Thread: Fancy Furniture Joints

Looks like they're all going to be dowel and mortise and tenon joints. I don't think anybody will be giggling and hopefully you'll do such a good job that no commiserating will be necessary either.

Good luck with it!

Cheers,
David

I reckon they would be a good project for an intermediate woodworker or advanced beginner. Rather than dowels, I'd suggest floating tenons or dominos (same thing, really).
While there's nothing terribly complicated, you will need to work accurately. Do that, and I reckon you'll come up with a good result.
Scandinavian modern design, while 50+ years old, still looks good when done well.

Thanks for the help guys. I really thought they'd be some cleverly obscure joint that would take me 300 times to get right. Hopefully it'll all come together relatively easily. Either way, I'll let you know how I go.

thanks again!

Just Google loose tenon joinery. There's a reasonable amount of information on the forum including a recent thread on vertical and horizontal jigs - Router or Drill Press with Moritising Bit for making mortises?

Well worth your while building one!

Actually, chair one would be a relatively easy build for a less experienced woodworker. That's because there are minimal alignment issues. The profiling is done after the pieces are joined. There is tolerance to small misalignments as these are cut away as you shape and smooth to the final profiles. You could use a sureform and sandpaper if you have limited tools and abundant patience.

The best way for a beginner to get a good result is to turn critical measures into non-critical ones. This design does that admirably.

If you cant do floating tenon - don't worry - dowels will work just as well. There are numerous articles on the web comparing the different joining technologies and one thing which is consistent is that when you get down to that stock thickness the thing which breaks is the timber around the fixing (dowel, domino, tenon etc) , very rarely the fixing itself. Woodworkers are want to choose the fixing which they think is strongest, but actually the best solution is the one which leaves the maximum amount of timber around the fixing (ie the one which preserves the maximum strength in the stock). Dowels.

cheers
Arron

"Scandinavian" style furniture is where I began my serious woodworking, Wolfie. I thought the simpler lines would make it easier, and they do, to some extent, but need to be done well to get the desired effects. The chairs you are contemplating will need a few "intermediate" skills as already pointed out, but as also pointed out, simple care & accuracy will be the real key to success. Choice of wood will help, too - don't go for something that is difficult to work with, choose something that is nice to saw & plane and rasp (looks like quite a bit of rasping/spokeshaving/sanding needed on some of those components!). Black bean was often used on locally made furniture of this type back in the day, as a 'Teak substitute'. It's not a bad wood to work with hand tools, but the dust is a very potent sensitiser, and can do nasty things to your respiratory system, so very careful dust-control is advisable! Qld Maple would be good if you can get it..

I have a personal detestation of dowels, particularly for highly stressed joints on chairs, and would much rather use mortise & tenon, myself. You need many dowels to equal the side-grain to side-grain area of a decent tenon, which is where joint-strength comes from. Making the joints with machines of one type or another would be smart if you were going to produce a dozen or more, but for one or two chairs, you'd almost certainly be quicker using all hand methods than spending hours making jigs. IMO, you could better use the time practicing a few hand-cut M&Ts. Hand skills are more versatile, and of more use to anyone making only one or two examples of any one piece. Those angled joints might look a bit intimidating, but the frames appear to be square, so you should only require sloped shoulders for the tenons, no angled tenons as needed on wedge-shaped chairs.

I always lay out & cut all the joins on squared-up stock, wherever possible, then have a good think about the shaping before assembling. It's often easier to part-shape individual parts, then just fair-in the joins and do the final cleaning up after glue-up. The joints will need to be accurately made, to allow for the shaping. 'Cheap' tricks like under-cutting the shoulders to get tight lines will let you down when you start rasping away the corners. The best way to get tight shoulders with hand tools is to saw close to your (accurately-scribed) lines then chop down vertically with a very sharp, wide chisel, using the scribe lines to register the chisel. With a bit of practice, you can make water-tight joins every time....

Derek Cohen's build of the "Wegner Chair" is a good example of making a one-off Scandinavian style piece. He set out to try & duplicate all the machine-made joints with hand tools only, which was an interesting challenge. I would've changed the joinery to suit hand tools if I'd been making that chair, but that wasn't the object of the exercise, in his case.

Good luck with your project, & keep us informed as you go.....
Cheers,

And this is why I come to a forum like this. Thank you all!

Just as a matter of interest, would these be the same mortise and tenon/dowel joints?

I could go on for the rest of my life just researching for this project, without actually making anything, and still die a happy man
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Originally Posted by wolfie

Just as a matter of interest, would these be the same mortise and tenon/dowel joints? ....

Wolfie, I suspect these joints are splined, which is a sort of M&T joint, except that the grain of the spline could run at an angle across the grain of the pieces being joined. However, I also suspect these frames might be ply, and so it's quite possible any spline would be mating with grain running in the same direction. It's also possible that if they have used solid wood, and the joints are splined, the splines were cut from wide stock so that their grain direction is perpendicular to the joins (the 'proper' way to do it), and won't come under as much strain as they would if they were just strips ripped from a plank.

You're right, you can defer a job as long as you like through endless research. But the best way to find out what works is to dive in & make mistakes. I find I learn my lessons more thoroughly that way.....

Cheers,

Originally Posted by IanW

I have a personal detestation of dowels, particularly for highly stressed joints on chairs, and would much rather use mortise & tenon, myself. You need many dowels to equal the side-grain to side-grain area of a decent tenon, which is where joint-strength comes from.

I'm with IanW on this. I loathe dowels for highly stressed joints like these, they seem to fail with unacceptable regularity.

I think those chairs are solid wood -- though the frame does look a lot like veneer, it appears as though the mitre joint continues across the inside of the curve.

The joint is probably a fairly long loose tenon

Originally Posted by ian

I think those chairs are solid wood -- though the frame does look a lot like veneer, it appears as though the mitre joint continues across the inside of the curve.....

Yairs, I think they are probably solid, too, I wuz just covering the possibilities....

Originally Posted by ian

....The joint is probably a fairly long loose tenon...

Tenon, spline, I guess it depends on which way the grain runs, what you call it. On a mitred joint like that, you could use a spline, but it would be risky. In such a high-stress spot, I'd be aiming for as much strength as I could get, so a spline with grain running perpendicular to the joint (i.e. a full-width floating tenon) would be my choice if I were making it...

Cheers,

Originally Posted by IanW

Tenon, spline, I guess it depends on which way the grain runs, what you call it. On a mitred joint like that, you could use a spline, but it would be risky. In such a high-stress spot, I'd be aiming for as much strength as I could get, so a spline with grain running perpendicular to the joint (i.e. a full-width floating tenon) would be my choice if I were making it...

Hi Ian

Agree.

a note for other readers

the grain in a spline, or loose tenon, should always run ACROSS the joint so you that the long grain strength reinforces the joint.

the only exception would for something like a small box, where a spline with the grain running parallel to the joint could be acceptable because for a small box, the joint will not really be stressed.

Originally Posted by ian

.......the grain in a spline, or loose tenon, should always run ACROSS the joint so you that the long grain strength reinforces the joint.....

This is indeed received wisdom, but I would suggest it really only applies where you are making a short-ish, stressed joint, i.e. where you would traditionally use M&T joinery. Splines used simply for registration purposes (e.g. when laminating pieces for a table-top) should have the grain running parallel with the grain of the pieces they are embedded in, imo. They are a lot easier to make and won't suffer opposing-grain problems during annual moisture cycles. Using 'cross-grain' splines in this situation would be less logical, to me, particularly as they add little or nothing to joint strength. In fact, as I read early in my woodworking days, a well-made edge to edge joint is purportedly stronger than a splined or biscuited joint. So I don't use splines at all when edge-joining, unless there's a registration problem.....

Cheers,