anyone know what kind of joint this is?

Antique router? I’d bet it was made with a rotary tool of some type.

-- Dan, Sterling Alaska, Before you criticise some one, walk a mile in their shoes...then you will be a mile away and you have their shoes!

Don’t know what it would be called. I would cut the drawer sides first then mark the front. You could template rout the drawer front but your template would need to match the drawer side exactly. I’m not sure how I would cut the drawer side. A router bit could hog out most of the waste but it wouldn’t be able to get into the sharp points between circles. Chisel the rest? Are you going to use this joint? Let us know how it turns out.

-- Brain the size of a planet and they have me parking cars.

Bears ear joint??

-- "I don't cut wood. I machine it!" G.M. The wood machinest

I have a round tenon cutter that I use to make dowels. That would make the drawer front real easy with a simple indexing fixture. (Tenon cutter has 870 rpm max so you would need a tall drill press.)

Round mortises in drawer side could be done with forstner bit.

Cutting the rounded humps on the drawer sides could be done with a point cutting roundover router bit. (I have one from Whiteside for routing signs.) Another indexing fixture required.

Aligning the mortises and routed humps on drawer side would need a very accurate fixture.

Steve.

Hi Bent,

I have a chest of drawers that utilizes the same joint. I have been asking for years how it was done. Let me know if you try and how it comes out.

It’s called a pin and crescent joint. I have been waiting for the right project to come along to use it. The problem is that the drawer height has to be divisible by the number of pins and crescents.

-- Gary - Never pass up the opportunity to make a mistake look like you planned it that way - Tyler, TX

That is a Knapp joint. There was a machine made just for those. It wasn’t in popular use for all that long so it may help in dating the piece.

http://www.antiqueweb.com/articles/antique_knapp_joint_dovetail.html
http://thewoodworksinc.com/resources/Knapps%20Pin%20and%20Crescent%20Drawer%20Joint.pdf

-- - CaseMan -

Here’s a router jig/template to reproduce the joints.

http://woodworker.com/cgi-bin/FULLPRES.exe?PARTNUM=886-459&LARGEVIEW=ON&CARTID=200402157660284040--1

-- - CaseMan -

My brother has a beautiful rosewood chest made with these joints. When I looked it up a couple of years ago, I found that it is a machine-made joint, and is known by a number of names: “Pin and Crescent”, “Crescent”, “Pin and Cove”, “Pin and Scallop”, “Half Moon”, “Knapp” – and likely others. The most common name seems to be the “Pin and Crescent” as noted by GaryK. I also discovered that “Woodworker’s Supply, Inc.” has a couple of jigs for making them.

-- Dave O.

Boy I learned a lot.

-- W James Brokenbourgh Custom furniture maker http://artisticwoodstudio.com/

yeah, me too!

thanks for all the information guys.

cool :)

-- I am always doing that which I can not do, in order that I may learn how to do it. - Pablo Picasso

This was most illuminating…..As Jim said…I learned alot about a joint I had not seen very much…and I certainly never had a name for it before…Thanks all for the great lesson.

-- Woodworking.....My small slice of heaven!

look ma, i learned a new thing! oh wait, i think i just forgot how to blink in order to make room :(

-- - Jei, Rockford IL - When in doubt, spray it with WD-40 and wrap it with duct tape. The details will attend to themselves.

Great thread. There’s always something new to learn.

-- Failure is the road to success if you learn to learn from your mistakes - Vince, Greenville, SC