs to make sure each piece was registered properly. As Dave pointed out, the rounding wont matter if the joint has shoulders.

[Gus Dundon]

I think watching videos on youtube can help you.

[Dave Richards]

I think watching videos on youtube can help you.

What kind of videos do you have in mind, Gus?

[Stephen Cherry]

A pin router could knock these out in no time flat.

[glenn bradley]

Not knowing the tools in your arsenal is obviously getting you a lot of various answers. If you have a large bandsaw that cuts at near tablesaw quality, I would use that as my first choice. A template on the router table would be my second choice. Both solutions would require a little bit of chisel work to clean the inside corners. There are probably a dozen other ways to do it including CNC but, I would have to keep guessing what you have at hand ;-)

[Jamie Schmitz]

So I just made some cuts and actually it does not matter that the cut is exactly half the width of the stock as far as I can tell.I cut over an inch past middle with my dado set. Once I put the pieces together it was so tight I could barely pull them apart, I stood on this joint with almost 200 lbs. and it barely budged. No tearout-Thanks Oshlun
251596

[glenn bradley]

Once I put the pieces together it was so tight I could barely pull them apart,

Excellent!

[Sam Murdoch]

So did you just lay the ply flat on the table and cut past center with your dado head about 4" away from the fence?

[Jamie Schmitz]

So did you just lay the ply flat on the table and cut past center with your dado head about 4" away from the fence? Yes laid it flat. No,test piece cut down after dadoed

[Sam Murdoch]

If I understand correctly then, you will be making 18 dado cuts into 6 pieces of plywood that are approximately 6" x 14".
Your dado cuts will be spaced about 3-1/2" apart.

Please do not try to do this with your 6 pieces cut to size and then just setting your TS fence away from the edge to do the 2 end cuts and then even further away to do your center dado. Forgive me for being mommy woodworker here but :eek: This is very dangerous! Even if you stop the saw at each cut before you back out the ply, there is just tooooooo much potential to make one little twist that will result in catastrophe. Dado blades are completely unforgiving.

One way that I can think of doing this with the fence that minimizes (but does not eliminate) the danger is to start with your plywood blanks cut to width but left extra long - say 30" or so, This way you can completely hold on to the plywood as you are feeding into the dado. Do the 2 outside cuts at one end. End for end the board and do the other 2 outside cuts - for all the blanks - and then reset the fence to do the center cuts. After that crosscut your pieces to length. AND I would add a stop at the fence to end the dado.

The way I would do this - If I were intent on using a TS and dad set up - is I would build a sled of 1/2" ply that would ride in my table top miter slots. I would make this sled wobble free. I would have a stops set up on my sled fence so that I could repeat all the cuts accurately. I would hold the blanks down with toggle clamps (like these or similar http://www.woodcraft.com/PRODUCT/2083524/34013/BESSEY-AUTOADJUST-HORIZONTAL-TOGGLE-CLAMP-LOW.ASPX?refcode=10INGOPB&gclid=CNnK8s7U9LQCFU-d4AodKmMAGA ) then cut the dados into the blanks.

My preferred method and by far the safest method would be to use a router template.

Please be careful - be attentive - be patient - and listen to your little voice.

All the best.

[Jamie Schmitz]

Got it Sam thanks for sharing and I am sure it is obvious that I am a new user and the info you shared is very valuable. I had actually planned on making this rack out of ply and so I would have as wide a piece as possible and just push the sheet in flip it end to end to get the other side to line up and then rip it to the right width. I do know better to get near a fully exposed dado set. I have the upmost respect for all things sharp. I do have a router and a nice cutter but to me routing this deep with so many cuts seems like a pain. Dadoing is super clean and efficient.The greatest thing about forums is that this info lives for a long time.

[Sam Murdoch]

routing this deep with so many cuts seems like a pain.

I've seen 2 guys lose multiple fingers to a dado head. THAT IS PAIN - no "seems" about it!

Jamie I sure want this to be a good and safe project for you. Please never sacrifice safety for expediency. You will only do that once.

Have fun.

[Steven Triggs]

Got it Sam thanks for sharing and I am sure it is obvious that I am a new user and the info you shared is very valuable. I had actually planned on making this rack out of ply and so I would have as wide a piece as possible and just push the sheet in flip it end to end to get the other side to line up and then rip it to the right width. I do know better to get near a fully exposed dado set. I have the upmost respect for all things sharp. I do have a router and a nice cutter but to me routing this deep with so many cuts seems like a pain. Dadoing is super clean and efficient.The greatest thing about forums is that this info lives for a long time.

Just to add a bit to the safety advice Sam was giving because I think you might have missed part of his concern (and Sam, please correct me if I'm wrong, I'm not trying to put words in your mouth):

I believe Sam's point isn't solely regarding proximity of your hands to the dado blade. It is also a concern of a VERY high risk of kick back. If that piece of wood loses perfect alignment, even for a split second, as it is passing the dado blade (very likely doing a stopped dado on a small piece), you WILL lose control of the material, and it WILL be thrown at you with extreme speed and force. You will not be able to stop it, and since dado cutting generally involves the removal of the splitter, nothing else will stop it either. The force and speed can easily be sufficient to seriously injure you, we're not talking a little scrape or bruise, we're talking potential trip to the emergency room. We aren't talking about a one in a million situation here, we're talking about a very likely result.

My two first hand accounts of table saw mishaps are:
1. My father made a slight error once resulting in contact of his thumb with the blade. He was extremely lucky in that it only made a small gash and didn't sever anything. Even so, it took him over a year to get proper control and feeling back in his thumb, and he insists now that he would trade thousands of dollars to have never had that experience.
2. I allowed my brother to use my saw once to do a simple rip cut of an unsafely short piece, and he didn't take proper measures to keep the board from lifting on the leading end, and I was stupid enough to not have the guard and splitter in place. This piece of wood, that couldn't have weighed more than a pound or two, was launched at the wall 15' behind with so much force that it damaged the OSB sheathing.

[Sam Murdoch]

Thank you Steven for the added emphasis.Yes, all that, plus the likely dragging of the hand into the saw blade as the wood is twisted and thrown - lost fingers and a hole in the head :eek:. There just isn't anyway to hold a plywood piece of this shape safely- by hand or with hold downs. You can't be expected to stop the saw at the end of each cut (one more moment of distraction) and most people would run the cut, then without thinking try to pull the piece back while leaving the saw running - then do it all over again. Gets exponentially crazy dangerous when trying to make that middle slot.

Have we said that this operation is very very dangerous?

[Gus Dundon]

I searched on youtube and found this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=80RAVzAJtuc .Check it out.

[Sam Murdoch]

Thanks Gus for the contribution to the discussion.

Does anyone really use those push/gripper pads? Man, I find those things to be very undependable grippers. Would never use on a TS, let alone for passing my hand over a dado blade.

[Mark Bolton]

For something like that it won't make a whole lot of difference if the ends of the slots aren't perfectly flat but there wouldn't be much involved in cleaning them up with a chisel. Setting a stopping point wouldn't be difficult with a stop block and you could use something akin to a box joint jig for registration.

How about doing something like this? You'd get stronger joints and it wouldn't matter what the ends of the notches look like because they wouldn't be visible at all. You could cut the through slot with a router or a bandsaw



I think Dave's option would be the bee's knee's using two router bits and a single template. Using solid stock you could simply plane your material to match the larger bit. Really nice drawing too by the way.

[Steven Triggs]

Does anyone really use those push/gripper pads? Man, I find those things to be very undependable grippers.
I agree that the typical cheapo ones (like the freebies that come with jointers) are very useless. However, I found, bought, and love the versions made by Bench Dog. They have a much "grippier" pad. If you're ever in store that carries both, an easy "self-demonstration" you can try is that if you put a cheapo on a smooth surface, like a table saw top, and push down with moderate pressure, you can still easily slide it with almost no effort. If you put the Bench Dog one on the same surface, and don't even push down, it is very difficult to slide it.

I've never thought to, and probably won't, try them for cutting on the table saw. However, I find them indispensable for the jointer and the router table.

[Jim Neeley]

Jamie,

My wife wants me to make a couple of "bookshelves" like this, around 7'w x 7' tall and I've been thinking about how to do it. After reading this thread, the safest way to me seems to be "a la Dave Richards" to cut the through dados with a TS and dado blade and the half-width through cut by following up with a router and a top-bearing router bit, with a stop. The bearing would ensure the through cut is exactly the width of the dado.

Just my $0.02.. YMMV.

Jim