Mortise & Tenon Joinery

Around the holiday events of this week, my work continued on the Child of the Hunter coffee table. After a second squaring-up of the four legs, I laid out pencil lines to locate the mortises for the end rails and side stretchers.

I then cut the eight mortises with a 3/8" diameter cutter on the slot mortiser.

Now we're getting somewhere.

Before I got into cutting tenons, I made sure that I had finalized all of the part orientations within the piece and labeled them accordingly.

Below, I've laid out an offset tenon on one of the end rails. The end rails will be curved, so the tenon will be centered on the rail once the curve is cut. More on that next week.

Then, it was time to cut shoulders on the table saw.

All the tenons are the same size, so the set-ups were simple.

Next, I cut the tenon cheeks and edges. The new Felder bandsaw comes through again.

Here they are, ready for fitting.

After marking the rounded edge of the tenon with a pencil, I cut the shape by hand with a chisel and file, and proceeded to adjust the tenon for a good fit to the mortise.

One down, seven to go.

Finally, a dry-fitting of the stand parts.

Next time, I'll be getting into the shaping of the legs, rails and stretchers. I can't wait!

Hej då!

Craig