Recovery Techniques Thread

[J. Z. Guest]

I've heard it said that a good woodworker is not one who doesn't make mistakes, but one who makes it look like he did it on purpose.

With that in mind, I thought I'd start a thread on techniques that might help others make a graceful recovery, rather than starting the piece over again.

Pictures are appreciated.

I'll start with this little guy.

I'm working on a jewelry chest. (still) Started it some time near the end of last summer I think. It's the Norm's take from the early 90s. I'm making the bottom hidden drawer, the height is 1". Norm joined the pieces with rabbet joints, brads, & glue. Not having a brad nailer, I thought I'd just use butt joints and fasten the sides together with epoxy putty, then reinforce with splines through the edges. Didn't hold. Tried wood glue, didn't hold. (being end grain to end grain) Tried Dowelmax. It held. Just one 1/4" dowel in each of the two joints that didn't hold with the epoxy putty. I got it together, and now it isn't square.

For some reason, I just can't give up on this, even though it is just four small pieces of 1/2" maple, 1" wide and less than 2' long. So it is finally together and out-of-square. I ran it through the table saw, so at least the sides that will need to slide in are parallel.

Next, I went ahead and routed 5/32" slots through the "joints" and made some splines. Two through each joint. Glued them in.

Today, I just sawed off most of the excess spline material, and sanded them flush with the Dremel drum sander. (I'm embarassed to admit how many touch-ups I've done with that little drum sander...)

Of course the splines were square instead of rounded, so that left some holes to fill. I used epoxy putty. This stuff is magical, guys. It is a light tan color, comes in two probably 3" diameter jars from Menards. I just spackled it in there. Tomorrow, I will sand that flush, and I will have the strongest damned drawer case ever of that size.

This would not work if any part of the drawer would be visible from the outside. But it won't. It will be glued to some molding in the front, and covered by more molding on the sides. It will be my little secret.

If not, I will break down and redo the piece using DM from the start and gluing all four corners at once, ensuring square. Even then, it will have been a good exercise.

Each post in this thread should have some shame and some pride.



Looks horrible huh? It will look better when the dried, hard-as-rock epoxy putty has been sanded down, and when the project is done, no one will know but us!

[Lee Schierer]

When making small items you have to be extra carful getting everything cut square and sides have to be exactly the same length. A good joint for small drawers is the locking rabbet. Look at the lower right corner of this box.

This joint when properly cut will stay together without any glue and will assemble square. The joints you see were cut on my TS with only a miter gauge with a adjustable stop block.

It is always a good idea to check glued up boxes for square by measuring the two diagonals. If the diagonals measure the same the box is square. If it is out of square you can apply pressure with and additional clamp to bring it square before the glue dries.

Sometimes it is better to bite the bullet and make new parts and put the old ones in the scrap rather than spend hours trying to fix them or adjusting every other piece of your design.

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

I have never made a mistake except for that one time when I thought I had but, I hadn't.

[J. Z. Guest]

Beautiful tiger maple box, Lee. I think I will try that.

It's too short for dovetails. (unless I try hand-cut)

It's too short for a lock miter too. Yours might be the perfect solution.

[Lee Schierer]

Beautiful tiger maple box, Lee. I think I will try that.

It's too short for dovetails. (unless I try hand-cut)

It's too short for a lock miter too. Yours might be the perfect solution.

The attached illustration shows a slightly easier version of the joint than I used in the maple box. The easier version can be done with two set ups. I use this joint on 1/4" material and use a 1/8" kerf blade to make the two cuts. The board thicknes as drawn is 1/4", the tounge is 1/8" tall by 1/8" deep on both pieces. On the left hand piece the cut is made flush with the end on the right hand piece the cut is made 1/8" in from the end. If you set the slot in a bit farther you can sand the overhang flush after the glue dries. I make two tongues on each side and two slots on each end.

[Myk Rian]

I use the same joint as Lee. (locked rabbet). Very strong. I used it to make the drawers for my tool chest. Shopnotes has info on building a jig, (Vol. 3 #18, Nov. 94) that works very well for 1/2" material. You don't need the jig, but it makes life a bit easier.

[glenn bradley]

I have never made a mistake except for that one time when I thought I had but, I hadn't.

Yeah, I've been wrong once; I thought I was wrong, turned out I was right.

[J. Z. Guest]

There sure are a lot of wiseguys here, hehehe. But apparently no one who makes mistakes and recovers from it.

C'mon guys, let's turn this back into a woodworking forum and get away from a tool acquisition forum.

Lee, I took your advice (partly) and re-started the drawer carcass yesterday. But I used Dowelmax instead of the drawer locking rabbet.

I tried a lock miter, but have not had any luck with that in 1/2" stock. The thin part of the lock is too thin and always blows out. I'm done with that ####### joint & router bit.

[Phil Thien]

But apparently no one who makes mistakes and recovers from it.

I make plenty of mistakes but don't recover from many.

[Chris Ricker]

My HS shop teacher taught me that "the mark of a great craftsman is not how well he performs his craft but, how well he covers his own mistakes"
I truly believe this, virtually EVERY project I make entails covering a mistake or a re-design. That is what makes it original and mine. In the end I would bet that only you will notice it anyway.

BTW if I took pictures, I would run out of film

Keep up the good work and don't forget to challenge yourself on each project

Chris Ricker

[Jim Kountz]

BTW if I took pictures, I would run out of film

Whats film??

[Rod Sheridan]

It certainly is all about the recovery from mistakes.

I've made so many, I wouldn't know where to start if I had to list them.

Every piece of furniture I've made has some defect, known only to me of course.

This results in me sitting in the living room, looking at the furniture and thinking..

- when I made that cabinet I cut the dadoe too deep and had glue in a strip and re-dado it. Of course it's on an interior blind dadoe and no-one will ever know...Except me

- that tiny little ding in the corner of the drawer front was because I was in too much of a hurry and dropped it on the bench while installing. Nobody has noticed it except me.

- one of the Morris chairs has a plug in the rear leg where I drilled a 7/8" hole in the wrong spot for the pivot pin. I repaired it with a plug, and the grain match is excellent so it doesn't show, however I know it's there.


I could go on and on, it is the recovery that's important.

Sometimes the only recovery is to make a new part, other times you can incorporate it in the design, or leave it as a mistake to prove that the piece really is handcrafted.

Regards, Rod.

[J. Z. Guest]

Sometimes the only recovery is to make a new part...

Talking of which, I had to do that drawer frame AGAIN, because I mis-calculated when changing the plan for butt joints instead of rabbet. I added 1/2" instead of subtracting.

Sawed the joint apart, sawed off an inch of the sides, and got a new front piece. Now I'll dowel that back on to the ones that are left. Phew. I can't wait to be done with this damned little hidden drawer.

[Chris Tsutsui]

I was building a frustrum pyramid subwoofer box with 3/4" factory laminated maple.

Each panel is lock mitered and no screws used. Just yellow wood glue and some dowels for the base.

Anyways I ran out of matching maple laminated MDF for the top! argh... So rather than trying to find a matching veneer and veneering the topa nd it not matching... I found some nice brushed aluminum veneer and laminated that on top.

Then I painted the speaker terminal "aluminum" to match.

The result is the top of the box can now have drinks and stuff put on the top and the box has held up great after 8 years.

Basically, mis-calculating how much sheet wood to buy was the mistake. Then finding scrap aluminum to change the design on the fly was the fix.

[Mike Gager]

"Never tell them where you buried the bodies!"

if you dont tell people about your mistakes they wont even notice