Now they used square pegs but I like to use round ones. I made some with my Lie Nielsen dowel plate. I cut some 1/4 x 1/4 cherry stock. Then whittled the end to make a point to start into the plate.
I put the square in a drill and pushed it into the dowel plate. And out come the dowels.
That is one way to make dowels. I like a second way, that is with a block of wood and a blade. I have seen it done with a chisel. I have an old spokeshave blade that is sharp and screwed to the block of wood just over a 1/4 inch hole. The hole is a little wider at the beginning. Again it helps if you pare away a little in the beginning of the rod to get it started in the hole. I put it in an electric drill and push it through the opening. It works like a pencil sharpener. It produces nice smooth dowels.
I made some dowels and cut them to 1 1/2 inch pegs.
I drilled 1/4 inch hole through the tenon to 1 1/4 inch deep. Then I put some glue on one end of the peg and pound it home with a hammer.
After the glue dries I pare off the peg flush and sand it smooth.
Next I start on milling some pine for the drawer sides, back and drawer bottoms. The back and bottom will be 1/2 inch thick and the sides will be a little over 3/8 inch thick.
The sides and back will be 3 3/4 inches high.
The drawer bottoms will have the grain running side to side across the width of the drawer. That way the expansion of the bottom goes to the back, rather than to the sides and make the drawers stick.
The drawer bottoms will be 7 3/4 inches by 16 inches. I need to glue up panels and try to keep them flat with weights.
I rip the sides and backs to the appropriate sizes and pile up the stock to be dovetailed to the fronts.
I start the same way all the time by marking on the inside top of each corner of the drawer, starting on the left front. So the two corners on the drawer front are i and iv on each corner. This is so I can keep track of which piece fits into which dovetail.
Once they are marked, then I use the wheel markers to scribe lines for each of the lengths I need for dovetails. I am going to make 5/8 dovetails in the front, 1/2 inch in the back and 3/8 deep for the sides. Using the wheel markers is real easy.
Once they are scribed, I layout the size of the dovetails. There are many ways to layout dovetails. I do it by guess. I have done this so many times that I kind of know what will work. If I did not know I would use dividers to come up with a consistent size. You do have to decide how many dovetails you want to start with. One this size drawer I usually make 3 or 4 tails. In this case 3 - 3/4 inch tails and 1/4 inch pins make it come out even. I usually start with 3/8 inch pin at the top and 1/2 on the bottom for the groove for the drawer bottom.
After marking the spacings I use a sliding bevel to set the slope. I have it set at 15 degrees. Again this is arbitrary. It looks good to me.
I mark out the tails on the sides and saw them as a pair with the numbers on the inside facing each other.
I saw through the lines on the tails. I leave the lines on the pins. I saw down to the scribe line. Then I chop out the waste with a chisel.
Here is a detailed video of mine on laying out and cutting dovetails.
Cherry Oxbow Chest Hand Cut Drawer Dovetails Step 11
So that is it for now. The next post will continue with cutting the pins in the drawer fronts and fitting the drawers.
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