Quick project help

[Frank J Hall]

My wife showed me a picture of a bench on pinterest that she wanted. It was pretty simple. Two sides that were attached by a seat and back. No idea how it was put together, probably pocket screws from the seat and back into the sides.

I was going to put two mortise and tennoned rails between the two sides to support the seat and give it a frame structure. Im struggling because I usually mark for the mortise on both sides and chop half-way from each side. As you can see from the picture, the sides are already curved. the edges are also curved from spokeshave so I wouldnt get good registration with the marking gauge.

Any advice? Am I even going about this correctly or would another construction method work better?

Thank you!

http://i345.photobucket.com/albums/p384/fjhalliv/IMG_20170325_132510_zpsdjyn3thr.jpg (http://s345.photobucket.com/user/fjhalliv/media/IMG_20170325_132510_zpsdjyn3thr.jpg.html)

[Jim Koepke]

My thought would have been to mark out the mortises before starting the shaping. Now you are in a situation where you may have to make a pattern to be set on either side of either piece to mark them out. Stiff cardboard could work, a piece of 1/4" ply wood would be better.

jtk

[Eric Schmid]

Looks like the feet are still square to the back before it was cut out? Could you triangulate off a corner of the front foot?

[Frank J Hall]

My thought would have been to mark out the mortises before starting the shaping. Now you are in a situation where you may have to make a pattern to be set on either side of either piece to mark them out. Stiff cardboard could work, a piece of 1/4" ply wood would be better.

jtk

Yes, I should have done it before shaping. Error because of the quick and dirty project mindset I was in to knock this out in a hurry...I didnt think ahead.
The cardboard pattern is a great idea. Thanks!

[Brian AdamsMS]

Another possibility is to lay out your mortises on one side. Then clamp a long straight edge that would extend past the edges of your work piece. Turn the clamped assembly over onto a flat surface and use squares of some sort to line up another straight edge on the opposite side and transfer that line. Continue this for each of your layout lines as needed.

[Pat Barry]

Mark one side where you want the mortice. Drill small holes at each corner. Flip it over and mark the other side using the 4 holes as references. Chop away as per normal procedure.

[Frank J Hall]

Pat, I ended up going with your suggestion, worked well. Thanks everyone for the suggestions.

FYI if anyone else ends up in this situation, my cleanest mortise was the last one, drilled holes from the front layout that were well inside the layout lines, then chopped with an undersized chisel from the other side (i was chopping 1/2" mortises and used a 3/8" chisel for the undersized cut) then just pared the sides to even the mortise.

[William Fretwell]

My first thought also!