The Great Morris Chair project

[Dean Karavite]

Tony and Walt, thank you very much for your replies! Please accept my apologies for not responding sooner (it has been a busy week).

Tony's diagram approach is brilliant and so much smarter that what I have been trying to do with text and poorly lit pictures. Plus I have had some time to look it over more carefully. So, my attached overly simplistic and completely out of proportion drawing should help explain my little problem.

The arms are angled about 9.5 degrees. At the back of the front leg ("A") the arm is flush with the tenon cheeks. At the front of the from leg ("B") there is a gap. The diagram is really exaggerating the gap, but it is just under a 1/16th. So, my conclusion is I was just a tad off in cutting the angle on my arms. Given this should I:

1. Clamp the heck out of it to close the gap and hope the glue holds for 20-30 years? (kidding on this one).
2. Pare/chisel the tenon cheeks to a slight angle to compensate and get a flush fit.
3. Scrape/sand/cut/plane the underside of the arm to get a flush fit.

I'm guessing #2 is the best approach, but maybe there is something else? I'm a rookie on anything other than 90 degree angle furniture, so any advice is appreciated.

Thanks again, I really do appreciate your time and thought on this. I'm actually enjoying making this chair and my most valuable lesson so far is to calmly walk away and think out problems (or post online and have others think out problems for you).

[Tony Parent]

The arms are angled about 9.5 degrees. At the back of the front leg ("A") the arm is flush with the tenon cheeks. At the front of the from leg ("B") there is a gap. The diagram is really exaggerating the gap, but it is just under a 1/16th. So, my conclusion is I was just a tad off in cutting the angle on my arms. Given this should I:

1. Clamp the heck out of it to close the gap and hope the glue holds for 20-30 years? (kidding on this one).

I would stay away from this if you can. Yes it may hold for a year or two, maybe even more, but eventually with the seasonal changes in the wood, something will give.

2. Pare/chisel the tenon cheeks to a slight angle to compensate and get a flush fit.
3. Scrape/sand/cut/plane the underside of the arm to get a flush fit.

I'm guessing #2 is the best approach, but maybe there is something else? I'm a rookie on anything other than 90 degree angle furniture, so any advice is appreciated.

There is a number 4 if you have room and the right saw. I've heard it called "Kerfing in" but I can't find an example at the moment on the web that describes it. Basically, with the arm in place, you place a saw flat to the underside of your arm, and gently saw the shoulder using the underside of the arm as a guide. The new kerf created by the saw will remove little to nothing on the "light side" and more on the "heavy side" if that makes sense.

ChairProb3.pngThis is obviously best done with a saw with little set. A Japanese pull saw or a flush cutting saw would be ideal. This of coarse shortens the legs by a small amount, but so would other alternatives. This offers a bit more control over the chisel, if you can get the saw in to the area. If you have some scrap pine or something, I would mock up your issue and see if this works for you

If you can't go this route, I would still start off the same as for kerfing in, only use a flexible ruler as a consistent spacer. Lay if flat on the underside of the arm, and draw a pencil line along the leg. (Given the size of the gap you mention, one steel ruler should be sufficient. If not stack a couple.) This will give you a consistent space from the arm as a guide. From there you can use a bit of sandpaper attached to a stick to sand down the back side to just shy of your line. Test fit as you go so you don't go too far and end up with the problem in the other direction...

Number 3 would be difficult to do without it looking like an, "oops"... (At least for me.)

Hope this helps...

[Dean Karavite]

Thanks again Tony and Walt. Walt, I think you pinpointed the source of my problem and Tony offered a way out.

"Kerfing in" is better than anything I thought of and doing that to get rid of this 1/16 or less of a gap seems the best option. I promise I will take my time.

Thanks again, I really appreciate your time and attention!

[Tony Parent]

Here are a couple mockups of what my sides might look like... They are more washed out then I would like, probably from a combination of crappy cell phone camera and overhead florescent bulbs. Hopefully you get the gist. The sticks are lilac, the rails will definitely be something else. Those are just thin stock I placed there to give the effect of some horizontal rails. Probably closer to the last couple of pics if I can plane out that stain...

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