Mortiser on your JP or a Domino?

[Dan Friedrichs]

Julie, your assessment is reasonable. The detail perhaps not captured is the ease of set-up with the Domino. Yes, you could cut tenons with the slot mortiser, but it will require set-up, test fits, tweaking, etc. The Domino is really designed for perfect-fit, dust-free, high-strength jointery of essentially any pieces of wood in a matter of literally seconds.

This is one of the best "how to" manuals for the Domino I've ever seen, and there are some incredible examples of very fine furniture being built using very unique applications of Dominos. Scroll through the pictures, at least, to get an idea for how it is much more than a doweling system.

[Prashun Patel]

That coped mortise can be done with a domino quite precisely. The tenon side can either be cut by hand or a custom loose tenon can easily be made. The Domino provides options for doing part or all of the joint. For thinner parts, sometimes an integral tenon is what I want, but I can still do a reliable mortise with the domino and then clean up the corners.

[Simon MacGowen]

With the Domino, you have to buy the larger machine. Ouch!

You can do everything with just the XL (700) by using the third party adaptor bits in place of the DF500. You don't need both the DF500 & 700.

However, that's not the approach I prefer, just like while in theory we can do any chisel work with a 1/8" chisel alone, none of us would have only one bench chisel. I use the one (500 or 700) that suits the job best.

As Dan points out, fine work or not has nothing to do the dj; it is the skills and techniques that dictate the outcome of the work. I forgot the issue nos, but Fine Woodworking has featured work using the dj joint. Instagram should have lots of pieces (esp. chairs) done with the dj too.

There are many examples in the two festool forums on fine furniture pieces made using the dj; here's one example:

http://festoolownersgroup.com/festoo...omino-cabinet/

I know a fellow in the high end staircase business, and his team has been using the dj for custom railing work which is practically impossible to do with a mortiser.

By the way, some mentioned about the cost of dominoes, and some pointed out that they make their own dominoes. I know some do. But to me, the consumable costs are minimal compared to the lumber used for the builds (not to mention the .de deal). Frankly, the stock preparation part in any project I do is the least part I enjoy. Making the dominoes is a process almost identical to stock preparation. If I could, I would contract out any stock preparation work to another woodworker!

Simon

[John TenEyck]

Or one could build (for free) or buy one of my horizontal router mortisers and do nearly everything a slot mortiser and Domino does. I built this almost 10 years ago after not being able to justify the price of a Domino and not liking it's limitations, as Derek pointed out, relative to size of the mortises it can produce, and before I had my FS-35 with the attached slot mortise. Even after I got the slot mortiser I use the horizontal router mortiser for everything except really wide and deep mortises because it's easier to set up and use, and much faster.




The version shown above has a tilting table that makes cutting angled mortises like used on chairs, etc. very easy to do. You can build the first version of this from free plans at this link for around $100 or less in materials and around 10 hours of your time. https://sites.google.com/site/jteney...outer-mortiser
While made of MDF, that machine has cut thousands of mortises, and much more, and is still being used today by a friend I gave it to after I built the model shown above. You don't have to spend a lot to be able to cut mortises of almost any size quickly, accurately, and safely.

This is not a plug to sell you a machine, although I'm happy to do so. I'm only pointing out that there are low cost alternatives that are highly versatile and you should at least look at them before spending big bucks.

John

[Simon MacGowen]

Or one could build (for free) or buy one of my horizontal router mortisers and do nearly everything a slot mortiser and Domino does.
John

"nearly" is cleverly put there.

Your photo reminds me of the shop-made domino joiner (search youtube if anyone is interested in how it was made). That shop-made dj also "nearly" does everything the Festool dj does. And we must not forget that there are many shop-made table saws (made of a ply wood top and a circular saw) out there that nearly do everything a cabinet table saw can do.

Simon

[Simon MacGowen]

I. But bear in mind that a slot mortiser can make much wider and much deeper mortises than a Domino. For most furniture and cabinet work that is of no consequence, but it is if you want to make exterior doors, etc. If I

John

John, The XL is perfect for making exterior doors...exterior balcony railing etc.

The dj can also cut wide mortises using overlapping cuts. But double mortises or twin mortises are the usual dj way for added strength.

Simon

[Chris Fournier]

I am anti Domino because I am stubborn, don't see the value, and am stubborn... Oh yeah, cheap too! I have had two slot mortisers on my Minimax machines and If I had a third machine I'd have a slot mortiser on it too! It is slower to set up for sure but you can make massive mortises with it and I use it for making doors every time. For smaller work I am convinced that biscuit joinery is the high value option in my shop. I also am not afraid to make one off router jigs for floating tenon work if needed.

I don't see why one couldn't make their own dominoes, they are after all just floating tenons branded by Festool...

[Simon MacGowen]

I am anti Domino

Pretty sure the size of the group of woodworkers who are anti Domino is not as big as the anti-sawstop's.

Simon

[Warren Lake]

it will be when they put flesh sensing technology into the domino and then try to force lamello and everyone else to use it in their gadgets.

[Simon MacGowen]

it will be when they put flesh sensing technology into the domino and then try to force lamello and everyone else to use it in their gadgets.

Haha...

For now, Fesool's priority is to push its new Festool saw with the flesh-sensing technology into the EU market. The prototype looks promising.

DFSS 500 or 700? I hope the bit could be re-used....

Simon

[John TenEyck]

"nearly" is cleverly put there.

Your photo reminds me of the shop-made domino joiner (search youtube if anyone is interested in how it was made). That shop-made dj also "nearly" does everything the Festool dj does. And we must not forget that there are many shop-made table saws (made of a ply wood top and a circular saw) out there that nearly do everything a cabinet table saw can do.

Simon

I could just as easily have said a Domino can do nearly as much as my horizontal router mortiser. Can a Domino do compound angle mortises? Can it make mortises of nearly any size, integral tenons, dovetails, raised panels, rabbets, dowel holes?

John

[Simon MacGowen]

I could just as easily have said a Domino can do nearly as much as my horizontal router mortiser. Can a Domino do compound angle mortises? Can it make mortises of nearly any size, integral tenons, dovetails, raised panels, rabbets, dowel holes?

John

Dominoes are loose tenons or floating tenons, not dovetails, or anything else. Inventors of the dj never intended a dj to do dowel holes...a dj is not a hole drilling machine.

Mortises of varying sizes, yes, by changing the fence heights and, as I said earlier, overlapping the cuts (in which case, non-Festool dominoes/tenons need to be made. It is faster and more accurate to use double, triple, twin or twin double etc. dominoes, however.

Compound angle mortises? Do you have a link to what they are? As long as a joint can be completed using the traditional M&T or the floating tenons, any angles are doable. http://4dfurniture.blogspot.com/2016/05/

The dj is an under-appreciated machine when people relate to it as a biscuit joiner or doweling jig. It has a deep learning curve, and other users disagree on that statement because they are thinking about the learning curve for the basic functions of a dj only: butt joint, jointing, miters, etc., tasks that can be done equally well with biscuits, pocket hole joinery, or even just plain glue. For instance, we see a lot of pictures showing the dominoes in edge jointing...for many of which dominoes were totally unnecessary, or an extra step with no extra benefits. I seldom use dominoes for jointing unless it is something 1" thick and 3" or 4' long or more.

Simon

[mreza Salav]

Have tried various ways of making mortises. Considered getting an attachment for my J/p. Had Domino 500 and used it extensively. It was worth every penny as its fast and i mean faster than any other method and then soldit and got 700. It is serving 99% of my needs unless i need to make 4” deep ones which i rarely need. Its fool proof and quite fasr to make several joints vs doing one using another machine.
Love the machine and I regret not buying it sooner.

[Brian Holcombe]

I believe John's mentioning dovetails because you can cut sliding dovetails with a slot mortiser.

You can argue almost any tool has a deep learning curve, consider how many possibilities a slot mortiser opens up.

[Simon MacGowen]

I believe John's mentioning dovetails because you can cut sliding dovetails with a slot mortiser.

You can argue almost any tool has a deep learning curve, consider how many possibilities a slot mortiser opens up.

I think I was pretty clear in my first post that when it comes to angles, the dj is far superior to any mortiser. Anyone who can show that the reverse is true, I would welcome them sharing examples or applications they have come across. I did not say the dj can do everything a mortiser does, but, for example, I am sure a mortiser can't do fixed shelves as quickly and easily as a dj, traditionally a task best done with dados. I have never used any of my dado sets since acquiring the dj which requires no test cuts and no allowance for dado depths when preparing the shelves to length. What a time saver there.

Sliding dovetails or rabbets or grooves have not been promoted by anyone including Festool as tasks that a dj is good for. Floating tenon is what the dj is all about. With that being said, could a dj do short grooves or rabbets? The answer is yes, if one knows about reducing the depth of cut beyond the factory settings (covered in the supplementary manual), guiding the dj on a straight edge, etc. But would one actually use a dj to do those tasks that a dj is not designed for? Unlikely. By the way, we are here talking about the dj being used as a hand-held machine. Out there, we have seen people using the dj in a stationary machine fashion, meaning that it may not be impossible to expand the functions of a dj even further.

Simon