Can you spot the boo-boo?

No? Well here is a close up.

Derek Cohen (in Perth, Australia)

>Zooming in ....]

Derek

Re: No? Well here is a close up.

William Duffield, on the Cohansey

>Well I still don't see it, and I studied both photos in detail. Maybe you are a master of disguise, or maybe you have decided that putting an even number of tails in the side of a drawer is aesthetically inexcusible, or maybe when you close the two drawers shown, you see a suggestive picture formed by the figure of the two drawers?

For the as yet incomplete top drawers, you seem to have chosen pretty fancy looking wood for the drawer backs, and maybe a bit thicker than needed. At least I assume that is the end of a drawer back showing, with its through dovetails. It's a little difficult to tell for sure, since I can't see both ends of all four boards that will make up one of those drawers in the photo.

How about some more clues?

A couple of clues ..

Derek Cohen (in Perth, Australia)

>William

The number of tails is as planned: 3 for the top two rows, 4 for the next two rows, and 5 for the bottom two rows. So that is not "it".

The timber is pine - nothing fancy.

The error is indeed difficult to recognise (so I shall not be changing it unless I am told it will be too weak - see, there is another clue!).

I am always on my guard for this type of error - I obviously had visual spatial difficulties as a child! (Another clue!!)

Regards from Perth

Derek :)

Re: Can you spot the boo-boo?

Alan Bierbaum

>Tradition is to put the tails on drawer sides. If this is a glue test; you are right on track.

The project is looking good, and with modern glues, will probably outlive you.

Re: Can you spot the boo-boo?

Derek Cohen (in Perth, Australia)

>Alan,

The tails ARE on the drawer sides!

Derek

Re: Can you spot the boo-boo?

GolfSteve in Calgary

>Usually the tails are much larger than the pins on a dovetail joint. Making small tails makes the tails weak during assembly.

I caught this right away because I made a similar mistake on my first dovetail project. I knew something didn't really look right, but it wasn't until weeks or months after the box was finished that I realized what was wrong.

You got it !

Derek Cohen (in Perth, Australia)

>I really don't know how this happened. I got into a zone and cut all the dovetails over two weekends. Through dovetails on the rear, Half-blind on the front. 120 dovetails in all. And today I began to assemble them. I thought something was odd. I caught it after the second drawer. I had made the tails as narrow as I had planned to make the pins, and vice versa!

Will it be stong enough?

Regards from Perth

Derek

shouldn't you be asleep?

GolfSteve in Calgary

>Well, the box I made hasn't fallen apart, but that's hardly a tough service.

It seems like small tails would make for a weaker joint (it's easier to break off a small tail than a small pin), but I have no idea how to quantify this.

Watching the Wallabies beat England at Twickenham!

Derek Cohen (in Perth, Australia)

>At rugby, of course.

Derek

Re: narrow tails

Moses Yoder in White Pigeon, MI

>They are plenty big enough. Take a piece of wood, cut a tail in it, and try to pull it off. Traditionally, the tails would be bigger because the only actual holding power in the pin is the wood that is caught in the angle behind the tail. Thus, a wider pin does not add any strength to the joint, but a wider tail does to an extent. Your chest looks fine, there is really nothing wrong with it other than a slight break with tradition in tail layout which would not even be noticed by 99% of woodworkers, and the general public wouldn't know what you were talking about if you tried to explain the problem.

Re: No? Well here is a close up.

Darrin

>Hmmmm, I never would have guessed on the tails and pins, I thought you meant the second drawer has no bottom.

Darrin

Does weaken the joint Derek

Andrew F in Australia

>What you've got there now is a drawer side effectively dowelled to the drawer front.

Time will tell if it's strong enough.

Cheers,

Andrew

Re: Does weaken the joint Derek

Derek Cohen (in Perth, Australia)

>Hi Andrew

That was my first thought as well. But then I considered that the reason dowels are weak is that they come loose as thet rely on end grain to long grain glue-ups. At least these are one piece with a dovetail connection. I wish I had caught them at the start. But now the deed is done and I'll leave it to my son to test them to the limit. I'll report back in a few years. Watch this space! :)

Regards from Perth

Derek

Re: Watching the Wallabies beat England at Twicken

Sgian Dubh

>Well, I watched the rugby too, and my lot were dire and got humped by the Springboks. France too were creamed by the All Blacks.

On to your boo-boo, aka a 'calculatory anomoly', or more prosaically, a FU (surely no full spelling out needed for anyone?) I spotted pretty quickly when I opened your image a few minutes ago this Sunday pm that you'd followed the ancient Egyptian style of dovetailing--- narrow tails, wide pins, so there's plenty of precedent. That can be your story if it suits you and you'll be able stick to it firmly, ha, ha.

The convention of wide tails, narrow pins is quite modern. By that I mean this has been the 'normal' configuration for the last few hundred years in western culture.

Oddly enough this point is relevant to the design thread started by Lee Grindinger which is ongoing in the main forum. Slainte.