Woodworking

Old slats discarded, metal frame restored (rust removal, a few coats of paint), new slats fabricated.

A common restoration technique of relieving tension by routing out kerfs and gluing in wedges.

European oak, fragile short grain reinforced with dowels.

Lever-operated mobile base for woodworking machines (table saw and band saw), with French cleat lock.

The main issues with this chair included improperly fitted and damaged tenons, which negatively affected the chair’s stability. After labeling the chair’s structural components and marking the needed repairs with a piece of tape, we disassembled the chair and prepared full-sized drawings of tenon repairs — the angled tenons are common in tapered chair stretchers.…

Two structural defects to be fixed included the wobbling sliding dovetails (which are housed in the table top, connecting it to the supporting legs) and a longitudinal fracture in the leg. To fix the sliding dovetails (SDs), we had to first chisel out the stoppers (using guide blocks to maintain the correct chisel angle) and…

This is a traditional wooden casement window with side openers. The corner joints the window frame use draw-bored tenons (secured with tapered pins) inside slot mortises. In the side opener frames, the corners use a sloped haunched tenon to increase the gluing area and the mechanical resistance to racking and twisting. The transom (median rail)…

The window frame uses use the traditional through dovetails for maximum glue surface and joint strength. The frame of the casement (top opener) employs sloped haunched tenons in the corners.

The Japanese-styled kumiko lattice proves a sturdy reinforcement to the French door frame and solid support to the glass panel.

Here we used simple edge-to-edge butt joints, with the two vertical connections reinforced with butterfly keys of contrasting color (dark cherry). The wooden latches were needed for other projects too, so a plywood template served as the basis.