bread board attatchment

So I'm building a farm house table for a customer and I'm doing a bread board look. Looking for the best way to attach them up as it will be a long grain to end grain glueing surface. I bought a dowel jig from Lee Valley with the intention of using dowels to increase my glue surface. I'm just a little worried that dowel may not be strong enough. Looking for either reassurance, if the dowels are an ok way to go, or another way to go. I could borrow a biscuit joiner if that would be better but I'd prefer to use the dowels if they will work. Thanks for the input.

Dowels aren't a good idea. The main part of the table top is going to expand and contract seasonally across the grain. The breadboard ends' length is not going to change. Doweling them together doesn't let them slide past each other. What you need is a sliding joint. The most-common approach is several long tenons coming out of the main boards, with mortises in the breadboard ends. The mortises are wider than the tenon, so they can slide past each other. The middle tenon is glued or pegged firmly in place. Sometimes the outer tenons are pegged too, but the hole through the tenon is ovalled out so the joint is still able to slide.

Breadboards require a groove, extended tongues from your end grain boards into mortises, with dowel pins through top, extending into elongated holes on far tongues to allow for wood movement. This is not terribly complex, but requires precision milling and draw-boring methodology on the retainer dowel pins as well. Anything less is a recipe for failure.
The only glue would be on the centering tongue, and a wee bit to hold the other pins from dropping out.

Your client needs to know the breadboard end will fluctuate in it's extension from the sides of the table. I've made several, and also had clients who did not understand this express disgust with this style after owning one, as they interpret this as a defect when breadboard is not flush with center field of lumber as the seasonal movement takes place. Far too complex/time consuming to fully explain in a simple post.

A few dowels and a good slathering of glue are not recommended.

Or, you could dispense with all the fuss and lay up a veneer pattern over particle/mdf core, which is how 98% of factory tables with this look are made.

Wish I could be more helpful - maybe someone else has the time and drawings available to share. FWW archive more than likely has an article or two, if you happen to have a copy or online access.

A sliding dovetail joint, pinned in the center of the table would be the best joint for this application. You can use dowels as mentioned by Jeff, however I would suggest a slightly different approach if you decide to use dowels. Make, your end pieces with the groove to fit the tongue on the main part of the table top. Put your end cap in place, then drill five holes for the dowels, with one centered on the end cap and the others paced out each side of center. Then remove the end cap and make all the dowel holes in the tongue of the table top into slots, leaving the hole in the center as a round hole. The slots near the outside edges of the table top should be longer than the ones toward the middle. Be sure to slot them parallel to the table top edge, both ways from the hole center as you may not know the exact moisture content of your wood and your shop. Then put your end cap back on your table top and glue in the dowels. Make sure you don't fill the slots you made with glue and only apply glue to the center inch or two of the tongue when you assemble the table. This will allow the table field to move and keep the end cap tight and centered.

Sliding dovetail? I think not!

Use draw bore pins, fix the middle pin, slots cut in tenons for the rest.

Attachment 472455

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Robert Engel

Sliding dovetail? I think not!

Use draw bore pins, fix the middle pin, slots cut in tenons for the rest.

Attachment 472455

---

Roberts has always been our approach. Blind dowel holes from the bottom (unless you want to see the dowels from the top). Fixed center, elongated holes outbound. BE AWARE to tell your customer that the breadboard ends and the top will NEVER remain flush on the width. Winter, the field of the table will shrink and the breadboard ends will be proud of the edges, and summer the field will grow and either be flush or wider than the breadboard ends. At some apex of the seasons, the sun, the moon, conjunction of planets, for a very brief moment in time, the breadboard and the field will be the EXACT SAME WIDTH.. and its for that moment in time only.

If you dont make them aware of this they will undoubtedly come back and say the breadboard ends need to be trimmed, or have shrunk, or the field needs to be trimmed...

Its simply an inevitable end result of this construction.

Thanks for all the replies. I obviously did not think about wood movement but that does make total sense. I watched some you tube videos and I guess I'm going to go with some draw-bore mortise and tenons. Thanks again.

+1 for the drawbore pins. As for the top and the breadboard not staying flush, you can leave the breadboard 1/8 - 3/16 proud of the edge of the top on each end. If you round the corners of the breadboard, it looks nice and you never have a problem with flushness.