Dovetail layout with a printed template
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Hi everyone..
I’m a woodworking software developer and have developed a simple dovetail layout designer. It allows you to visualize how your dovetails will look and prints a template which you can stick on your board and have precise lines to cut to.
Here’s the tool: https://tinydesigner.app (free to use)
And here’s a video of me cutting dovetails with the printed template: https://youtu.be/r0gl2HZcHjcIf you have any feedback, let me know. I hope you like it!
Very clever tool, great work. The visualization is more valuable to me than the printable option, but I see how that would be useful to some.
I’d like to see something that defines the rake of the dovetails and the ability to toggle between different rakes (ie 6:1 vs 7:1). The tail base width is not something I usually consider.
The forum software is wrecking my replies, so I’ll try again
please forgive any duplicatesI think the tool is off to a great start, and I’m wondering if it can be used to create tails with arbitrary layouts, or must the tails be spaced uniformly?
I’m envisioning a sort of layout where there are two equal tails to the left and right, and a small central tail — can the tool do that?Thanks for the feedback. Setting a different ratio should be easy. I’ll have to think about where to put it in the UI though. Will keep you posted.
Arbitrary layouts with differently sized tails is definitely something I’m aiming for. However that’s not so easy while keeping the tool easy to use.
What I could do rather quickly is enable you to remove certain tails from an evenly spaced layout. This might allow you a bit more design freedom. I’ll try to add this in the next couple of weeks and keep you posted.
Hi Bert,
I suppose if one could remove certain tails, then one could print two, three or more different layouts, then transfer the various layouts one at a time and thus achieve the desired result of arbitrary tails, but I think that’s harder to use than virtually anything you might build into the app.
I’m sure you’ll think of something, looking forward to it!
I’ve uploaded a new version with following improvements:
– Nicer dialogs to input numbers.
– Ability to change the dovetail ratio (click on the ‘1 : 6 ratio’ dimension on top of the layout to change the denominator)
– Ability to hide individual tails (hover and click the checkmark) – click the ‘on/off dimensions’ button on the left menu to get a better preview.Still lots of things to improve but If you guys already want to give it a try and let me know your thoughts, that would be great!
https://tinydesigner.app/dovetails
Looking good !
Thanks for posting this and taking the time to put it together. I enjoy playing with it.
I don’t want to start a discussion of the merits of the metric vs imperial system, but I do most my work in inches and feet. Would it be reasonable to add the option to change between the units? I’d be happy to buy you a coffee for the trouble.
What a good idea, the mitre gadget would be really useful as well.
Hey, late reply i know. I really like the App you made, the vizualisation helps to find the right ratio that is looking good 🙂
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