Using the Festool Domino with narrow stock

[Cary Swoveland]

I've written a paper that addresses the problems of using the Domino with narrow stock. I've posted a draft of the paper over at the Festool Owners Group" (FOG) website. To find the paper, go to the "gallery" section, then navigate to "Enhanced Festool Gallery" and then to "Domino".

I've started a thread in the FOG's main forum where I've requested suggestions for corrections and improvements to the paper. I hope Creekers will find the information in the paper useful, and contribute suggestions in the FOG thread.

What I've done is make the set of spacers shown in the picture below:

Photo 1 Spacers ed.jpg Photo 2 Preparing to cut with th 13mm spacer in place ed1.jpg

I then constructed tables that show which spacer to use for various combinations of type of joint, stock width, whether one or two domino are used and the size of the domino.

Cary

[Justin Bukoski]

Cary,

Isn't this what the trim stop from Festool is for?

[James Phillips]

Cary,

Isn't this what the trim stop from Festool is for?

That is what I was thinking

[Mitchell Andrus]

Hanging a spacer on the pin is a cool idea, but holy cow, I don't work in a machine shop building rocket engines. I make one cut tight to the tenon's size, the other the next size up and the wiggle room lets the joint line up perfectly. If it's a high-stress joint then there's a need for more than one tenon which makes some room for adjustment upon assembly almost a requirement.

[Cary Swoveland]

Cary,

Isn't this what the trim stop from Festool is for?

Justin, the trim stop is helpful for holding narrow boards, but it has limitations. Consider, for example, using a domino to join a narrow (horizontal) rail (say, 1-1/2" wide) with a (vertical) stile, where the rail butts into the stile and the outside edge of the rail is flush with the end of the stile (i.e. forming a corner). It would be nice to be able to register one of the Domino's pins on the end of the stile and outside edge of the rail, but the distance from the pin to the centre of the cutter is too great to be able to do that--the cutter would cut through the inside edge of the rail.

What you could do is mark the centreline of the mortise on both boards and use the trim stop to hold the rail when you cut its mortise. Because there is no registration available for both cuts, you would have to adjust the Domino to provide a little sideways wiggle-room in one of the mortises, and then align the joint manually.

If you were to instead use a spacer, you would have a registration surface on both boards, so you could cut a tight mortise in both boards. That would be faster too, as you would not have to mark the centerlines, or install and adjust the trim stop.

I can think of only a couple of situations where the trim stop provides registration for both boards being joined. In both cases the boards must be the same width. One is joining boards end-to-end, the other is joining the end of one board to the face of the second (at the edge of the latter). (For the latter, to cut into the face grain, the board would be placed vertically into the trim stop.) For these joints to be accurate, the boards would have to be centred precisely in the trim stop.

Note that the trim stop cannot be used for mitre joints.

I find that I can hold narrow boards securely when one face of the stock is pressed against the Domino's fence and another abuts a spacer. That is, I don't really don't need the trim stop for holding material in place. (The stock does need to be clamped down, of course.)

Cary

[john tomljenovic]

I like your idea cary. much quicker in use than the trim stop, which I never use. and much better then the scrap piece of wood I usually use between the pin and workpiece, when wanting to get a domino closer to the edge of the wood.

[Per Swenson]

I must be some Kinda hack.

Cary, that system is great but you know what I do?

Very sharp #2 Ticonderoga.

Make a mark, clamp the piece.... and as that phony redneck sez...

Git er done.

Per

[Hank Wangford]

Justin, the trim stop is helpful for holding narrow boards, but it has limitations. Consider, for example, using a festool domino to join a narrow (horizontal) rail (say, 1-1/2" wide) with a (vertical) stile, where the rail butts into the stile and the outside edge of the rail is flush with the end of the stile (i.e. forming a corner). It would be nice to be able to register one of the Domino's pins on the end of the stile and outside edge of the rail, but the distance from the pin to the centre of the cutter is too great to be able to do that--the cutter would cut through the inside edge of the rail.

What you could do is mark the centreline of the mortise on both boards and use the trim stop to hold the rail when you cut its mortise. Because there is no registration available for both cuts, you would have to adjust the Domino to provide a little sideways wiggle-room in one of the mortises, and then align the joint manually.

If you were to instead use a spacer, you would have a registration surface on both boards, so you could cut a tight mortise in both boards. That would be faster too, as you would not have to mark the centerlines, or install and adjust the trim stop.

I can think of only a couple of situations where the trim stop provides registration for both boards being joined. In both cases the boards must be the same width. One is joining boards end-to-end, the other is joining the end of one board to the face of the second (at the edge of the latter). (For the latter, to cut into the face grain, the board would be placed vertically into the trim stop.) For these joints to be accurate, the boards would have to be centred precisely in the trim stop.

Note that the trim stop cannot be used for mitre joints.

I find that I can hold narrow boards securely when one face of the stock is pressed against the Domino's fence and another abuts a spacer. That is, I don't really don't need the trim stop for holding material in place. (The stock does need to be clamped down, of course.)

Cary

Good info.
Thanks.

[johnny means]

The biggest problem with this system is these stupid black tabs most of us will be stuck with. Pinned dominoes are like automatic assault weapons or ivory, if you didn't get it a while ago you never will.