Roubo #5: Stretchers

I made a little more progress this week. I now have the stretchers cut and fit. The first thing to do is to cut the mortises. It took a lot of fiddling and was pretty slow going with the mortises that are 2 1/2” deep by 3/4”. I could only get away with going about 3/16” w/ each pass that’s a lot of passes to get 2 1/2” deep on eight mortises.

Next up was the tenons. These went much faster. Here they are roughed in using a dado on the table saw.

I decided to round over the tenons rather than square up the mortises, it’s easier I think.

Then for final trail and error fitting.

Then let’s see if everything will go together. This always makes me nervous, the dry fit is when any big mistakes show up. I’m happy, no major screw ups and everything fits to my standards. I can’t glue up yet, there is a lot more to do on the leg vise before I can glue up.

Then I had time to work on making a couple of widgets for the leg vise. Roller brackets, I think they’re called.

-- Bondo Gaposis