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Tongue and Groove question

7554 Views 61 Replies 8 Participants Last post by  sommtr, 
A
Hello, I am putting end caps on a small bench seat to cover the end grain.
Should the grooves be in the seat and the tongue be in the caps or the other way around?
Or does it even matter?
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Stick486
how wide are your end caps aka breadboards???
how thick???
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Stick486
https://www.routerforums.com/router-bits-types-usage/47459-router-bits-mortise-tenon-project.html
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A
I'm thinking 1 1/2 to 2 inches wide. They will be 0.868 in or 22.05 mm that's the thickness of the seat.

That other thread is way too confusing for me. I just plan on a couple of passes on the router table. The seat is only 15 1/2" wide, I can run it through the drum sander to true it up.
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Stick486
3
spline it w/ a centered 5/16~3/8'' spline...
mortise the breadboard to take advantage of the grain...


.

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A
I'm putting the caps (breadboards) on the end grain. I plan on using tongue and groove router bits to accomplish this.
Thanks for your help
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Stick486
adot45 said:
I'm putting the caps (breadboards) on the end grain. I plan on using tongue and groove router bits to accomplish this.
Thanks for your help
Click to expand...
okay...
be advised normal T&G isn't deep nor strong enough for the task..
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DesertRatTom
I love splines. Relatively simple. If you have a long spline, you have to use short sections with the proper grain orientation. It's also important to get both sides of the joint straight and the same size, and to put both pieces through the router with the same (usually the front) side down. If you do one up and the other down, you generally wind up having to sand, sand, sand because it's almost impossible to get a bit perfectly centered.

If you cut the groove on both pieces face down, they will automatically line up when glued up. It will take a minimum of sanding or scraping to get a perfectly flat surface. Fingers can feel a mismatch of just a couple of thousandths

The following is just background info. The flatter your stock, the better your joints will turn out. Which is the job of the jointer and planer. But if you flatten stock and let it sit for awhile, it may warp or twist or resume its slightly-off surface. So you want to use your prepared material fairly soon after working it.

Sometimes you use an exotic or different color stock for the spline, which then becomes a decorative element. For example, I often use purpleheart for splines on the corners of frames or boxes because it really looks great against a lighter wood.

Splines should be very close to the exact width as the groove as possible. Too tight stresses the joint and leaves no room for glue. Too narrow and the joint will be weaker. This is where setting your saws and tools up carefully becomes important. If your table saw blade is not a perfect 90 to the table, your splines will be off as well. That's where a Wixey angle gauge come in handy. They're about $30 on Amazon.
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DaninVan
Dave; you know the old architects' adage, 'Form follows function'...couldn't be more apt than this particular application.
You're letting the availability of a specific tool dictate the design of the joint. You might regret this down the road; with the grain running lengthwise on the tongue it can potentially split off. Quite honestly, with modern glues it's not likely, but nevertheless.
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A
OK, I had a plan but I am flexible. If that isn't how I should do it for the project to last, then I'm not going to do it like my original plan.
I do have a Wixey cube and I do get the tongue oriented with the long grain would be weak....SO, just to scheme this out
in my head, use a dado blade to cut mortises in the bench top ends, then cut mortises in the breadboards, then fit splines to them and glue them up?
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Stick486
adot45 said:
in my head, use a dado blade to cut mortises in the bench top ends, then cut mortises in the breadboards, then fit splines to them and glue them up?
Click to expand...
yes.. or use a slot cutting router bit...
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Stick486 said:
yes.. or use a slot cutting router bit...
Click to expand...
With either method the seat would be vertical huh? It's only 25 inches long so I guess that would be doable.
I think I still have a jig for my table saw that would hold it, I could clamp to. It won't happen today though because I have to think it through somemore. :| I'm using walnut so don't want any mistakes either.

Let's also keep in mind that I have to work within my skill level. Just because I work with wood
doesn't make me a woodworker.
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Stick486
a slot cutter is done w/ the wood in horizontal...
if you were to get a slot cutting set there is so much you could do w/ them safely... dadoes, rabbets, T&G, splines, miters and etc...
the slot cutting set... Router CNC | Joinery | Stacked Slotting Set
this what a slot cutter looks like..
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A
OK, I was picturing something else, like the bit for box joints. Yes, that would be the way to go. Now the plan shifts into something a lot more manageable, thanks!
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Stick486
adot45 said:
OK, I was picturing something else, like the bit for box joints. Yes, that would be the way to go. Now the plan shifts into something a lot more manageable, thanks!
Click to expand...
good...
have you been to this link and studied up???
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DesertRatTom
If you buy a tongue and groove bit set, make sure they are matched in height. I'm pretty sure you can get such a set from Freud. Mine came from Sommerfeld tools. The point is that if you don't change the router height (and put a half inch grommet in the bottom of the collet), the two parts would fit right. Route face down!
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DaninVan
Walnut...there's good strength in that!
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Cherryville Chuck
Stick486 said:
a slot cutter is done w/ the wood in horizontal...
if you were to get a slot cutting set there is so much you could do w/ them safely... dadoes, rabbets, T&G, splines, miters and etc...
the slot cutting set... Router CNC | Joinery | Stacked Slotting Set
this what a slot cutter looks like..
Click to expand...
I agree with Stick. This is one of the bits you should buy sooner than later. The ones I've seen usually come with 4 different thickness cutters, the largest being 1/4". If you want to do T&G on 3/4" stock an extra 1/4" cutter makes it a bit easier although you can stack two together instead. My set has a set of thin shims for fine tuning the gap between two cutters and if you can find a set that has them or find a separate set of shims that would be good. The fact that you use them horizontally opens up your grooving options.
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Stick486
DesertRatTom said:
If you buy a tongue and groove bit set, make sure they are matched in height. I'm pretty sure you can get such a set from Freud. Mine came from Sommerfeld tools. The point is that if you don't change the router height (and put a half inch grommet in the bottom of the collet), the two parts would fit right. Route face down!
Click to expand...
he already has a set...
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DaninVan
Dave; if you don't want to see the spline start and stop the grooves before the ends of the boards, ie they're not cut through to the ends.
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