End grain to long grain joint
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- This topic has 7 replies, 4 voices, and was last updated 8 years, 7 months ago by Ed.
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Josh, can you show a photo or picture of what you’re trying to do?
A simple box can be dovetailed around. All the grain runs more or less parallel.
A cross-grain joint would be better off with a mortise and tenon. You could do a dovetail, but with wood over about 6″ or so there is a possibility of cracking.
Hi, thanks for the replies here is a picture. It is essentially a coat rack with cubby holes above it. My aim is to housing dado the middle sections, but not sure how I would mortise / tenon?
I’ve jointed two boards together, to make an 11″ horizontal piece, and now want to add the two end pieces making it 5″ deep. I will be cutting out a curve shaping the end pieces so that they are thin at the top, fat at the middle and thin ish at the bottom.
I could get some more wood to make sure the grain was all aligned which would allow me to do dovetails, but is that my only option?
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You must be logged in to view attached files.End grain to long grain may not be the issue here. At 11″ wide, I’m worried you will have too much movement across the 11″ vs. the close to zero movement that will occur along the length of the top and bottom pieces. The two short middle pieces are probably fine because they are short. The long middle piece could be done with a sliding dovetail and a dab of glue at only one end, leaving the rest of the joint unglued, free to slide, but secure via the sliding dovetail. For the two end pieces, you could glue up more stock to 11″ so that you don’t cross wood width to length. You could use dovetails then. Alternatively, if you made the whole thing longer so that it extended beyond those end pieces, you could use sliding dovetails for them, too, and glue just a couple inches, as for the middle piece. You could then shape the part that extends past these end pieces in some way, but you’ll need to go far enough past the sliding dovetail that you don’t leave weak grain. If these end pieces don’t take much stress, yet another option (again, if you glue up more 11″ stock) is to miter them at 45 degrees and cut splines into them. I think Paul illustrated that on one of his picture frames. The final option that comes to mind, if you want to stay with crossing grain and not glue up, is let the end pieces extend *behind* the long 11″ horizontal member by and inch or so and join with sliding dovetails. Now, the housing is in the end pieces (vs. in the idea of extending the horizontal member, the housings would be in the 11″ horizontal member).
Wait….that last idea of putting the housing in the end pieces may not be a good idea since they would be grooves, really, not dados. The tapered housing for the sliding dovetail would probably be weak when run along the grain rather than across it…not sure. Indeed, you may have the same issue if you use the sliding dovetail the other ways I suggested, again since part of the joint would be along long grain. It depends on how much stress this would take, and I’m unsure of the strength of a sliding dovetail when part of it is fabricated running along long-grain. I’d glue up more 11″ stock and dovetail or spline.
Hi Ed, I appreciate your replies! The longer piece in he middle was a bit of a red herring! It should be the same length as the other two and inhave not cut the two pieces as a side and bottom for the cubby holes.
The end result will look like Paul’s dovetail caddy but with the back piece longer to allow coat hooks to be attached.
I will go with the solution of gluon up more 11″ pieces and dovetailing. I need the practise!
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