Monday, October 19, 2009

Domino Butt-Joint to a line

This is a post I made on The Woodwhisperer Community forum about how to butt-joint a member into the middle of another with a Domino joiner.  Normally you use registration surfaces to create Domino'd joints, but here you have a line.  Voilà the post:

When you have the Domino standing up on a board, the tenon's centerline will be 10mm up from the bottom edge of the Domino. Note that this is to the centerline so it does not matter which size Domino tenon you are using (4, 5, 6, 8, or 10).

Here's a walk-through:

Voilà, two boards to butt joint:


The line on the wide board represents where the reference edge on the narrow board will line up.

Next, set the Domino on that line and line up the mark on the bottom of the unit to the tenon's position.
 
Notice how the centerline of the tenon is 10mm up from the reference line. This is constant since there is no adjustment for it.

 
Now, you'll need the mortise centered 10mm down from the reference surface of the second board to join. Since this other board uses the 90-degree fence, set it to center the mortise 10mm down from the fence; since the gauge on the side centers the mortise on a thickness, you set the gauge at 20mm to put the mortise 10mm down from the fence.

 
Mortise the end of the narrow board using the 90-degree fence like you are used to.

 
Voilà:

 
One other important point: when you adjust the height of the 90-degree fence, adjust it with the fence in the upright position. If it is tilted down 90-degrees when you set it, I've noticed that the fence may lock tilted. With the fence up during the adjustment, I can't get it to lock tilted when trying.

2 comments: