At the start of this week, I started building a dovetailed coffee table, which ironically I've put to one side to start a built-in wardrobe project.

Although I've touch on dovetails in the past, on blogs and videos (sometimes in great detail), I thought it would be good to go over some tips, and my thought process.

The below statements are my own, and not the be all, end all. This may be of help to people just beginning their dovetail journey, or for people looking for a different approach.

This is simply how I like to cut dovetails, and what works for me, so please take this with a grain of salt!

Just to state the obvious, if you don't have a dedicated dovetail saw, get one! Yes this will make a difference, and you will see it plain as day!

Carry out the cutting of the dovetails in a well lit area, preferably natural light. Again very obvious, but will make a difference if your eyes aren't the best.

When cutting the first portion of the joint (in my case tails first), staying on the line of the 70-80° angle of the dovetail isn't of great importance, other than esthetically.

What is important, is the 90° angle on the end grain. The closser you get to 90° the better your results will be.

The same can not be said about the pin portion, which requires both angles to be spot on, or as close as you can. Again the closer you follow the angles, the better the result you'll get.

Something else that I've seen a lot of in the past, is when people have marked out for the pins, using the tails portion, they cut exactly on the pencil line. 

If you cut on the pencil line, you will end up with gaps in the joint, this is because you traced the shape of the tail on its outer edge. 

This is easily resolved by simply leaving the pencil line on. What i like to do, is to just kiss the line, but after its cut i can still see the pencil line. My goal is to always get the dovetails to snuggly fit, straight off the saw. Sometimes I achieve this, and other times i have to pair down with a chisel.

Finally, make sure your pencil has a sharp pointed tip all the way through the tracing of the pins, not just at the start. This will allow you to get right into the corners, giving you accurate layout. It may also benefit you to reshape your pencil thinner to allow better access to the corners.

While the above isn't an extensive list, it will most definitely help, or give you extra options to try, depending on your skill level.

Wood porn

Today's visual candy is brought to you by sojoonghan, a very talented woodwork, who's attention to detail is very noticeable in his work. 

Check out his Instagram to see some amazing work holding, and practices.

What impressed me

The above is a tiny sliding kumiko box. What's impressive, is that unless you do, or have worked on small projects like this, you won't appreciate how hard, patience testing, and time consuming these little projects can be.

Go check out his other tiny master pieces on instagram.

Woodwork ponder

How many piece's of furniture have out lived there maker's, and continue to stand the test of time?

Podcast

In case you missed it, the podcast is available to those who are interested.

You can listen on Spotify here, and Apple Podcasts  here.

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Thats it for this one guys, see you next week!

Regards 

David