Dog Bowl #5: Fixing loose dovetails

Well I had a few dovetails that I wasn’t happy with. I took my dozuki saw and carefully opened the ones I thought looked loose to a consistent thickness. The idea is to get a kerf that you can then shim with similiar wood.

I cut those shim strips on the table saw with a zero clearance insert from cut offs from the sides. It was still a little thick so I sanded it a bit and then used a chisel to break off short shim stock. Then I slide a small piece with a bit of glue on it into the side of the kerf. Filling the kerf is a two step process so I was only trying to get the side of the dovetails to look good.

Next I trimmed those shims flush with a block plane and chisel. Now I’m ready to fill the top of the kerf. I carefully measure how wide the shim needs to be, trim one corner so it can sit properly in the kerf, a little glue and slip it into place. Just finger pressure is all it needs. After the glue dried, I trimmed these by placing a chisel blade down low and breaking off the shim so there was only a little bit that needs to be trimmed with the plane.

A little planing and sanding and this baby is about done. Here’s a quick wipe down with mineral spirits to check it out before putting some Danish oil and wipe-on poly on. Jersey will be eating dinner out of here in couple of days.

-- Every cloud has a silver lining