getting ready to cut motises in the shaker end table

[gardnesd]

What to do. Can I hog out some of the waste with a hand drill? What would you do?

[Bob Lang]

Sure, drill out most of the waste with an undersized drill bit and pare the sides down with a chisel. Assuming you have a chisel.

Bob Lang

[gardnesd]

Sure, drill out most of the waste with an undersized drill bit and pare the sides down with a chisel. Assuming you have a chisel.

Bob Lang

Wow, I wasn't expecting expert advice. Thanks Bob.

[RenaissanceWW]

The key will be to mark out the mortise clearly. If you are drilling it works well to mark a center line that you can drop the bit into. Then knife the perimeter of the mortise and you can pare down to that line with the chisel. Very fast method actually.

[gardnesd]

So if it's a 3/8 in mortise use the 1/4 bit??

[Pete Bennett]

Standard method is to set your mortice gauge to your chisel, then set the distance in from the edge that you require, mark the two sides of your mortice from the face edge and knife across the ends. If you are going to drill out then mark a centre line with the gauge afterwards. Use a drill that is not quite as wide as the mortice. Though with care and practice it's more than possible to drill right up to your gauge marks.

It used to be one of those very stupid things that so called 'Purists' would frown upon if you drilled out the waste first. Their utterly idiotic argument used to be that the ancient 'traditional' Carpenters never used a drill because the correct way was to chop out with a mortice chisel. Excuse my reply but, Bollocks! about sums it up. The reason these ancients didn't use a drill was because their wobbly hand made augers were notorious for wandering. If you attempted to drill a neat straight hole down a three inch mortice, you'd almost certainly have the point dig you in the leg as it burst out the side. Believe me, until a few years ago I had quite a collection of some very, very old boat augers, and they never drilled more than an inch or two without wandering.

Infact, until three years ago I did all my drilling with a brace and bit and various twist drills and augers. Most of which I still posses. These days I have a mortice machine. But go ahead and drill out as much waste as you can safely remove before cleaning out the mortice with a sharp chisel. If you have corner chisels of the right size it'll be even better. when using your drill you may want to place a depth stop on it so you can get an even depth to your mortice. It'll definitely help when you come to clean it out with your chisels. And remember only a mallet and please don't go bashing delicate bevel edged or paring chisels with it. If you haven't got a set of mortice chisels either borrow some or go buy 'em.

Pete

[thewoodwhisperer]

Wow, I wasn't expecting expert advice. Thanks Bob.

Haha, get used to it. We are actually lucky to have quite a few folks on this board that I would absolutely consider experts.

[gardnesd]

Maybe the Cherry I ordered from Bell Forest is flimsy. I was able to hog out most of the waste with a cordless drill and a 3/8 forstner. I didn't need the mallet that I had on hand and I don't own and don't know anyone who owns mortising chisels. I was able to pare the rest out by hand without a mallet and it was an quite an enjoyable excercise.

Tomorrow: make the tapering jig for the talbesaw.

[thewoodwhisperer]

Cherry works rather easily. Its a great wood to test some hand tool skills on. And it sounds like you are well on you way! Keep us posted.

[harmsdph]

if you have a doweling jig you can use it to keep the hand drill straight.

[gardnesd]

if you have a doweling jig you can use it to keep the hand drill straight.

OOOOOhhh? I do have a HF one i might try next time.

[gardnesd]

OOOOOhhh? I do have a HF one i might try next time.

Tapering is done. Legs are done except for dovetail mortise.

Mark, in the video you hogged out the mortises at a little less than 3/8. Did you go back later and take them to 3/8 or did you shorten your tenons? Perhaps you cover that in a later video.

[thewoodwhisperer]

If I recall correctly, i just trimmed my tenons accordingly.

[gardnesd]

Tried to "sneak up" on some tenons today. They saw me coming. Scared the sh&^ out of 'em. By the third one i got the hang of it. NOw i have two loosish joints and no more wood. Should i use a special glue on those joints???

[thewoodwhisperer]

Well you can always re-do the tenon by glueing on some scrap and planing it back down to the appropriate size. Otherwise, you'll want to use something gap filling like epoxy. Not the best solution for a loose joint but it will work.

[Sac]

I actually had to fix some loose tenons today. I took a piece of scrap to the bandsaw and started to resaw it. I was just cutting a thin strip about 1/16". Then I cut it off and used a utility knife to trim to rough size. Brushed a little glue on one side and glued it to the tenon. I let it sit for just a bit and used a block plane to clean it up. worked perfectly. If you don't have a band saw, you can use your table saw. Good luck.

[gardnesd]

I actually had to fix some loose tenons today. I took a piece of scrap to the bandsaw and started to resaw it. I was just cutting a thin strip about 1/16". Then I cut it off and used a utility knife to trim to rough size. Brushed a little glue on one side and glued it to the tenon. I let it sit for just a bit and used a block plane to clean it up. worked perfectly. If you don't have a band saw, you can use your table saw. Good luck.

I think I'll try this.