dove tail box glue up

[Brian Runau]

I did a dry fit on some drawer boxes I made with dovetails. When I did the dry fit I had a square box, but when I started applying clamps with light pressure it racked the box. is there a trick to clamping the glue up? Thanks. Brian

[Bradley Gray]

Apply glue, drive together and clamp, then measure the diagonals and apply another clamp across the long diagonal and tighten until the diagonals are equal.

[Brian Runau]

I guess I thought they would square up due to the joint design. thanks,.

[Jim Becker]

There can always be a little bit of play even in the most finely crafted joinery during assembly and glue can be a little slippery. Bradley's comment about measuring diagonals is very sound...it's one of the defacto ways folks use to square up all kinds of constructions.

[Brian Ross]

I do a lot of half blind dovetails with the help of Mr Leigh. Never have clamped a drawer box yet. I measure diagonally and call it a day.

Brian

[Leo Graywacz]

Ideally when you setup your dovetail jig the fit is with a little friction. Using a mallet to get the slightly oversized tails into the sockets is the best way to clamp with no clamps. The friction fit is critical, a light or medium tap with a mallet should force them together. You shouldn't have to slam them. I don't know how much oversized the tails are but it's probably less than .001". a 1" dowel going into a 1" hole is a friction fit.

If you must use clamps then you can angle the clamps to force the box in the direction it needs to go.

[Brian Runau]

Success. First dovetail box glue up. With the glue on the joints they pulled together square or much clamping pressure. Thanks Brian