Half blind dovetails

[tim walker]

Hi all, I have an Incra Positioner for making dovetails. Is it possible to make half blind DT in 1/2" stock?

[Mike King]

google search does wonders. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u8UFKVRgWTY

[Mike King]

And this. https://incra.com/books_plans-mtl2.html#prettyPhoto

[Jim Dwight]

For fixed spacing half blind dovetails the cheap HF jig works very well if you spend a few more dollars for the machined template guide from Grizzly. The holes didn't match perfectly on mine but work. I think the total was about $50 for a mostly metal jig. I've done at least a half dozen dressers drawers with mine. The instructions stink but I found better ones on-line and now do not need them. It works well with 1/2 inch or even a little thinner drawer sides.

[James Jayko]

I was thinking about half blinds this morning. Had to repair a drawer that had a ~50-60 year old set of machine cut half blind dovetails holding the drawers together. I've used a jig to make half blinds in the past, but as I've moved to cutting dovetails by hand, I'm trying to get good at half blinds (I'd say I'm a ~B-/C+ half blind cutter at this point).

Aside from looking...bad...are machine cut half blinds meaningfully weaker than hand cut? Seems like you have a lot more of that transitional grain between face and end, which I'd assume has to be weaker than the substantially larger face-grain-to-face-grain connection on the hand cut (assuming a good fit). Anyone have any opinions here? Just my curiosity...

[eliot feldman]

Hi all, I have an Incra Positioner for making dovetails. Is it possible to make half blind DT in 1/2" stock?

Absolutely, you can. Watch their instructional video; the one they show is on 1/2 stock.