The material is ready to go. It has been machined to the correct thickness and cut to length. The first step is making a box. One of the biggest question that many woodworkers ask is what type of joinery to use; that is, how do I connect these two pieces?
There are many options for connecting wood. Some are simple butt joints where the wood is butted up against each other and fastened with a screw or nail. Others include a miter joined with some type of wood reinforcement. Still another could be the box joint where fingers are cut in an opposing way on each piece so that when they are connected, they will fit snugly together. For this project, I have selected one of the most traditional and, as some say, the holy grail of joints—the hand cut dovetail.
I am not going to go into the history of the dovetail nor am I going to tell you step by step how I approach this joint. What I will go through is the experience of dovetailing such a large piece and the thoughts I had as I worked through it. What I have found as a woodworker is that the process of woodworking has many tasks and those tasks have many stages that you work through as you are performing them. As Ingold (2011) discussed regarding sawing a plank, each one of these tasks has the four phases of getting ready, setting out, carrying on, and finishing off but each phase has its own challenges within.
Getting Ready
In the case of dovetailing, getting ready is about ensuring you have the right tools to do the job well. In my case, it has taken me a few years to amass the tools for this task. In my mind, I have tried to use the adage buy your last tool first. This means that you should spend as much as you can on the tools you use so that it does not become money waste. Why by a $50 saw when you will need to replace it in a year with another $50 saw? Instead, purchase a $100 saw once that will never need replacing. Of course, this does not always work but it can in many circumstances.
Once I have all my tools laid out for use, and assuming they are sharp (see blog on sharpening), I can move onto the next step—setting out—which is, incidentally, my favourite of the four phases.
Setting out
Setting out in the dovetailing sense is that time where you plan your work. You are scribing baselines for the saw cuts, you are marking where the tails will go on one piece which will inform where the pins go on the other, and you are setting up the entire look of the joint. It is at this point where you need to be accurate and creative to ensure the joint looks as you want it.
I find this is where the excitement around dovetailing lives for me. It is the first instance where you can see what the finished piece will look like and how it will start to come together. A dovetail joint must be very accurate and has many places where it could fall apart. You could cut off too much and the joint is loose. You may cut off too little and try to force the piece together and it cracks or one of the pins or tails breaks off. The setting out of this joint is so critical to the success but also so defining to the look that it is full of energy and leads to the next phase.
Carrying on
Here is the monotony. Carrying on is where the joints are cut and the waste is chiseled. One by one, tail by tail, pin by pin, the joint is created. This is often where the podcasts enter my shop (my most recent is Crimebeat). During this time, you fall into a rhythm of cutting and chiselling, following the plan you set out. It becomes tedious and there are times you think using a machine would have been easier, but you have decided on this method and now you are committed. Perhaps you misstep and cut the wrong line—then you need to fix it (more on that in a future post). Or, you notice that your tools are getting dull and you need to re-sharpen.
I find this part the hardest to push through. There is not a lot of excitement and there is not much to see happening other than shapes cut out of wood. But it all comes together in finishing off.
Finishing off
This is where all that work pays off. The final fit and finish show the work you have accomplished. In this phase, I am still tweaking and adjusting but it is the place where all the planning and tedious cutting comes together to show your final product. You fit those two pieces of wood together and breathe that sigh of relief that they fit. All your attention to detail and skill have come together to show that you can make something work well. The dovetail is the strongest joint known to woodworkers that provides ample glue surface and a mechanical fit that will not allow the wood to separate. The joint has been used for centuries and has become a mark of craftsmanship for many woodworkers. And it looks freakin’ cool.
References
Ingold, T. (2011). Walking the plank. In Being alive: Essays on movement, knowledge, and description (pp. 51–62). Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge.