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Thread: Dowel Intersection Question

  1. #1

    Dowel Intersection Question

    Hello,

    Novice woodworker here in the middle of my first real project. Building a dresser for my 2yo daughter out of hard maple and ran into an issue. I am using the project to learn some new joinery (dowels - mainly using exposed) and realized that I didn't plan the project through all the way.

    I have two dowels (centered and evenly spaced) going into the side panel horizontal piece at the bottom. However, when I go to connect the long stretcher to connect the two panels, the new dowels would cut through the existing ones. The person I got the plans from I believe just glued in this piece (which is not enough to properly secure it, in my opinion). Any creative solutions here? - I have three theories:

    1) Just move the stretcher up a couple inches rather than flush on the floor. This seems to be the logical thing to do. Not sure if that would impact stability, though I *will* have the dresser anchored to a stud in the wall.

    2) If I hadn't already finished one of the panels, I could have been creative with mortising the first connection to overlap, and then just using dowels for the stretcher. Bit late now, but I think that would have worked.

    3) Drill the stretcher dowel holes just short of the existing dowels so they don't interact. Feels too shallow to me to be useful. Dowels are 3/8", and the legs are 1 1/2", so not sure there's enough room to just drill around them.

    Note that the third picture doesn't have the dowels drilled in bottom connection yet, but it was done identically to top connection.
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    Last edited by Micah Puscheck; 02-02-2021 at 12:44 PM.

  2. #2
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    Do you really need the cross piece between the two back legs at floor level There should be a bottom frame or panel in the dresser that will hold the sides in place. Can you show the design with the drawer removed so we can see the carcase?
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  3. #3
    Quote Originally Posted by Lee Schierer View Post
    Do you really need the cross piece between the two back legs at floor level There should be a bottom frame or panel in the dresser that will hold the sides in place. Can you show the design with the drawer removed so we can see the carcase?
    Doesn't look like it. Happy to make changes if the design isn't up to snuff.
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    Normal dresser construction would have a closed bottom just at or below your drawer runner. This would eliminate the cross piece on the floor at the back. Also for rigidity there should be a back panel. The panel can either be hidden up against a wall or it can be made of finish grade wood. This panel will make the carcass much more rigid. For a dresser that will be placed against a wall, the back panel can be 1/4" ply wood. I usually set my back panels in a rabbet that runs all the way around the back frame. I can't tell from your photos if the side panels are veneered plywood or solid wood. If they are solid wood, you need to allow for seasonal movement due to moisture changes. If you don't allow for movement in large panels you will have some sort of join failure. If they are solid panels you should not attach your drawer runners to them unless you slot the screw holes.

    heirloomdresser_illustration2_1.jpg
    Last edited by Lee Schierer; 02-02-2021 at 9:10 PM.
    Lee Schierer
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  5. #5
    Quote Originally Posted by Lee Schierer View Post
    Normal dresser construction would have a closed bottom just at or below your drawer runner. This would eliminate the cross piece on the floor at the back. Also for rigidity there should be a back panel. The panel can either be hidden up against a wall or it can be made of finish grade wood. This panel will make the carcass much more rigid. For a dresser that will be placed against a wall, the back panel can be 1/4" ply wood. I usually set my back panels in a rabbet that runs all the way around the back frame. I can't tell from your photos if the side panels are veneered plywood or solid wood. If they are solid wood, you need to allow for seasonal movement due to moisture changes. If you don't allow for movement in large panels you will have some sort of join failure. If they are solid panels you should not attach your drawer runners to them unless you slot the screw holes.

    heirloomdresser_illustration2_1.jpg
    Thank you for your thoughts on this Lee.

    I should have probably paid more attention to who I bought the plans from - had other cues that they weren't taking movement into consideration. Oh well, my responsibility in the end. The side panels are indeed solid maple.

    I will add a back panel to it as you mentioned.

    A horizontal (?) slot for the screw seems pretty reasonable, but now I'm concerned I'm screwed (ha) anyways with the lack of give for the panels...

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    How about moving the stretcher to the middle (still on the floor)?

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    Quote Originally Posted by Micah Puscheck View Post
    A horizontal (?) slot for the screw seems pretty reasonable, but now I'm concerned I'm screwed (ha) anyways with the lack of give for the panels...
    It's not the end of the world. Depending upon where the dresser will reside and the current moisture llevel it may or may not become a problem. I see in your sketch that you are going to use metal drawer slides. You can slot (horizontally) the mounting holes with a small rat tail file or with a dremel tool. If you do I would suggest slotting the front and rear screws leaving the one in the center as a round hole. This will hold the slide in place while the panels moves a little in width on each side of that screw.
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  8. #8
    Quote Originally Posted by Doug Garson View Post
    How about moving the stretcher to the middle (still on the floor)?
    Good point! That would work too.

    Quote Originally Posted by Lee Schierer View Post
    It's not the end of the world. Depending upon where the dresser will reside and the current moisture llevel it may or may not become a problem. I see in your sketch that you are going to use metal drawer slides. You can slot (horizontally) the mounting holes with a small rat tail file or with a dremel tool. If you do I would suggest slotting the front and rear screws leaving the one in the center as a round hole. This will hold the slide in place while the panels moves a little in width on each side of that screw.
    Makes sense, thank you for the elaboration.

    I will post some updates as I get it finished. I'm going to continue the project as I've already assembled some of the subsections, but do my best to mitigate the issues you've brought up. Learning so much from this that if I have to build another one in a few years that I'm sure it'll be that much better.

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    I'd make the legs shorter and get rid of the stretchers. Your 2yo might be 6'6" one day but for now shorter furniture is better. More importantly from a structural point of view, the stretchers are fragile. If you move them up they will be stepped on and likely broken. At floor level, they don't look right in the design and will be hard to clean around.

  10. #10
    I think you can improve the stability if you add a rear panel. Even a recessed hardboard back will improve racking.

    If it were me, I'd probably make at least one framing member midway in the front and I'd move the bottom stretcher forward. Is there a reason to make the bottom open?

  11. #11
    Quote Originally Posted by Alan Rutherford View Post
    I'd make the legs shorter and get rid of the stretchers. Your 2yo might be 6'6" one day but for now shorter furniture is better. More importantly from a structural point of view, the stretchers are fragile. If you move them up they will be stepped on and likely broken. At floor level, they don't look right in the design and will be hard to clean around.
    Good point about it being stepped on, though it would be in the back against the wall, with the dresser anchored to the wall. Then again, I don't want to underestimate the ability of kids to torture test things...

    Quote Originally Posted by Prashun Patel View Post
    I think you can improve the stability if you add a rear panel. Even a recessed hardboard back will improve racking.

    If it were me, I'd probably make at least one framing member midway in the front and I'd move the bottom stretcher forward. Is there a reason to make the bottom open?
    Definitely adding a back panel - Lee mentioned that too. When you reference the framing member midway, do you mean something like shown in this picture? Hadn't really shown it in the other pictures I uploaded so far.

    Bottom being open I believe is just a design choice. I kind of like the feel of it, though it's pretty obviously just unused space. I realize for something that is literally built to hold things, that sounds kind of dumb.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Micah Puscheck View Post
    Good point about it being stepped on, though it would be in the back against the wall, with the dresser anchored to the wall. Then again, I don't want to underestimate the ability of kids to torture test things...



    Definitely adding a back panel - Lee mentioned that too. When you reference the framing member midway, do you mean something like shown in this picture? Hadn't really shown it in the other pictures I uploaded so far.

    Bottom being open I believe is just a design choice. I kind of like the feel of it, though it's pretty obviously just unused space. I realize for something that is literally built to hold things, that sounds kind of dumb.
    When building a dresser many folks build dividers between the drawers. This prevents items from climbing out of the drawers and falling down below. They are called dust panels. When I build dressers I build frames like the one shown below to help square up the dresser, give added support to the back panel and to make dust panels. I attach them to the sides and front face frame if there is one with pocket hole screws. In your design I would place one with a center panel below the lowest drawer. This will hold the bottom together better and give you a place on the back to attach the lower edge of the back panel.
    frame.JPG
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  13. #13
    No. I meant a horizontal framing member from left to right. The easiest way to think about that is a fixed shelf midspan. If you wish to save weight or material, you can make a hollow frame instead of a solid shelf, but this does complicate how/if you conceal the front edge or incorporate it into your design.

    Kitchen or bath euro style cabinets don't have these midspan supports and they can carry sometimes very heavy loads. But they are also often nailed to a wall and connected to their neighbors on the side to improve stability.

    I am sure your materials and joinery will be a might more stable than the RTA standalone closet drawer units you can get from the Home store, but this design is similar to those. All of those units tend to rack and sway in my home or office after years... YMMV.

  14. #14
    Not sure if I should be providing "updates" in the design section, but here's a current look at the project. I've spent a pretty ridiculous amount of time just getting to this point, but I've learned so much. I'll try not to be that guy nit-picking his own work, so I won't go into it too much. I thought I had the spacing of the faces a bit better than it looked when I put all of them back in together.

    To answer the question I asked to start the thread, I ended up doing a mortise and tenon approach for the three main pieces going across. This did cut into one of the two dowels for each of those top 2 corners, however there is still some length for the cut dowel in both pieces of wood and it still looks fine on the outside. I believed this to the best approach as I really wanted the strength on those cross members. The M&T definitely aren't perfect, but for a first shot I'm pretty happy with how it came together.

    I did do a rabbeted back panel as well. There wasn't too much racking before, but you could tell that it stiffened it up more. Thank you. Kept the bottom stretcher and centered it. Kind of liked the look.

    By the way, the top is not installed yet, just sitting on the top for the picture looking at the edges.
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    Last edited by Micah Puscheck; 03-01-2021 at 3:48 PM.

  15. #15
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    Looking good.
    Lee Schierer
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