Domino Help Please

[Jordan Lane]

I am building a an English outdoor bench out of white oak and have a question about what size dominoes to use. I know i need the outdoor dominoes but my question is what size and how many to ensure good strength vs the traditional mortice and tenons that are very large on the plans. I will be joining leg post and rails that are 2 3/4 thick by 2 7/8 the also rails that are 1 7/16 thick by 3 3/4. I have the Domino 700. Can someone recommend the thickness and length of the domino to use for best results. Will 2 do it or should it be 4? Can these be pinned with a dowel or is it necessary. All of the tenons in the plans are 3/4 thick by generally 1 3/4 long of varies heights and pinned with dowels. I have never built anything with the 700 this beefy. I am proficient with the 500. Or should i bite the bullet and stick with the plans? Here is a pic so you can get an idea of the scale. Thank you in advance


Garden Bench.JPG

[glenn bradley]

With all the M&T for the back slats I would just go ahead and do M&T all around. The Domino is a great time saver but, you are not always interested in speed, eh? Once I was rolling on that many M&T joints, switching methods would probably just slow me down ;-)

[Jordan Lane]

the slats aren't an issue they are floating in mortises which seem easy to do .... but i do see your point

[Biff Phillips]

I just have the regular domino.. I am not sure if you have the regular one or the giant one..
In any event, I would use 10 mm dominos.. Those are recommended for 1.5" thick stock.
You say part of it is : 2 3/4 thick by 2 7/8
You can use multiple 10 mm dominos there if you wish.

No point in buying multiple cutters and bags of dominos since your most limiting dimension is a hair under 1.5 inches thick.

[Chris Padilla]

With the 700, you can do as large as a 14 mm (x 28 mm). For outdoors, you'll want the SIPO stuff. The lengths you can get vary.

As to your question, I'd probably try to mimic what the plans call for but not freak if you can't nail it. It'll all be plenty strong. Use TB-III for your glue.

[Mike Goetzke]

I have a 700 too and I recently built a crib for my daughter (guess granddaughter) and with all the slats I ended up machining around 200 mortises. I made my own trim stop for the 1/2" thick slats and used the Seneca Domiplate. Machined all the mortises in no time at all.

Good luck with the project!

Mike