Curved chair top rail and flat slats?

[jteneyck]

If you decide to cut it from solid stock on the BS, you could still glue a nice veneer on both faces so the grain looks "right".  Also, if you had one of my horizontal router mortisers cutting the mortises in the ends of the rails and along the curved edge would be a piece of cake.  If you don't have one, you should.  With one, you make a little cradle from scrap for the rail to lay in.  You cut the mortises in the ends of the rails, or integral tenons if you prefer, with the rail centered in the cradle.  To cut the mortises along the curved edge you would index the rail so that the center of each mortise is at the bottom of the cradle.  This approach would allow you to use rectangular tenons on your back splats.  

John

[woodydixon]

John:

I am having trouble visualizing what you are describing. Do you have any pictures by any chance?

[KC]

I always cut the tenons on the end and mortises for slats first from a solid piece of 8/4 stock.  Had a jig for the mortiser that would hold the blank at the appropriate angle for the mortises.  After that, I cut the curved profile on the bandsaw.  Chair rails were one place where an edge sander came in awfully handy.  I don't have one anymore, but if I was to have occasion to make any more chairs I'd buy a new one.  A disc sander would probably work, but the edge sander was sweet.

[jteneyck]

John:

I am having trouble visualizing what you are describing. Do you have any pictures by any chance?

No problem.  I happened to have a curved drawer front left over from a project that will serve as a curved rail.  To cut the mortises in the ends of the rails it's just a matter of adding a support shim under the rail until the end is 90° to the router bit, or whatever angle you want. 





Adjust the router bit height as desired, set the width, and route as you would in a flat piece of stock.  This one is just a demo; you could make it any length desired.



To route the mortises in the side of the rail it helps to build a simple cradle, like this:



It took about 5 minutes to make.  To route the mortise, you center the cradle on the center line of the mortiser X-table.  Put the rail on the cradle with the center line of the mortise over the centerline of the cradle.  Adjust the stops to an equal distance on both the left and right sides, adjust the router bit height, and cut the mortise in the normal manner. 



To cut another mortise, just slide the rail in the cradle until the centerline of the new mortise is on the centerline of the cradle, then repeat.



I made two mortises to show the process:





These mortises were 1-1/2" long; the width you can make them is limited by the radius of the curve and thickness of the rail. 

Hopefully, this shows the concept.  Start to finish, it took about 20 minutes to do this.  Once the cradle is made, you could crank out one mortise after another, less than 30 seconds from one to the next.

John

[Steve N]

John I love it every time you post about your children  


I now save every pic, and just rename it to what I see it as, that way I can just put the pics in my laptop, and bing them out to the shop. No need to go online to read all about it. I just summon up the pics, and you tell a complete story with them. My memory isn't what it once was so just my rename of the pic, tells me what you were doing, though usually it is clear from the pic alone. Anyhow thanks for your gift of the doing, and the ability to convey through just a few pics how to do something some may see as a difficult task

   

   

   

   

[Steve N]

I should add this thing John makes, the FMT, is almost half of what a Domino (the cheap one costs) It does what the domino does, you just need to bring the work to the tool. It also does a lot more, you with John's help can figure it out.

[woodydixon]

John,

The pictures were great and it all makes perfect sense now. Thanks.


Woody

[jteneyck]

Steve, thanks for your continued support of the mortiser.  As those who have one know, it's easy to set up and use and very versatile. 

John