Thread: Suggestion for Table Saw to do Pro Picture Framing

Mr B,
I use dominoes all the time for my frames. The only problem I encountered was that you had to make sure you weren't going to cut through the frame and out the other side. 4mm domi's helped that quite a bit, but there's a couple of ways to handle the problem as well.
1, Make sure you place the mortise where there is enough frame to cover the depth of the mortise
2. Make your own tenons and make your mortises to your required depth and just cut off an appropriate length of tenon. This is much simpler than it sounds. I can run up enough dominoes for several frames in about 15 minutes. If you want I can go into more detail for you in a new thread.

Regards,

Rob

Hi Rob

This moulding is so massive that it'll take maybe even a 6mm domino, carefully placed as you say (especially on the outside of the corner). To give you some idea, the maximum height of the moulding is about 60mm, minimum 25mm, and it is over 100mm wide It only just fit through the guard on our framing saw.....

After reading your post I might just go for the meatiest domino with a shallower plunge depth on the machine, then cut the domino back to the required length.

The 4mm domino comes in very handy. I only bought the extra cutter and dominoes recently, but have found them great for making quick boxes with mitred corners from 18mm material.

One question - do you use the tightest fit setting on the domino for both sides of a frame corner (making it easier to align/clamp since nothing can slide), or is a tight/oversize combo better? By oversize I mean the middle setting; I've only ever found the widest setting useful for making slip tenons !

Cheers

Mr B,

I actually use the 2nd setting on both rails for the joint to allow maximum slip, without making the joint too sloppy.

Regards,

Rob

what did you end up using to join your frame corners? Biscuits?

hi Mr Brush, I am of the belief after reading lots about it in this forum, especially this one here from Ian Smith, that biscuits have as much structural strength as Weetbix. They are really designed to help align joints.

I started a thread here to see if little round hardwood biscuits would be feasible, cut with a plug cutter, so am now thinking to make some 4mm plywood biscuits the size of the small #FF biscuits . I can cut the slot with my old 2inch slotter on the router table and a new 1 1/2 in bearing that I just received from Eagle in the US, not found locally. - the #FF biscuits were designed for this size slot.

The conclusion I have come to is that the Domino and the little floating tenons will be the best result for strengthening a mitre joint in picture frames.

For your large frame, as a suggestion from one who has never seen or used a Domino, I would be making a jig and putting the Domino on a piece of MDF so that the base is fixed in position ( if possible). I would then make a set of rails , so that the frame pieces would slide up the rails to the Domino, exactly at 45 deg to the Domino face. You can test it on pieces of pine cut the the same dimensions as the frame first. Once that setup is satisfactory, you can then do all four corners of the frame consistently and accurately.

hope this helps

Thanks Rob and Jill for the useful suggestions

I won't need to use the domino very often for framing, but just once in a while we get a moulding like this that is just too much of a monster to use V-nails on !

Some customers pick the weirdest (and most expensive ) mouldings.....

Lots of them have no idea what suits the item they want framed.
As long as it is huge, expensive and, preferably, with a lot of gilding
Cheers
Wolffie

Mr Brush,
A question?
Any saw cut is dependant to the blade. So the top line saw, the blade has....
type and number of teeth
speed of blade
thanks
les