Antique high chair repair

[Pirate]

I lucked into this antique oak high chair, that transforms into a chair and desk. Made in 1942 according to seller.
The tray was just doweled to the arms and the dowels snapped.
My idea is to line up the arm and tray, and on the underside, use a router to cut a dado as wide as the dowel, in the tray and arm. The dado would be 1/2" x 1/2"and 3-4" long.
Then glue in a 1/2" x 1/2" hardwood piece.
I believe this would be stronger than the dowels, and you would only be able to see it when the tray was raised.
The tray has a thin metal brace, that just screws to the table, and wraps around the end of the arms to give, not much support.
What say to my idea? Better idea?

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[handi]

Personally, I would be tempted to simply re-dowel it.

The photo is fuzzy, but the break looks to me like the original dowel was poor quality. A birch or maple dowel with the grain properly oriented end to end would not break easily.

If that is a dowel joint and not a round tenon joint, then removing the old dowel should be easy. Drill it out with an undersized drill bit, then chip out the waste. This should open up the holes and give you the space and alignment for the new dowels.

Ralph

[John Mihich]

That's what I have done. Only need a drill and a saw/chisel.