Best way to cut wedges for wedged tenons

Bob · 2004-11-09T04:21:48+00:00

I must have read a jillion articles on Mortise and Tenon Joints in the lastfew weeks and I'm having pretty good success making floating tenon jointswith a router, table saw and hand planes for touch up. Now I need toemulate some wedged tenon joints.In all the articles I've read, they show clear pictures of suggesteddimensions, ratios, angles etc. Lots of attention is paid to techniques forcutting mortises and tenons. But everyone seems to gloss over techniquesfor cutting these little wedges.Now to describe my challenge.I'm building a plywood rack which will have a base composed of 23 1" oakdowels with PVC sleeves around them to act as little rollers. These dowelswill be mounted between two 2x6 rails. I've decided the best way to mountthem is to emulate a wedged tenon - cut a slot in each end of each dowel anddrive a wedge into it. Any commentary or suggestions on how to make thewedges are welcome. I have a tablesaw, drill press, several hand planes, aJapanese saw, and some chisels in my arsenal.I know some of you will say "glue it like it is, that ought to hold justfine". The problem is the logistics of such a glue-up. Each dowel will have15 little sleeves on it. In order to just glue the ends in place, I'd haveto do it all at once - fitting 374 parts, 54 joints and trying to square an8 foot by 2 foot assembly before the glue sets. No Way! I put the mainframe together, squared and glued it without a hassle. Now I've got toinstall the dowels/sleeves doing it patiently one at a time.I am chronicling my progress on a web page. I've got it through dry fit-upand begun some gluing. Perhaps this will help you see what I'm trying todo. DavisHouston, Texas

Nov 09, 2004 20 Replies

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On Thu, 11 Nov 2004 19:34:50 GMT, "Bob" calmly ranted:

Did you figure in the width of the stock, hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm? ;)

Nah, it'd prolly just maim ya. If it were going up against the wall to begin with, 2 hinges would be in order. That way you can load it at any angle up to 90° from the wall if needed.

I had seen this basic pivoting design in a couple of magazines. The pineywood dovies were my idea, flaunting sanity.

It'd be my pleasure. Coffee, please, if that happens. I'm an ex-drunk (heavy on the EX.) I'm in OR and you're in TX, and many a mile separates us.

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