Quick Poll – 1/20 Results
January 20th, 2008 at 7:54
Loading ...Wow! Sharpen your chisels and break out your hand saws! A large number of our readers prefer to cut their dovetails the old-fashioned way.
Posted by Tom,
in Quick Polls
January 20th, 2008 at 9:55 am
Scrollsaw–it’s easy, thin kerf, and as accurate as my lines are.
Verna
January 20th, 2008 at 10:10 am
Why am I not surprised?
For those who don’t know Verna – she is a WHIZ with the scroll saw.
January 21st, 2008 at 4:10 pm
My philosophy is, if God had meant for me to use a router or some mechanical means to cut a dovetail, he’d have invented that FIRST
January 21st, 2008 at 5:20 pm
Well, it must be monday because the moron in me came out in full ‘Dunce’ attire (I submitted the following comments for last weeks pole – sorry Tom).
As for the dovetails -
Honestly it depends on the project. I have a cruddy old Craftsman jig that I haven’t used once in the 10 years I’ve had it.
More often than not, I use a Japanese pull saw, coping saw, and chisels but have tried the whole David Marks ‘Band-saw’ set up with ok results. By ‘ok’ I mean it worked but the table on my saw is really only meant to tilt outward so I had to semi-disasemble the trunions to tilt inward… not the smartest move I have ever made, but it did work.
With that said, I know my self well enough to realize if I had a super cool Leigh jig, I would most likely never cut another pin or tail by hand.
… but I would feel bad about it.
January 21st, 2008 at 5:22 pm
See, I told you – I misspelled ‘Poll’!
January 21st, 2008 at 7:02 pm
I use the Rout-R-Joint by Woodline. It does Hearts, locks, dog bones, bear heads, pen and crescent, lolypops, arrow heads and dovetails among others. Its easy to set up and comes with everything you need including the bits. I never got the hang of the Incra but I love the Incra on my table saw but I think the Jointech is better.
January 21st, 2008 at 7:06 pm
Hey, Pete, if misspelling Poll is the worst you do, you are WAY ahead of the curve!
Recently, with the Keller, I had to recut some pins twice – and almost messed up again – because I had one end of the board pointing in and the other pointing out…
Hey, every day’s a learning experience!
January 22nd, 2008 at 9:52 am
Have not tried dovetails yet but want to soon. most likely will use a hand saw or maybe band-saw.
January 22nd, 2008 at 11:08 am
Ump -
Hey, no sweat. They can be a bit perplexing. There are plenty of resources out there you can use… Router jigs, cutting guides, etc. Plus, I think if you learn how to hand cut those babies, you become better at the process – even if you end up using a router jig.
Good luck! Dovetails are one of those deals that if you get it right, you are DA MAN!
January 23rd, 2008 at 5:18 pm
I tried once with an off-brand jig that’s so off-brand, I don’t think it has a brand on it! My friend gave it to me for nothing just to get rid of it, and I gladly took it off his hands. It may be an okay jig, but I don’t get have a collar bearing so my first try wasn’t really a “real” try.
Let’s just say that I ended up with a burned-black dovetail router bit and joints that looked so awful it was hysterical.
One of these days I’ll give it another try.