Squaring up dovetails
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Welcome! / Forums / General Woodworking Discussions / Squaring up dovetails
I found this post today. I can’t say I will use it all the time,but maybe I will try it once or twice to see if it helps guide me in the future
https://instagram.com/p/3T-du7pp8J/
This take a lot of extra time. It is better that you develop the skills to cut straight…practice..practice..practice.
On thing that will help here is to stack your tail boards and cut both at the same time. That will give you a longer bearing surface and longer line to see and use as a reference as you develop the correct sawing motion.
I have found that careful layout & marking – on both faces of the board – help me, as does practice. I will also look at my tail cuts and test them with a square, then trim the tails a bit if required to square them up before I mark for the pins. It gets better with practice, and the sawing accuracy helps with other operations too – e.g. tenons.
I haven’t tried any of the various jigs out there. I suspect that positioning the jig might introduce some errors as well.
For me its just a lot of practice and knowing where your battles are! If I understand correctly, it’s the 90 degree cut that is most important. That is the one that will affect it going together. You can be off your desired angle/rake as long as you match it to the corresponding piece. So if you are tails first, if you cut the 90 degree perfect, then go off your lines for the rake, just go with it. But don’t listen to me…I do pins first, only mark the vertical 90 degree on pin, and just eyeball the angle! Aesthetically I like the variance.