construction of barred doors

A lot of cuts in this type of work can be describe using two words. Plan and Ahead. While the representation of these cuts appear nothing short of miraculous, many of them were cut so long before it is necessary to picture them in a joint detail such as these that one can only sit there, slack jawed, and muse on how much these gentleman who built these things spent on nerve specialists. Let's step back a bit.

You are setting up to make a rack of glazed doors, all with the same mullion pattern. You have a cut list for stiles and rails etc. and a cut list for the mullions. There is also a box of patterns. The first thing you do is get somebody else to do all the hand planing. You cut everything to length (allowing for tenons) but not width. There are several shortish boards about 8 " wide and as thick as the width of the mullions. In the box of patterns there are several tacked on to a box jig, perhaps with marks for shoulders, etc. One of them is clearly the one you need to cut a v shaped notch into the end grain of the board for the mullions. You first cut this little notch along the end on the 8" board (with a plane set up for this purpose maybe). Then you move the board to the next jig and cut the shoulders for this tiny little mullion. Now with all the joinery practically complete, you rip the lengths of mullion stock to size. At this point your cousin comes into the shop and berates you for cutting that fiddly little notch in the end of the tenon because he's told you a hundred times that for all the good it's going to do it might as well be squared off.

That's the news from Williamsburg, Massachusetts
Happy New Year
 
There is one other alternative view. This tenon may have originally been made square. The mortise into which it is fit goes through the mullion into the bed for the glass. The tenon is left long, though produced as previously described, from a block of mullion stock. When the entire frame of the door has been assembled, a short little man with a bushy mustache comes along with a wicked sharp chisel and trims the ends of all these mullions flush with the inside corner of the glass bed. He then shuffles off muttering something about farriers being paid too much while you disassemble the frame. When the mullion is pulled out it has this really cool looking v-notch cut into the end of a tiny little tenon. You say to yourself "I'm bringing this to the pub tonight. This is wicked cool."
 
I just finished making a set of Chippendale doors. The post you referenced was provided by Don McConnell of Clark and Williams when he kindly responded to my post asking for help making these doors. After a long period of study and cogitation I concluded there was no way I could come up with a way to make this notch in the end grain of 1/8" stock with hand tools. I squared off the bar and butt jointed it to the adjacent joined pieces as noted in Mac Campbells article in Taunton's "Traditional Woodworking Techniques". I then reinforced the joint with cloth tape. All done with hide glue. The joint isn't very strong but after the bars are attached to the ribs, it's reasonable.
If anyone knows how to cut the V-notch I'd like to know for my next set of doors.

Careful Fran
Sarcasm of the sort displayed above could result in your membership being revoked

Howard Steier
 
It wasn't intended as sarcasm. I'm just better at writing a story than technical writing. I can get a much clearer message across if I can imagine characters actually doing something rather than try to describe some operation. I thought I did pretty good on this one.
 
Fran has you on the right track, do ALL cross grain work before anything is cut down to final width. Make up another shooting board specifically for this purpose and use a rabbeting plane with a modified cutter set high enough to clear the "bed "of the shooting board so the sole of the plane has something consistent to ride against. I suppose you could make a type of scratch stock to serve the purpose if you don't want to tear down your rabbeting plane. Same idea as coping for doors.
 
I see a rabbet or shoulder plane wedged into a jig that rides on the face of the mullion stock. The same jig, since it gauges off the face of the stock, could be used to ride a scratch block or a shoulder plane that would cut the right angle on the end.
Fran
 
Fran and Mark
Are you talking theory or have either of you succesfully cut a V-notch in the end grain of an !/8" piece of mahogony with the above descrbed techniques?
I can tell you from just having made a set of doors that each rib has to be individually fitted, so cutting V-grooves in a wide piece of 1/8" stock and then ripping all the ribs out is problematic, as they would all end up being the same length. So I believe if one is to use notched ribs each rib would have to be cut to length and then notched.
Has anyone out there made barred doors with V-notched ribs?

Howard Steier
 
Speaking for myself, I am talking theory based on experiences on setting up similar types of processes. Often an apparently complex problem can be resolved satisfactorily, and often more accurately, by a carefully thought out plan. I have solved a few of the issues outlined above by the basic premise of the K.I.S.S. method. Often it is necessary, in order to avoid the problem of actually being careful, to employ a simpler and more thought out approach to fine joinery. Cheating, I guess, is the best way to describe it. I have done quite a bit of mullion work involving curved work. It is impossible to execute this type of joinery with the methods I have described as the form of the curve is created prior to the joinery. But with respect to the perfectly angular, the Hepplewhite breakfront e.g., it is entirely possible to develop a method of standardizing each cut using patterns and jigs which virtually eliminate the need to tweak every joint. The fundamental idea here is to predict the variables that will be encountered and by careful evaluation, eliminate them. That is all.
F
 
If I understand the question correctly - there are two different illustrations in your link, each with a pierce # 2, and I think some respondents have addressed Illustration # 1 - I would pare the V-ee notch working in a series of progressively deeped cuts using a very sharp flat chisel blade and working along the cenerline of the V-ee. I was actually taught this method many years ago in a shop practice class; but cannot recall the application.


Karl
 
I'm not sure I fully follow the inquiry but if "cutting" wasn't successful, I was wondering if the V could be let in with a file of appropriate angle, and touched up with a fine paring chisel as needed. Work both ends until it fits.

The breakfront shown in the journal is inspiring; I hope the ideal method comes forth.
jd
 
Adding to my earlier reply ...

1. When paring out the "back" of a piece of end grain, never fail to clamp a backup piece of stock behind the piece being cut to surpport the grain at the edge and avoid chippiing/breaking out the rear corner.

2. I now recall the application upon which I was taught to use this method; it was the notch on a wood pattern for sandcasting an open end wrench, and also one for a cast box wrench. Not exactly 90-degrees in either case, but the same situation; made even more complex because the pattern needed to have a draft allowance for removing the pattern from the sand, and in the case of the box wrench, obviously planes would not clear the sides of the opening.

Karl
 
I finally just went for it and have now got all the slats in place.  I ended up taking a fine tooth saw (razor saw) and made a slight cut into the endgrain.  Then using the saw kerf as a guide, I pared the angles on the endgrain.  Not perfect but sufficient for the application.  Since the slats are 1/8" wide, there isn't a lot of material to remove.

Thanks for the help

PS:  Does anyone have any references / pics from which I can get some idea how the astragal was fitted to the slats?

Mike
 
I don't have a picture but I'll tell you what I did.
I cut a groove in the bar (astragal) on the table saw. I made a custom push stick that would hold the bar flat to the table and tight against the fence. I cut the groove slightly wider than the 1/8 rib (approx 5/32) by setting the fence off center of the bar by 1/64 (some trial and error) and then running the bar twice down the saw to cut a centered groove.
The reason I cut the groove oversize is that since the set up of the squares and diagonals is unlikely to be perfect, there needs to be some leeway when joining the bars. I cut each bar to length as close as I could and then trimmed them on 45 degree and 22 1/2 degree shooting boards; tedious but ultimately very effective. Cut extra bars; you'll need them.
I did some experimenting with glues for glue up. I ended up using Franklin's cold hide glue. I know that cold hide glue isn't very popular but for this application it was very effective. It was plenty strong, easy to apply, and cleaned up easily. I filled a syringe with glue and squirted the glue into the groove in the bar. I placed a small amount of glue on the end grain (used a small brush) and slipped the bar onto the rib. The cold hide glue is easy to clean up; wet rag when fresh, scrape it off when it's dry. After an overnight set everything was solid.

Howard Steier
 
Thanks Howard,

That is how I made the grooves on the trial pieces I made also.  Good advice about the extra room to help align the pieces.  Does your doors have an "X" brace?  I am a little puzzled on how to make that particular intersection look right.  All the rest seem to be pretty straight forward. 


Mike
 
The doors I made do have crossed bars. The ribs are crossed with a half-lapped joint. Then the bars are laid on the ribs with 45 degree miters where they all meet.
I believe the article I referenced above (Traditional Woodworking Techniques) has pictures.

Howard Steier
 
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