Dovetailing quartersawn to flatsawn, will it break?

[Roger Marty]

I'm making drawers with sides out of flatsawn maple. About 7" high. I would like to use quartersawn oak drawer fronts since I like the grain pattern. Half-blind dovetail joint. I've already made one as pictured.

But now I'm fretting about wood movement since I have a flatsawn maple side piece joined to a quartersawn front piece.

I calculated that the flatsawn piece might have seasonal movement about 1/32" to 1/64" more than the quartersawn piece along the 7" width. What do you think the chances of joint breakage are??

Most others online have said "it is fine", but my local woodworking instructor suggests something will give.


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[Brian Tymchak]

But now I'm fretting about wood movement since I have a flatsawn maple side piece joined to a quartersawn front piece.

I calculated that the flatsawn piece might have seasonal movement about 1/32" to 1/64" more than the quartersawn piece along the 7" width. What do you think the chances of joint breakage are??

Most others online have said "it is fine", but my local woodworking instructor suggests something will give.

Welcome to the Creek Mike!

I'm not a cabinet pro but I'm in the "it's fine" camp assuming your calcs are correct. Unless you glued in the drawer bottom (hopefully you didn't), those boards are wanting to expand in both directions, so your net movement relative to the QS at either edge is likely half of what you calculated. That small amount of movement can, IMHO, be absorbed by slop in joints, flexibility of wood, etc. FWIW, my (store bought) kitchen drawers are rift-sawn RO fronts (~ 6" wide) half-blind dove-tailed to maple-veneer ply sides. No failures in 18 years.

[Jamie Buxton]

I'm in the "it's fine" camp also.
To be really finicky about the answer, the amount of wood movement depends upon the weather at your home. Some parts of the US have bigger swings -- for instance Boston -- and some have much smaller swings -- for instance San Jose. Where are you?

[roger wiegand]

I've never seen such a failure and have made similar joints over many decades (in (near) Boston, no less!). I'd say it's always been fine before, so will probably continue to be fine.

[glenn bradley]

I get what your instructor is talking about but, if well glued and well fitted I am going with the "its fine" group.

[Brian Holcombe]

Consider that mortise and tenon joints are working against one another in a similar fashion and very few of them fail for that reason unless they're excessively tall or excessively deep.

That happens for many reason including wood compression and slack in the joinery. I've done extremely tight dovetails out of dissimilar woods without issue over 5-6" spans.

Panel sized stuff is different, in that case you may want to stronger consider very similar woods, in fact, I try and make panel sized pieces out of the same wood (continuous length cut to become a case, etc) to minimize those issues.