Tongue & Groove - Suffered I have

[PeteG]

After a lot of help and advice earlier this week using the Drawer Lock cutter, I've spent the last couple of days setting up the Tongue and Groove cutters.
Through I lot of trial and error and plenty of timber, this morning I thought I had it cracked. I cut all the pieces for the intended drawer, each side
consisting of four lengths of 3" x 1" redwood. Taking each side at a time, I moved them around trying to avoid knots going through the cutters as much
as possible. I wrote "Face Down" on each one, and then wrote "Tongue" or "Groove" on the edges to avoid any mistakes. I began with the "Groove" cutter,
passing each piece through and then changed the cutters over. The first piece I put through the "Tongue" cutter, was the side which had already been through
the "Groove" cutter, so now it had neither a "Tongue" or a "Groove". #-o And as I'd used so much timber on the test cuts I couldn't replace it, so the image
is only showing three sections.
Now, paying a bit more attention, I put the next two pieces through correctly, but as you'll see in the image something went horribly wrong. The leading edges
all line up, but the back end is all out of sorts.

Table set up.



Image on the left shows the leading edge all nicely aligned, and the right hand image shows where the devil was at play :twisted:



Once I've cracked this, and after buying some more timber, I can glue all the sides up and then put them through the drawer lock cutter So any advice on taking up a new hobby, or pointing out my flaws,
would as always, be greatly appreciated

 

[marcros]

I think that your timber is wedge shaped- that is why on the right hand pics the tongue is not centred- that end is thicker than the left hand picture end. I can't quite tell, is the tongue sitting in the groove all the way along- if not it may need jointing before you run it through the router table.

 

[Glynne]

My initial thought is that either your stock is not of an even thickness or that it is bowed and you haven't ensured sufficient sideways pressure when running through your router? If your cutter is at a fixed height and the fence is locked, then if the front of the stock is OK, then it has to be with the dimensions of the stock or the way you are feeding it through.
Don't get too frustrated, a large part of woodworking is being able to work out what went wrong and how you can fix it. Even the professionals make mistakes, their skill is being able to sort it so that only they know there was a mistake in the first place.

 

[marcros]

Or is the timber not quite flat and when you bring the far end through it is lifting slightly as it is cut?

As above. Typed it now!

 

[PeteG]

Hello Marcros and Glynne. The timber is all 3 x 1" planned all round redwood purchased from a local timber yard. The right hand shoulder of the tongue gets shallower towards the end, only the last few inches. Sorry if this is stating the obvious, I'm totally baffled! Perhaps it is the way I'm feeding it through as Glynne said. At one point I made the mistake of adjusting the insert plate and then had to re-adjust the cutter height.

 

[Phil Pascoe]

Don't ever presume that PAR is uniformly thick or square.

 

[marcros]

Or flat

 

[Zeddedhed]

If you've only screwed up this much on a first attempt with something new I wouldn't beat yourself up too much.
I normally need at least three attempts to even get close to a proper result with a new tool/jig.
Having said that it's likely that the guys are right that the timber is wonky - so technically not your fault. This means you get to blame someone else

 

[Phil Pascoe]

Or flat

Or straight.

 

[PeteG]

Don't ever presume that PAR is uniformly thick or square.

Or flat

Or flat

Or straight.

Have to admit Phil and Marcros, I presumed it would be and I haven't checked and it's only just dawned on me that it's Friday and the timber yard is closed tomorrow.

 

[marcros]

there must be somewhere nearby- even a builders merchant should have something. take a square and a straight edge and pick the best of it.

dont resort to b and q- that stuff will be dreadful, guaranteed!

 

[RobinBHM]

Sadly the beauty of timber, with each piece being unique, is also its frustration!

If you have some digital calipers, checking the distance from the datum face of the timber (the side facing down as fed through the router table) along the board length will tell you where it varies.

Every piece of timber, however apparently straight, can be assumed to be somewhat bowed in its length. It is generally considered good practice to mark the timber so that the face side of the timber is the convex side. This side would then run face down on the router table. Pressure next to the cutter should keep the timber tight to the table along the whole length.

Router tables are often difficult to get very flat it might be worth double checking. I have sometimes cramped my router table so that the centre of the table is a tad proud.

The push stick is a good, safe way of working but it isnt applying any downward pressure, maybe the fingerboard doesnt have enough pressure to overcome any spring in the timber.

I hope it works next time

 

[deema]

Tricky stuff wood. You have to keep a close eye on it. Turn your back for a few minutes and it will twist and turn.

After selecting your wood, place it in a flat surface with sticking under each piece. The sticking should be of the same material, and each stick should be the same width and height to ensure it reflects the flat surface. Allow the wood to 'breath' for a couple of days or as long as possible in the area it will finally reside when finished. Do not store in direct sunlight, near a radiator or any other heat source. Place sticking evenly about every 12".

Use winding sticks to check for straightness and twist in the board. Correct with planes or a planer. Use a gauge to set a thickness and then either use planes or a Thicknesser to get the stuff flat, and of an even thickness. In between working on the wood, I clamp the flat surfaces together overnight and cover in a cotton dust on some sticking. The cover helps to keep the temperature / moisture level even around the wood. Never cover with plastic.

It's tempting to buy PAR, but In reality, for any joinery, you will need to flatten it and square up the edges. It's cheaper to buy rough sawn, and about the same amount of effort to get it into useable stock. PAR is produced normally on either a 4 or six cutter, the machine planes all 4 edges together, however there is no surface table off which the machine runs to get one side flat to begin with. The machining just follows the straightness of the wood which has been rough sawn. So, apart from looking nice, it's fairly useless for any joinery.

 

[PeteG]

Gentlemen, I can't thank you enough for all your comments/advice. I checked a few pieces of stock this morning with mixed results! Some were a little bowed when face down and/or edge down, a couple were also slightly twisted. I've spent the entire week in the shed and had hoped by now to have had the one drawer complete and in place, and if I had made it from ply and pocket holes as I've done with the other four, my bench would be complete. Deciding to use PAR, tongue and groove, and corner lock joints has been a learning curve but a valuable one. I've questioned my technique and my abilities, and I took buying PAR for granted. Moving on.

Whilst I was at it, I also checked the router table. Removing the cutter and fence I clamped a spirit level across the top so I could adjust the grub screws on the insert plate, double checking that to was set correctly. I re-set the cutter/fence, checked the featherboard and ran another piece of timber through which came out exactly the same as the ones from yesterday. Not giving up, I ran a second piece through which now had the reverse problem, the leading edge was out but the following edge was fine. This is more down to technique me thinks, not passing the timber through correctly with even pressure. I then decided to check the insert plate again, and noticed it's sagged/bent a couple of millimeters under the weight of the router. With this in mind, a passed another piece through keeping the pressure over the timber which is flat against the table not the insert plate, and as it passed through and over the insert plate applying the pressure again but relaxing it at the back as it passed over the insert plate. Result, a nice almost perfect fit tongue and groove.

So after a week of poor fitting joints, lots of wasted timber, some valuable lessons, I need a new insert plate. The table is this little fettler from Axminster with the big Triton router fitted, the insert plate is 6mm phenolic. No point buying the same plate again so the only one alternative as I see it, is buying the UJK 6mm aluminum one. Only thing is, I really don't fancy the idea of drilling holes for the screws and the winder handle in £50.00 quids worth of alloy! I'm tempted just to replace the top with some 30mm MDF or source a kitchen work top cut off, have the router fixed directly to that, and have a hole large enough for my largest cutter.
Does that make sense?

 

[Sgian Dubh]

It is generally considered good practice to mark the timber so that the face side of the timber is the convex side.

Are you sure? Who taught you to do that? I wouldn't put a face mark on the face of a piece of timber that isn't flat because flatness is what a face mark indicates. Nor would I put an edge mark on an edge that's similarly not straight, nor square to the board's face. Face side and face edge marks aren't very helpful if they're put on faces and edges neither of which is flat or true. In fact, incorrectly allocated face and edge marks can be a menace because in larger manufacturing businesses, where machining operations and joinery or making operations are carried out by different people in different places, the joiner/ maker will assume the wood machinist has done the job correctly and marks applied to the wood by the wood machinist can be relied upon to convey specific and accurate information. Slainte.

 

[Phil Pascoe]

Pete - your problem there is that now you have the potential length of the cutter minus 6mm, and with the 30mm top you'll have the length minus 30mm - which in many cases isn't going to leave you much cutter.

I confess to sometimes marking the "least worst" side and edge when doing very rough and ready joinery, just so I know which ones I've gauged or measured from, but make sure I use non standard marks so that if I pick the pieces up at a later date I don't presume them to be accurate.

 

[PeteG]

Pete - your problem there is that now you have the potential length of the cutter minus 6mm, and with the 30mm top you'll have the length minus 30mm - which in many cases isn't going to leave you much cutter.

I confess to sometimes marking the "least worst" side and edge when doing very rough and ready joinery, just so I know which ones I've gauged or measured from, but make sure I use non standard marks so that if I pick the pieces up at a later date I don't presume them to be accurate.

Cheers Phil So you reckon I'm best of getting the 6mm UJK alloy insert plate? Without it sounding to daft a question, will the 6mm alloy insert be OK for my router? Or should I buy the 10mm phenolic and increase the depth of the table top?

 

[Phil Pascoe]

I'll leave that one for someone with more experience of router tables to answer.

 

[ColeyS1]

The pictures in the first post look so good im not sure if it's a stock photo or you're just a really good photographer ! The hold downs dont look like they are under any pressure. They should be forcing the timber onto the bed where as the gaps between each finger would suggest its only just touching the timber. Have the hold down so it creates a little resistance pushing the timber through that way it should push any bowed timber onto the bed. The first finger gap on the left would be better nearly touching the bit that's got the knob

Or the fingers should look uncomfortable and slightly bowed

 

[PeteG]

Appreciated Coley, have never been sure how much pressure to apply using the featherboard, or if I should have a second one for the work piece coming off?
Work has now ground to a holt with the router whilst I decide what to do about the insert plate.

I'm glad you like the images I'm a self employed currently unemployed product photographer who wishes he'd spent his redundancy money on a bandsaw
and planer/thicknesser instead of studio lighting which is all over the living room. Although if I don't get any work soon, I'll happily sell all spending the day and
proceeds in Axminster or some other den of temptation.

The first couple of shots were taken with a couple of off camera strobes on lighting stands with a slave attached to the camera and a piece of white contiplas
used as a fill in reflector. A very simple set up really which can be purchased quite cheaply from Amazon. I'll find the links if your interested?