Sawdust on the Floor

Good Morning. Today I would like to get a couple more things done on the bedroom dresser, that I started building last time.  As you recall the carcass of the dresser is done, the only remaining steps to be completed are the eight drawers and the  6/4 top.  Before I began work on the drawers, I decided to address the trim work that is needed to cover the exposed plywood, and the end grain of the side panels.  I had planned to make and install the trim at this point, however in a moment of total clairvoyance, it became clear to me that the trim had to wait to be installed until after the drawers were made and installed. So I moved on to the  building of the drawers themselves. 

Now on to the fun part of this project, the drawers. Unlike the nightstands, whose drawers will only get limited usage, the drawers of the dresser will be opened and closed several times a day.  Which translates to the joinery in these drawers needing to be stronger than those in the nightstands. Other than a failure of the slide mechanism, the most common failure mode of a drawer is that it simply pulls apart at the joints.  Most joints, even the drawer lock joint I used on the nightstands, rely mainly on the strength of the glue itself, where as the dovetail joint is designed so the parts of the drawer are interlocked and can not pull apart. This is why the dovetail joint was chosen for these drawers. 

The dovetail joint is made of two parts, a tail and a pin. These two parts interlock to create the joint.  Now I have seen professional woodworkers who were capable of hand cutting these joints with a hand dovetail saw and a sharp chisel and I am in Awe of them. Those who can do that are truly artisans in my book.  Me, I rely on my router and a good dovetailing jig. Over the years I have had a couple different dovetail jigs.  And all but my latest one, left a lot to be desired.  With the earlier jigs, I was able to successfully cut two maybe three joints okay, however when I started the forth one something would change and the joint would be off.  Please don’t ask to explain what happen, because to be honest, I don’t know.  Let’s just leave it this way. With the simpler, less expensive jigs, I was not able to produce multiple good dovetail joints. 

Thanks to my wife, I got an early birthday gift this year, of a Leigh Dovetail jig. And everything that has ever been said about the Leigh jig is correct.  There is an awful lot of set up work that needs to be done, but man, when you do all of the set up work, the joint is perfect.  There was a learning curve with the jig, but in all honesty, when I actually read all of the instructions, it was a simple process.  There are separate router bits used to cut the pins and the tails. I was lucky enough to have several routers in my shop so I didn’t have to keep swapping the bits into one router, because the hardest part of the setup is getting the bit height set correctly.  A couple of things I figured out with the Leigh Jig is to plane all of the material that you are going to cut dovetails into at one time.  Any change in thickness will screw up the dovetail joint.  I trust the thickness gauge on my planer, but realize its limitations.  Unless you are constantly cleaning out your planer, sawdust will accumulate on the inside of the planer.  This accumulation can affect the accuracy of the thickness gauge. 

The other is to use a digital micrometer to measure the height of the bits once you have them adjusted correctly. And once you have that number record it someplace where you will remember where you hid it.  Because if, no make that when you have to re do a dovetail joint, it is really nice to be able to duplicate the setting.  I could write a whole posting here on how to set up the Leigh Dovetail jig, but the manual that came with the jig, does a very good job of that. 

I used the dovetail jig to connect the front and the sides of the drawers only.  The back of the drawers was inserted into a dado in the same manner as those in the nightstand.  I used more of the good 1/4″ plywood for the bottoms of the drawers. Glue, clamps and small pin nails were used to secure the back of the drawers to sides, as well as securing the plywood bottom.

Since I had eight identical drawers to build, I batch cut all of the sides, fronts and back panels.  Then I spent a couple of hours creating the dovetails for the front panels and the sides.  Before assembling the drawers, all of the components were sanded.  It’s a lot easier to sand the insides of the drawer before they are assembled.  The dovetail joints were secured with glue only.  It is important to get glue on all of the interlocking portions of the dovetail joint.  I found the best way to do this is to actually paint the glue onto the joint.  Also, be prepared to clean up the glue squeeze out when the dovetail joints are interlocked. I have found that applying painters tape just outside of the glue line helps with the clean out. 

So with only seven more drawers to assemble and clean up, I think this is a good place to stop for now.  Next time we will get the drawers and their slides installed, put a top on this dresser and get it ready for a finish coat

Related posts:

1. Woodworking Project Bedroom Dresser Part 1
2. Woodworking Project – Bedroom Nightstands Part 1
3. Woodworking Project – Bedroom Nightstands Part 2
4. Woodworking Projects – Bedroom Nightstands Part 5
5. Woodworking Project – Bedroom Nightstands Part 3 Resawing Panels