Angle of dovetail

[Steven Bolton]

Hi:

Does anyone care to guess at the angle of the attached dovetail? It seems like a steep angle, yet it is attractive. This seems like one where cutting the tail boards with a bandsaw would make sense. Is there a bandsaw blade with little set and many teeth?

Steve Bolton

[frank shic]

steven, those look like handcut dovetails which are easy to learn from klausz's DVD dovetail a drawer. don't get too fixated on the exact angle - as long as it's not ZERO!

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

I have always believed that angles that are more slight are stronger. I came to this because the glue will work better when there is less end grain and clearly whenever one cuts wood at an angle to the grain there is end grain. So the steeper the angle the more the end grain and the poorer the glue joint.


I read somewhere that those slightly angled DTs tested out stronger but I don't recall that there was a reason given why.

However, DTs that are painfully thin seem to me they ought to be weak because the stress point of the tail is so small. I could be wrong. It's just my impression form looking at 'em.

[Andrew Williams]

Both the Wood Joiners Handbook and Tage Frid Teaches Woodworking mention this... That angle will cause weakness in the joint due to short-grain failure. 1:5 is a much safer grade.

[Mark Singer]

I vary between 1 to 6 and 1 to 8. One to 7 is a nice angle. The tiny ones are fragile and harder to make. So I would start with one to six and just practice those. Try through dovetails fist they are easier but all the mistakes show which is good when you are learning. The links below are to more advanced dovetails, but the principles are the same.

http://www.wkfinetools.com/contrib/mSinger/z_art/htDovetails/htDove1.asp

http://www.wkfinetools.com/contrib/mSinger/z_art/miteredDovet/miteredDov.asp

[Ken Werner]

My solution is simple, but may not work for all. I got tired of figuring out 1:6 or 1:8. So I made a marker for 10 degrees. Use it for all my DTs.

Ken
http://sawmillcreek.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=67901&stc=1&thumb=1&d=1184335949 (http://sawmillcreek.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=67901&d=1184335949)

[frank shic]

Once again, I will put in a plug for NOT measuring the angles especially on something that's not going to be subjected to a huge amount of stress like a jewelry chest. If you watch Frank Klausz in the DVD, he never whips out an angle gauge and start making pencil marks. His technique is by far the most liberating one that I have learned thus far. If you want machine cut precision, then by all means invest in a router-guided dovetail jig, but if you want the CHARM and UNIQUENESS of handcut dovetails, I'd highly recommend his video.

[Gary Keedwell]

Once again, I will put in a plug for NOT measuring the angles especially on something that's not going to be subjected to a huge amount of stress like a jewelry chest. If you watch Frank Klausz in the DVD, he never whips out an angle gauge and start making pencil marks. His technique is by far the most liberating one that I have learned thus far. If you want machine cut precision, then by all means invest in a router-guided dovetail jig, but if you want the CHARM and UNIQUENESS of handcut dovetails, I'd highly recommend his video.
Ordering that DVD has been on my "to do list" for a long time. I just pulled the trigger.;)

Gary K.

[frank shic]

gary, you won't regret it. the one piece of advice i can give you is to watch very carefully how he makes his divisions for the dovetail pins. practice a few times and you too will be convinced that there is no need for measuring!