How tight to make a joint?

[Tim Douglass]

*Very* nice roach^h^h^h^h^h bracelet assistant. And since it is made from wood it gets this mess back on topic.

Tim Douglass

[Phisherman]

Pinch her tit.

[John DeBoo]

Hmmmmm, there just may be something to turning pens................................ John

[LRod]

Please turn off your HTML.

- - LRod

Master Woodbutcher and seasoned termite

Shamelessly whoring my website since 1999

[charlie b]

and charlie b added:

the following may make George's points clearer

wood expands more, a lot more, acrossed the grain than with the grain. A mortise and tenon typically joins at 90 degrees (+/-). If the tenon fits the opening snug all the way around, the dimension of the mortise won't change much, the depth of the mortise might but that's not a problem. The tenon, on the other hand, can expand or contract because of the cross grain on the critical, largest cross grain height dimension. Leaving a little room on top gives the tenon some room to move.

|| | |------ | | ^ | | | | | v | |-----------

And here's some more on "fit", including "spit tight".

M&Ts seem so easy and straight foreward - until you think about it a bit - or try to make some good ones. Them old woodworkers were pretty smart - and skilled!

Hope this helps.

charlie b

[charlie b]

SCREAMING YELLOW ZONKERS THE Ultimate stoner munchie!

charlie b flashing back now its nitros oxide - at the dontist's endodontist, periodontist, prostheodontist ... "we can rebuild him - we have the technology. (am way beyond mere dentists and approaching the 6 million dollar mark)

[Tim Douglass]

to square the corners of my mortises when I cut them with a router. It is dead simple to make the tenon fit the rounded corners and a bit of a pain to make the mortise square, so with no structural reason to do it differently I'm voting for round ended M&Ts unless someone provides a practical reason or if I'm doing a through tenon.

Tim Douglass

[Nigel]

I just browsed around a bit on charlie b's site. There are some interesting thoughts there ... probably old hat to you pro's but this beginner is pushed into thinking a bit about what he finds there. Thanks charlie !

[GerryG]

Charlie's site like a pretty good reference for many to start with. As was mentioned, there are very few articles that go into enough detail. However, keep an eye open for articles by Ian Kirby. He goes into more details of joinery than most.

A little confusing, though, on his mortise/tenon-first page. He says he cuts the tenon first, then goes on and gives another reason for cutting the mortise first. I agree with his comments, but I'm not sure which his conclusion is. For most cases, I used to always start with the mortise. Moving to router template jigs, however, it no longer matters since I get exact duplicates (provided I don't flip the reference faces, of course).

GerryG

[charlie b]

Geez, and I thought I was like The Pope - inflammable. Sorry - it was a Thinko (mental equivalent of a typo) and it's been fixed. Definitely mortise first -yeah, mortise first. K-Mart sucks, yeah.

Sorry about the confusion. My bad.

charlie b

[Larry Jaques]

On Wed, 23 Feb 2005 11:21:46 -0800, the inscrutable charlie b spake:

Zig-zag machine. (Remove stems and seeds first.)

Hmmm, mmm mmm "No stems, no seeds that you don't need, Acapulco Gold is Bad Ass Weed." mmmmm

(from a whole 'nother life ago)

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[GerryG]