Toward a philosophy of joinery.

[Robert Engel]

Staying a several B&B's with antique furniture I noticed much detail paid to the facade but not the interior. Frankly, quite shocked to see dovetail drawers I would have thrown in the trash and nails holding runners and kickers in place. Only to find out this was typical of the day in cabinetmaker's shops.

To the point: in the middle of a dresser build now working on the drawers.

If I actually was capable of doing DT's as some of the more accomplished people here, I wouldn't be able to tell if they were done by hand or by machine. Philosophically, The little gaps and oversaws are the indicators this dresser by hand. Wow how does that take the pressure off and make my ww'ing experiences rather enjoyable instead of criticizing myself and getting depressed.

Not so say I slop it together like some of those antiques, OK?

So now I'm face with a bit of a dilemma. After completing 4 drawers, the next day my shoulder and both elbows tell me I've got a row to hoe with 6 more deep drawers to do.

I built a jig and used my TS with a 7 degree bevel blade to cut the tails. They are too perfect! I find myself varying the width of the pins just a bit and will have to cut the pins by hand.

And my wife says "you're the only one who will care about it."

[Glen Canaday]

She's right ;)

Most of your customers - be they paying or family or really anyone but you - won't even look at the quality of the DT at the end of your drawers.

And as far as those antiques, it is a safe bet that you might be the first to look!

[mike holden]

Build your furniture to please yourself and your client (self, spouse, family, customer)
The guys who made those antiques were building to put food on the table, not to please someone 200 years down the road.

I strive to do the best I can, and then move on. The polished appearance of machine joinery is one of the reasons I work by hand, mostly. I use power when useful.

Just my thoughts,
Mike

[Stanley Covington]

It sounds like angst. But this forum is mostly guys who don't give a rodent's fundament about feelings, and are focused on fixing problems, so here's my take.

You are posting your angst for the world to see, which tells me that you haven't figured out the goals for your woodworking. You need to get those pinned down before you pick up another handsaw.

If you are a professional, then budget, schedule, client's specs, and your own standards govern, so the goals are fairly clear cut.

If you are a hobbyist, then you need to figure out why you are going to the trouble of working wood, and what you want to accomplish. When these things are clear in your mind, everything else will fall in place, until it doesn't anymore.

Now I suppose you will turn around and say you already have all this figured out. If that is the case, then why bother?

Stan

[Brian Holcombe]

I agree with Stan.

I'll add a few more comments. In today's age people compare our work with handtools against what they see that is done mostly with machine tools and maybe fitted by hand. It's not a fair comparison but it is a common comparison. What that does is setup handtoolers to feel that they need to strive for absolute perfection in order to show their work.

People getting a start in handtools also make the mistake of comparing themselves with people who've been using these tools for many more years. It takes a change in process to move from machine to hand and in doing so you'll expose yourself to errors not previously experienced even though you may have been woodworking for many years.

It's a tall hill to climb, and the more that you climb the taller it gets.

[Prashun Patel]

I have been doing dovetails by machine, by hand, and by hybrid means. Each situation and project suggests a different approach. I don't judge others' choices, and therefore try (feebly) not to judge my own.

Even if you can do Holcombe/Cohen style dovetails purely by hand, you can ALWAYS do them better, faster, more efficiently. (Talking out of school alert): The Japanese Shokunin is marked by not only great crafstmanship and execution, but swiftness. I am sure that quest for improvement never ends. I therefore submit that you always be happy with your work in it's present state, but never content.

I will also submit that you can certainly tell the difference between 'manual' and machine cut dovetails. The angles and widths of the pins are sometimes tell-tale. As I cut more and more of them, I'm less impressed by the precision and more impressed by the layout when viewing works of others.

All that being said, here are some tricks that work well for me (I'm sure you have many of your own):

- Experiment with softer hard woods. Working in softer hardwoods can forgive and favor undercutting the joints which allows them to compress into place. I just completed a butternut night table and it was a revelation. It also saws, chops, and pares much easier than harder woods. The wood choice can make so much difference in the quality of my joints as I'm learning.

- The most tedious part of the job for me is chopping the pin waste. It is possible to become very efficient at this, but on 6 deep drawers a much faster way is to excavate with a trim router and a 1/4" spiral bit. Even better, if you are doing through dovetails and make your tails wide enough, you can use a 1/2" bearing guided mortise bit. You saw the pin walls manually, then use the mortise bit to take out all the waste. The bearing rides on the sawn walls and leaves perfect bottoms in no time. There's no risk.

- Get a fishtail chisel for half blinds...

[Andrew Hughes]

I have some of my Dt work that I did at least 15 years ago.When I did them they were tight and now gappy.
So I'm sure some of my older Dt work that's out there looks like crap but started out very nice.
As long as it still does what it was made to do then I did a good job.Heres A step stool I made at least fifteen years ago.

Nothing lasts forever
Nothing is ever finished
And Nothing is perfect.

Aj

[Reinis Kanders]

One has to have some sort of fun in this even though it might hurt at the times:)

[Mike Henderson]

Nothing lasts forever
Nothing is ever finished
And Nothing is perfect.

Aj

Sage advice.

Mike

[Robert Engel]

Thanks Stanley and Brian for your thoughts. When I started the project I was determined to do as much as I could totally by hand.

I guess I'm chasing an idea which either my skill level and time has negatively impacted. I do have an idea of what I want to do and it is simple: be an excellent craftsman by practicing skills and challenge myself with higher and higher expectations with each project. What I've come up against is there is a balance between sacrificing your "standards" vs. getting a project finished in a reasonable time. With these drawers I quickly realized its 12-16 hours (which means 2 weeks for me) of chopping dovetails.

What my wife said hammered it home because I know in the end, only myself and another woodworker would know the difference, much less care, so I have opted for a faster route that will give me time to concentrate on the more important parts of the project. I think its just a real world decision.

While I'm not doing this for money I'm just as serious about the quality of my work but there's only so many hours in a day.....

[Brian Holcombe]

You'll have to determine your own way, for me I would those two weeks would be devoted to improving your ability to make dovetails meaning that next time you do them, maybe it takes 8 hours and they fit up better.

I chose to put myself through an apprenticeship of my own making, entirely with hand tools because I was determined to suffer until the point at which I could produce, I continue down that path. It becomes significantly more work for the same amount of reward over time, but it does reward greatly on the whole.

My first mortises probably took me an hour each, now they take 3 minutes.

[Prashun Patel]

"My first mortises probably took me an hour each, now they take 3 minutes". But you didn't count the 57 minutes to sharpen your chisel, Brian... ;)

[Brian Holcombe]

Hah! Sometimes longer.

[Pat Barry]

... make my ww'ing experiences rather enjoyable instead of criticizing myself and getting depressed.
This is the main thing isn't it?

[Stewie Simpson]

If you are a professional, then budget, schedule, client's specs, and your own standards govern, so the goals are fairly clear cut.

If you are a hobbyist, then you need to figure out why you are going to the trouble of working wood, and what you want to accomplish. When these things are clear in your mind, everything else will fall in place, until it doesn't anymore.

Excellent advice Stanley.


Staying a several B&B's with antique furniture I noticed much detail paid to the facade but not the interior. Frankly, quite shocked to see dovetail drawers I would have thrown in the trash and nails holding runners and kickers in place. Only to find out this was typical of the day in cabinetmaker's shops.

That's a misnomer Robert. Each individual cabinet maker shop would have determined its own standard of ethics.

[Doug Hepler]

Robert,

We all have gone (or are going) through the dilemma that we are discussing in this thread. I certainly did, and I am reflective by nature, so I gave it a lot of thought. I decided that I was being too reflective, to the point of narcissism, and I see a lot of that in woodworking forums. For example, what is the perfect sharpening system, how sharp is sharp enough, or anxiety about the meaning of "hand made". I once asked (on another forum) how thin I should make the walls of my turned bowls. I was greatly insulted by the answers I got, until I realized that nobody could answer the question for me. Nobody can answer your question for you.

I resolved the dilemma after some years of anxiety about "measuring up" with a simple formula. I seek to make furniture that is attractive, durable and useful for its intended purpose, according to both my and the client's standards. I take jobs only from reasonable people and only when I'm sure I can execute them well. When I make sure that I know the client's expectations I have never failed to please him/her, and any narcissistic misgivings were much easier to live with. The wisdom in this (if I may call it such) is that my three-part formula put ME in the background and focused instead on criteria (mainly the client's criteria).

Since you titled this thread toward a philosophy of joinery, let me go on, although I realize this is getting preachy. You have probably heard the one about the sign in the custom furniture shop. It said "Our work is fast, cheap and highest quality. Pick any two." (Think about it.) Woodworking is multifaceted: we each have multiple objectives that we must balance. In addition to speed, cost and quality, most of us strive to improve our competence, which is a combination of knowledge, skill and attitude. Somewhere along the way we hope to find pleasure and satisfaction in accomplishment. That is an analytical way of stating that craftsmanship is impossibly complicated and that we each must find and honor our own way. Custom woodworking is, like other crafts, intensely individualistic, yet if we contemplate our navels too much we wind up making birdhouses all day.

These thoughts will surely offend somebody. I don't really mean to do that, simply to offer my best answer to the questions raised in this forum about a philosophy of craftsmanship.

Doug

[Jim Koepke]

Well stated Doug, thanks.

jtk

[Stanley Covington]

Robert,
We all have gone (or are going) through the dilemma that we are discussing in this thread. Custom woodworking is, like other crafts, intensely individualistic, yet if we contemplate our navels too much we wind up making birdhouses all day.


Ah, if I could only have those happy days of navel contemplation and birdhouses again... sigh.

Stan

[Stanley Covington]

You'll have to determine your own way, for me I would those two weeks would be devoted to improving your ability to make dovetails meaning that next time you do them, maybe it takes 8 hours and they fit up better.

I chose to put myself through an apprenticeship of my own making, entirely with hand tools because I was determined to suffer until the point at which I could produce, I continue down that path. It becomes significantly more work for the same amount of reward over time, but it does reward greatly on the whole.

My first mortises probably took me an hour each, now they take 3 minutes.

Brian has great discipline, the fruits of which can be seen in his projects. But why was he so determined, you ask? I suspect it was because he had decided his goals for woodworking, broke the process of achieving those goals into manageable pieces, and proceeded to attack each piece like Rosie O'Donnel after a bag of potato chips.

It works.

Stan

[Rob Luter]

Ah, if I could only have those happy days of navel contemplation and birdhouses again... sigh.

Stan

There's something to be said for birdhouses (and the like). While I strive to hone my skills with ever more challenging goals, it does the heart good to bang out a utilitarian project now and again.

[Phil Mueller]

I just spent 3 months of evenings and weekends agonizing over a table I was making for a friend. Perfect wood selection, perfectly flat and square, perfect M&Ts, perfect curves, perfect glue up, perfect finish. At the end, it ain't perfect.

The friend loves the table. No mention of .001 gaps at a tenon shoulder. No mention of a slight 2mm tear out. No mention of a tiny sag in the shellac where the leg meets the rail. And I don't think he's just being nice.

I think we can all be proud of our work when we STRIVE to do our best. With every project, something gets a little better. And when we take on a new challenge (Mike Allen and his Federal Table, for example), we enjoy the learning from doing our best.

If there's one thing the past few years have instilled in me, is patience and discipline. Just slow down...enjoy each step of the work...make it the best you can. I keep two things in the back of my mind while working:

"Just walk away"
"It's not the destination, it's the journey"

[Doug Hepler]

Very well said, Phil. I have had the same experiences. I once nearly trashed a display case because of my frustrations with myself (basically). It was perfectly sound and square, etc. but had "microscopic" defects. I decided to deliver it. I would take it back for a do-over if the customers complained. They absolutely loved it. I know they were not being polite. They are the kind of people that would only allow the best quality in their home. It was still in a place of pride 10 years later. I learned a lot that day about "perfection" and myself.

It also confirmed my resolution never to criticize my work to anybody but myself or another woodworker. There's usually a lot to criticize because, like you, I'm always trying to stretch myself. But only another WW cares about those details. Attractive, durable and useful. Amen

Doug

[steven c newman]

Biggest lesson I learned? Know when to just walk back up the stairs, and turn out the lights. Sleep on it and see how things go the next day. Also, NEVER work on Mondays in the shop.....never turns out to be a "good day".

Practice, practice, practice. If you have a bunch of joints to make, and they have to be "perfect" , make a couple practice runs, just to work out any "bugs"

Old timers, their clients weren't going to pay for things they couldn't see. All the "show" parts were done to a high standard, anything else..not so much. Client wasn't paying for fancy panels on the backs of their items, as they would be against a wall. Inside of drawers? Unless it was something to show off in there....only the fronts were finished. There rest? Meh. Outsides of drawers MIGHT get finished, IF they were going to be shown. all depended on what the Client/Patron was willing to pay for.

[Robert Engel]

Practice, practice, practice. If you have a bunch of joints to make, and they have to be "perfect" , make a couple practice runs, just to work out any "bugs" I don't think the practicing ever ends. Even when building the piece if one is striving for perfection.

And I think this is the crux of it. I'm a perfectionist by nature and extremely self critical. I remember a carving I did once I was pointing out a couple mistakes to my wife she kept asking me "where, I don't see it?".

I love ww'ing and I'm learning to accept the little mistakes surprised like Doug said when they don't even see them!

My philosophy has changed now I don't sweat it as much. The nitpicking little oversaws and gaps I now see they prove the joints were man-made!

I'm not justifying sloppy work I'm in awe of you guys who do it to near perfection. Like just about anything in life requiring skill, there are some more talented than others no matter how much I practice I will never hit a ball like Barry Bonds, right?

For the perfectionists among us who get frustrated I'm just saying relaxing and celebrating your imperfect humanity sure takes the pressure off and makes ww'ing much more enjoyable.

Getting back to craftsmanship of old, how many of you would consider this poor craftsmanship?

345577

[Pat Barry]

Getting back to craftsmanship of old, how many of you would consider this poor craftsmanship?

345577
I would consider that very sloppy and obvious signal that the person doing the work was taking shortcuts. I would immediately wonder where else they took shortcuts and maybe take those shortcuts where you can't see anything such as mortise and tenon being a sloppy fit, just filled with glue.

[Prashun Patel]

The dramatic undercuts to me are not a sign of bad craftstmanship, but for me, they are an inefficient way to accomplish a goal. Undercutting does not release the pin socket as dramatically as I had hoped. I find it more efficient now to just chop it away and pare it with the right chisel. The most persnickety part is the corner anyway, which will in theory NEVER release with the saw.

I will say that while I encouragingly recognize everyone's work happily as a snapshot of their own journey, I find more and more that what appears difficult now becomes remarkably easier with practice. So effort is often (not always) more efficiently spent practicing instead of finding shortcuts.

[Jim Koepke]

With double blind dovetails some consider it good form to have a bit of saw mark past the lines. This signals anyone doing a repair a century later how the joint went together.

With half blinds I like the method Derek Cohen uses of cutting all the way with a very thin piece to extend the saw cuts.

jtk

[Tom Vanzant]

Robert, never mind the overcuts, but those sure are little tails.

[Pat Barry]

With double blind dovetails some consider it good form to have a bit of saw mark past the lines. This signals anyone doing a repair a century later how the joint went together.

jtk
That's a pretty dumb reason. In a hundred years no one will care about this sort of nonsense.

[Stewie Simpson]

how many of you would consider this poor craftsmanship?

Cant blame the tool for that amount of overcut.

[Robert Engel]

My research as shown over cutting blind DT's was a common technique done to save time. Once upon a time in any furniture makers shop, chopping dovetails was considered grunt work relegated to the apprentice, who was expected to get the job done quickly and efficiently. And he was taught by his master.

So Pat, although I know you and many others would not approve, I hope to show you whether it is a sign of poor craftsmanship is purely a matter of opinion. I would expect to see evidence of this on many pieces of antique furniture we would all agree are masterfully done.

In trying to duplicate techniques craftsman used in antique furniture, I'm doing the drawers this way. In the end, when the drawers are full of clothes, what difference will it make?

Prashun, on a practical note, after trying it, I do feel it offered some advantage but I agree not as much as I thought it would.

I have also tried the technique of hammering in a scraper blade I think that works the best.

345646

345647

(Sources: "Fine Furniture for a Lifetime" & "Illustrated Guide to Building Period Furniture", Glen Huey)

[Robert Engel]

Robert, never mind the overcuts, but those sure are little tails.
Yeah I'm a little embarrased by that. Despite that, drawer looks ok though.

Over 60 rule applies. :)

[Stewie Simpson]

Robert; who is supplying you with these facts on past practice.


chopping dovetails was considered grunt work relegated to the apprentice;

[Brian Holcombe]

Hammering in a scraper may well crack the board.

[Malcolm McLeod]

I know a man in his 90's who as a teenager apprenticed to a woodworker in Scotland. He was tasked with chopping dovetails as soon as he could pick up a chisel without losing a finger. He hates them to this day!

I have no reason to question his veracity.

[Stewie Simpson]

Malcolm; and what else did that elderly gentleman learn, apart from doing dovetail joints during his apprenticeship tenure.

Stewie;

[Jim Koepke]

That's a pretty dumb reason. In a hundred years no one will care about this sort of nonsense.

A restorationist in a museum or at an antique dealer might.

jtk

[Kees Heiden]

Overcutting a half blind dovetail like that used to be a pretty common technique. It can be enhanced a bit by not just overcutting but also really digging the tip of the saw into the wood. What remains then in the corner is just a few stray fibers that are easilly cut away with a sharp pointy knife.

I describe the process with some pictures overhere: http://seekelot.blogspot.nl/2015/06/early-dovetaling.html

I find myself drawn more and more to these kinds of techniques. I am absolutely not interested in perfectness anymore. Boring to my eye. And when the piece is put into use, I really like it when it gets a worn and scruffy look as soon as possible.

[Pat Barry]

So Pat, although I know you and many others would not approve, I hope to show you whether it is a sign of poor craftsmanship is purely a matter of opinion.
Exactly correct - you asked for opinions and I gave you mine. There is no correct answer to this. If your goal is to faithfully recreate something that you have observed then doing what you are doing is valid. I would though, if it were me, do it without the the sloppy overcuts and other shortcuts you may discover in that piece.

[Kees Heiden]

Exactly correct - you asked for opinions and I gave you mine. There is no correct answer to this. If your goal is to faithfully recreate something that you have observed then doing what you are doing is valid. I would though, if it were me, do it without the the sloppy overcuts and other shortcuts you may discover in that piece.

It's the word "sloppy" I object against ;) (Of course, it is an opinion and yours is as valid as mine, probably).
When you want to work more along ancient workmethods, then it becomes the "correct" method.

And you don't need to make period reproductions to use period techniques. Making modern looking stuff using old techniques is also possible. You could also say that using handtools is a start for that.

[Malcolm McLeod]

Malcolm; and what else did that elderly gentleman learn, apart from doing dovetail joints during his apprenticeship tenure.

Stewie;

He learned he did not wish to spend his life in a wood shop, so he emigrated to the United States of Texas.;) To the best of my knowledge, the closest he has come to woodworking since that epic trip has been to use a hammer to hang a picture. However, he is an amazing musician and the bagpipes tremble at his approach!

End of highjack; returning to topic.

[Brian Holcombe]

I will make an objection to the over-cutting. The goal of joinery is to provide integrity.

The dovetail holds due to an interlocking fit between tails and pins, everyone knows this. The dovetail joint loses its ability to resist pulling apart if you severe the ties between socket and pin. The pins are now reliant upon their connection between the top of the pin and the socket, which in a pin is the thinnest part.

IMO, it needlessly weakens the joint, and increases its reliance upon the glue connection between the pin and tail.

We see surviving examples, what we don't see are examples that broke in use and were either replaced or discarded.

[Stewie Simpson]

He learned he did not wish to spend his life in a wood shop, so he emigrated to the United States of Texas.;) To the best of my knowledge, the closest he has come to woodworking since that epic trip has been to use a hammer to hang a picture. However, he is an amazing musician and the bagpipes tremble at his approach!

End of highjack; returning to topic.

Malcolm; then there is no need to go into detail of my own fathers tenure as a Carpenter & Joiner in Scotland during the 1950s. His home country before moving to Australia.

regards Stewie;

[Graham Haydon]

Getting back to craftsmanship of old, how many of you would consider this poor craftsmanship?

345577

I don't think this is evidence of poor craftsmanship. The inside face of a drawer is seldom seen and strength would not be changed. A bigger indicator of poor work would be a drawer not running smoothly, a drawer actually falling to pieces, being part of a design that looked bad or failed to make life easier, bad stock sellection and finally show surfaces that were badly prepared.

Being able to understand when these methods were typically used and the pieces they be found on should be of greater importance than dismissing the work as "sloppy" or taking "shortcuts".

[Malcolm McLeod]

Malcolm; then there is no need to go into detail of my own fathers tenure as a Carpenter & Joiner in Scotland during the 1950s. His home country before moving to Australia.

regards Stewie;

From the lone shieling of the misty island
Mountains divide us, and the waste of seas;
Yet still the blood is strong, the heart is Highland,
And we, in dreams, behold the Hebrides.

OK, now I'm done with highjack...sort of. Maybe.:o

[Kees Heiden]

I will make an objection to the over-cutting. The goal of joinery is to provide integrity.

The dovetail holds due to an interlocking fit between tails and pins, everyone knows this. The dovetail joint loses its ability to resist pulling apart if you severe the ties between socket and pin. The pins are now reliant upon their connection between the top of the pin and the socket, which in a pin is the thinnest part.

IMO, it needlessly weakens the joint, and increases its reliance upon the glue connection between the pin and tail.

We see surviving examples, what we don't see are examples that broke in use and were either replaced or discarded.

When cutting the pin, the overcutting is usually minimal, just enough to release the fibers in the corner. You mostly see these very long overcuts in the socket, where there is plenty of wood around to keep up the integrity of the piece.

Those guys may have been "sloppy", they sure weren't stupid.

And I don't think we can draw any conclusion from the fact that the majority of antique furniture didn't survive. The most important factor was changing fashion.

[Brian Holcombe]

By pin I mean the wood that separates the sockets. I draw no assumptions WRT their logic, but do attempt to look at things from my own perspective.

This approach my work fine for drawer fronts, but I dovetails are used structurally in casework, removing a great deal of their integrity might not fare well in that case.

[Kees Heiden]

Yes of course, I am always a bit at a loss when talking about pins, tails, sockets...


When we refer to the picture at the top of the previous page, I don't see a whole lot of decrease in strength due to the overcuts. I suspect it is all still waaaaaay strong enough.The pins are still firmly attached to the uncut wood at the outside side of the cabinet.

[Malcolm McLeod]

I don't think this is evidence of poor craftsmanship. ...... Being able to understand when these methods were typically used and the pieces they be found on should be of greater importance than dismissing the work as "sloppy" or taking "shortcuts".

I would agree, especially if you include context. What is the intended purpose of the 'craftsmanship' displayed in the pic? ...Is it fit-for-purpose? Is it for a drawer in a buffet in a grand formal dining room? Or, is it for a junk drawer in a work table in a basement store room? Will it hold gold bullion? Or be a catch-all bin for worn out feather dusters?

Without context, can anyone judge if it is good craftsmanship? ...Lousy for a buffet, but overkill for a junk drawer. Judge if you must.

[michael langman]

For no understandable reason, I was born a perfectionist!
I just got done putting down red oak flooring in the hall and one bedroom.
When I walk down the hall, 99% of the time, my eye is looking at that gap between the molding and the floor line. Too much of a gap for my mind to let go of.
But as I get older, I tend to let go of those imperfect things, because I am realizing that I am missing the broader picture of how beautiful things really are around me.
My wife told me a long time ago, that, "We don't live in a perfect world." So that is why she married me!

I bought a hard maple chest on chest dresser for my bed room. The dovetails in the top two drawers are filled in with a white gluish filler. When my brother in law saw that he replied that the dresser was not of a high quality, or was worth less then a dresser without those imperfections.
Being a tool maker who has worked in the shops for years doing high precision work, where things had to be right, I see those dovetails through the eyes of the person that made them. Maybe an older gentleman whose eyes were no like those of a young man. Or maybe his wife, or father or mother had just died, and his mind was not on his work. Or he was working sick, because he could not afford to be home.
So it goes, I suppose.

[Chris M Pyle]

Overcutting a half blind dovetail like that used to be a pretty common technique. It can be enhanced a bit by not just overcutting but also really digging the tip of the saw into the wood. What remains then in the corner is just a few stray fibers that are easilly cut away with a sharp pointy knife.

I describe the process with some pictures overhere: http://seekelot.blogspot.nl/2015/06/early-dovetaling.html

I find myself drawn more and more to these kinds of techniques. I am absolutely not interested in perfectness anymore. Boring to my eye. And when the piece is put into use, I really like it when it gets a worn and scruffy look as soon as possible.


I can appreciate patina but I don't understand the urge to have something look used. A well-designed piece should look good as it ages.

Undercutting looks terribly sloppy/ugly to me. The beauty of our lives: each of us is drawn to something. Some like the decaying, used or decrepit look.

On the other hand, well designed/executed furniture is a thing of beauty to me. The clean surface, the tight fit, the hours of design and fitting are what I find most interesting.

Shaker furniture is cute but Ming dynasty chairs or tables are absolutely breathtaking, perhaps because I appreciate what went into making them as much as the form itself.

Each item can be appreciated for what it is: some are utilitarian, some are production designs intended to be built economically, some are meant to stand at the top in design and execution.

Each has a place but the reason Michaelangelo's name lives on and others have faded is because he sought perfection over everything else. The pursuit of perfection in any field is the most beautiful thing to me.

[Pat Barry]

When you want to work more along ancient workmethods, then it becomes the "correct" method. .
It may be that the most ancient of methods involved the chisel only and not saw cutting of the sockets. In this case, there would be no marks of this sort. Who knows what came first?

[Stewie Simpson]

There is another alternate approach to cutting single lap dovetail joints, as you will note from 31.20 onwards in the following video;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VYYyrNR3700

[Kees Heiden]

It may be that the most ancient of methods involved the chisel only and not saw cutting of the sockets. In this case, there would be no marks of this sort. Who knows what came first?

Probably not, the egyptians had saws allready. And very early furniture relied much more on mortise and tenon construction.

[Warren Mickley]

When we look at drawer dovetails that have failed they tend to fall into these categories:
1) Thin pins and or thin half pins at the top or bottom.
2) Extreme angles on the dovetails, like 15 - 35 degrees.
3) Machine dovetails: rolling out of rounded sockets.

When we look at old work with overcuts in the back of a drawer front, we don't see failure. Part of the reason is that we are weakening the wood in a direction that was already weak. Avoiding the longer cuts adds very little strength.

The idea that there was some golden age when dovetails were made without saws is something Todd Hughes would have called "interesting".

[Pat Barry]

Probably not, the egyptians had saws allready. And very early furniture relied much more on mortise and tenon construction.
It would be very interesting to find out that a saw came before a chisel since a saw is obviously a much more elaborate tool than a chisel. Are you just guessing?

[James W Glenn]

Extrapolated guess: Chisels need a more "advanced" Metallurgy to produce. Saws can be made of much "softer" metal as can axes and adzes with a convex blade geometry.

[Stanley Covington]

Extrapolated guess: Chisels need a more "advanced" Metallurgy to produce. Saws can be made of much "softer" metal as can axes and adzes with a convex blade geometry.

Disagree. Forging a sawplate of any significant size is much more difficult than making a chisel, whether the materials are copper, bronze, iron, or steel. A chisel can be made, and the archaeologists tell us they were routinely made, from stone.

[James W Glenn]

Saws are found in the copper age.

http://www.wikiwand.com/en/History_of_construction

Quick googling shows chisels existed in the copper age. I do not think that with copper as a material a very steep bevel or a flat "back" of the chisel would be possible, so I will add Chisels with a "modern geometry" to my hypothesis. Lithic Stone tools may well have been produced as a wood chisel and if made for "fine wood working of the day" and made to do paring cuts and such. The same technology could also produce a long thin serrated blade used to "Saw" thru materials. Neolithic technology showed further refinement of tools. With out spending the day freshening up on my archaeology, I am confident that chisels and saws could and were made of bone and sea shells. Today a cold chisel and a paring chisel are both called a chisel. The general description "Hand held Wedge" seems inclusive enough. A saw is a much narrower description. A chisel does not necessarily "chisel" but a saw "saws"

[James W Glenn]

I know that this started as a "Form or Function" discussion of dovetailing, but when I think of a "Philosophy of Joinery" the first thing the comes to mind is

"Chain saw to cabinet scraper, with as few steps as possible between" This is an adaptation of my Boat building philosophy which is "Chain saw to block plane"

Which is an oversimplification, as the jack or hand planer always gets used.

When it comes to producing functional "workman like" work especially at an sort of production level with hand tools, I don't reduce the standards of work I am attempting to produce, but accept the element of risk that some percentage of the multitude of individual operations involved will not be "perfect".

If the joinery needs to functionally or visually "perfect" I will do whatever I can to control that risk.

Most importantly, I do not want any of the work I produce to suggest that My "Give a Damn" is broken.

[James Waldron]

There was once a time, including the 17th, 18th, 19th and some parts of the 20th centuries, when one could rely on the fact that friends and neighbors visiting in the home would not be poking about inside one's drawers or peering at the bottom of one's tables and cabinets. For the poor cabinet maker struggling to feed his kids, over-cut dovetails that make things go faster was quite acceptable and the owner of the piece had no concerns other than the outward appearance, function and cost of the work. All was good even with over-cuts, scrub planed undersides and secondary parts. In fact, using secondary wood itself is testimony of the lack of "perfection" given to unseen parts of the work. The proud new owner might never see the over-cuts, the scrub planed areas, the secondary wood. After all, those who ordered bespoke furniture had servants for opening and filling or emptying drawers, cabinets, etc.

If, in today's world, over-cut dovetails are unacceptable to you on your work, take the time and care to avoid the overcuts. Please yourself. Plane away on the underside of the table tops and the backs of cabinets and case work. And so on. It's your work, it's your time, and your kids are already well fed and the pressure is off. Go to it.

Just stay the hell out of my drawers! That's private territory.

[James W Glenn]

I tried this logic with one of the talented and successful furniture makers I worked for. I slipped with the palm sander and left a little track in the veneer inside the knee well underneath a desk.. Or shall I say I kept talking as I backed slowly out of the shop.....

[James Waldron]

I tried this logic with one of the talented and successful furniture makers I worked for. I slipped with the palm sander and left a little track in the veneer inside the knee well underneath a desk.. Or shall I say I kept talking as I backed slowly out of the shop.....

Well, hell, if you're going to use a palm sander on veneer, ....

And if you're going to put finish veneer on a secondary surface, you've got to know you're working for one of the more hysterical types.

Next time, you might get yourself a scraper and stay away from sanding altogether.

And if the veneer was done properly, it should be reasonably easy to repair. You did use hide glue, right?

[george wilson]

Veneer has gotten so ridiculously thin these days,it's a miracle if anything can be done to it! I used the last of my 1/28" thick veneer on the large harpsichord when I was first in Williamsburg in 1970. I did not order more,and discovered later that it was a thing of the past.

[James W Glenn]

I didn't just put the "talented and successful" part in incase he's a forum lurker........

[Art Mann]

I know this won't make you happy but I think it is absolutely awful craftsmanship. You are rationalizing the technique by saying it was done in centuries past. So what? There have been craftsmen who take shortcuts and produced shoddy work ever since there have been woodworkers. I don't think it is a worthy goal to copy them.


I don't think the practicing ever ends. Even when building the piece if one is striving for perfection.

And I think this is the crux of it. I'm a perfectionist by nature and extremely self critical. I remember a carving I did once I was pointing out a couple mistakes to my wife she kept asking me "where, I don't see it?".

I love ww'ing and I'm learning to accept the little mistakes surprised like Doug said when they don't even see them!

My philosophy has changed now I don't sweat it as much. The nitpicking little oversaws and gaps I now see they prove the joints were man-made!

I'm not justifying sloppy work I'm in awe of you guys who do it to near perfection. Like just about anything in life requiring skill, there are some more talented than others no matter how much I practice I will never hit a ball like Barry Bonds, right?

For the perfectionists among us who get frustrated I'm just saying relaxing and celebrating your imperfect humanity sure takes the pressure off and makes ww'ing much more enjoyable.

Getting back to craftsmanship of old, how many of you would consider this poor craftsmanship?

345577

[James Waldron]

I know this won't make you happy but I think it is absolutely awful craftsmanship. You are rationalizing the technique by saying it was done in centuries past. So what? There have been craftsmen who take shortcuts and produced shoddy work ever since there have been woodworkers. I don't think it is a worthy goal to copy them.

I would suggest that we're talking at cross purposes here. No one is suggesting shoddy work or awful shortcuts as a goal. Much of the debate depends on how one defines good craftmanship: is leaving scrub planed surfaces on the lower face of table tops shoddy? Is a flattened, straightened, smoothed and scraped bottom of a table top a sign of worthy or superlative craftsmanship? Perhaps it would help if there were a few more museum visits to see what passes muster among the masters of the trade of 200 years or so ago. Or, I guess, we could ask George; he was there, you know.

On the other hand, if you wish to use Burmese teak as a secondary wood and spend your shop time perfecting the finish of table top and drawer bottoms and remaking every piece that has overcut half-blind dovetail pins, there's no one stopping you. And no one is going to criticize you for wasting your time on such matters, since no one is ever going to see your effort or those details - unless you make a big fetish of showing off the bottoms of your drawers or some such. (I suspect however that your significant other will put that to a stop without much delay. His or her bridge club won't be very interested and neither will he/she.)

[Warren Mickley]

There was once a time, including the 17th, 18th, 19th and some parts of the 20th centuries, when one could rely on the fact that friends and neighbors visiting in the home would not be poking about inside one's drawers or peering at the bottom of one's tables and cabinets. For the poor cabinet maker struggling to feed his kids, over-cut dovetails that make things go faster was quite acceptable and the owner of the piece had no concerns other than the outward appearance, function and cost of the work. All was good even with over-cuts, scrub planed undersides and secondary parts. In fact, using secondary wood itself is testimony of the lack of "perfection" given to unseen parts of the work. The proud new owner might never see the over-cuts, the scrub planed areas, the secondary wood. After all, those who ordered bespoke furniture had servants for opening and filling or emptying drawers, cabinets, etc.


I have in my possession a desk that has been in my family for seven generations. It has figured wood drawer fronts on 22 drawers, three plain hidden drawers and a modest amount of line inlay. The original owner was a prosperous farmer. It is doubtful that he had servants like you would suggest, because in 1800 census his county had 8000 residents and only six of them servants. Here is the upgrade (larger) house he built some years after purchasing the the desk. No room for servants. There was also a fancy clock in this house which is now in a museum
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Many have seen this desk, but I am almost certainly the only one alive who knows whether there are overcuts on the dovetails or not. It is not an issue. As cabinetmakers we use secondary wood for three reasons: to save materials expense, to save labor, and to make the carcase lighter. Even if expense were not an issue, it would be desirable to make many parts from lighter woods for weight concerns alone.

Frankly I think farmers and tradesmen of the 18th century were able to buy good furniture, and cabinetmakers were prosperous as well, not "poor" or "struggling to feed their kids" as you suggest.

[Pat Barry]

I called it sloppy workmanship because I personally don't want that appearance inside my drawers, or inside my cabinets. Regardless, though, of who is going to look inside your drawers, I think you need to consider the "why" for overcutting. It obviously saves time for the maker. It no doubt helps to register the chisel vertically for the sidewall chopping that is still necessary. It doesn't help with regard to the end chopping though. For the sidewalls, the longer the overcut, the less sidewall chopping needs to be done. For those that use this approach, how much time / effort savings are there? I think in reality the answer is not much at all. By my estimation, overcutting each cut by 1/2 inch will only save you about 20% of the work involved with chopping out the sockets.. Overcutting by 2 inches might save you half the work. Its obviously a matter of diminishing returns. I don't have the time to do the math involved but I feel that any significant overcutting doesn't buy you much in time and effort savings and ;ooks less desirable.

[Graham Haydon]

The "Why". Trained professionals working at a comfortable but brisk pace, skills learned from other professionals who made many, many pieces by hand. They didn't need to do the math, it was the way things were done and unless one chooses to make as they did it's unlikely you'll appreciate the "Why".

[Jim Koepke]

it's unlikely you'll appreciate the "Why".

The "Why" is because before the 20th century workers were paid by how much work they did. If they could produce 20% more work by over cutting, that could be the difference between eating good or not eating.

jtk

[Robert Engel]

For those that use this approach, how much time / effort savings are there? I think in reality the answer is not much at all.
The reality is, after 10 drawers, for me there was much time savings. I now understand why they did it that way.

Whether I will ever use the technique again is debatable but I do think it will lend a sense of the old ways to the piece which is what I wanted to achieve.

[Prashun Patel]

I find more distasteful than the overcuts, the notion that people in the past could be reduced to a single opinion on this subject. Just as we have varied opinions on it, what makes you think users of furniture in the past had less variety in opinion? Add to that the fact that we spend proportionally far less of our income on furniture (or food) which means we tend to consume both with arguably less discretion than people at any point in the past.

200 years ago, when purchasing a desk may have been a large purchase of disposable income, I suspect some people scrutinized the workmanship inside and outside. And I bet were a variety of conclusions made based on the length of the over cuts inside the drawer.

Aspire to make more perfect joinery or do not. The fact is, while many may not care, it is objectively a shortcut taken. It is left to the maker, consumer, and internet viewer to make their own conclusion about what that signals.

[Ryan Mooney]

Lets get back to the title question as I think its still intriguing. Why pick a certain joint for a certain application?

There are a handful of decision points I've come up with, but I'm curious what others might add.



Is it strong enough? This is the overwhelming criteria for me (although usually not a huge problem except in some high stress cases).
Will is work with/against the movement of the wood? related to 1, but in some cases a join that would naively meet 1 fails here.
Is it aesthetically pleasing (basically the criteria that's been noodled on ad-nauseum here)?
Is it stylistically appropriate (i.e. clunky round M&T joints work well with a rustic log frame bed but not so much with a Louise XIV recreation)? This closely tied to 3, but there is room for wiggle here. Again overlaps with the discussion here to some degree.
Can I make it? Some fancy joinery is hits all of the above in spades but is frankly well past my abilities (or tooling, or..), so it gets a skip.
Will is survive long term IF that matters (no I don't really want to start the dowels vs M&T conversation but it may well be there..). If I'm building a fence outside where the post will rot out in 20 years anything past that is moot, consider appropriateness of use.

I think that the discussion here has thus far been primarily on point 3 with an overlap onto 4 and a bit of #5 (with some questions mostly resolved about #1). Whether or not 4 applies is a question for the historians, generally I'd take the tack that if you are making a piece in line with where the overcut technique was used then sure use it, if not then don't. if it offends your aesthetic (#3) then don't, but if it doesn't and helps point #5 then do.

I think breaking the point down into a set of selection criteria is generally useful to help decide if what you're doing "works" or doesn't (in the larger abstract concept of "works").