Now comes the time to assemble the undercarriage. I don't have many pictures of this, as it's a bit hectic, and I'm focused on not ruining my work up until this point. The mortises and tenons are sized so that they require a bit of force to go together, and once they are together it's pretty much impossible to take them apart without destroying either the mortise or tenon part. So, like I said, it's a bit hectic.
In a nutshell, the process is: assemble the center and side stretchers, take this assembly and add it to one leg, using the chair seat as a reference. Then add the 2nd leg, then 3rd and 4th, using the holes in the seat to gauge the proper angles. Then, add glue to the seat mortises and leg tenons, and hammer each leg until it's tenon is fully seated. The leg tenons then get wedged from the top.
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| Splitting out maple leg wedges |
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| A simple little jig and a sharp chisel make this easy |
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| The legs get a kerf sawn about 2/3s down to accept the wedges after assembly |
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| This needs to go a smidge further |
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| The center stretcher and seat upside down and ready |
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| Done and wedged |
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| Always exciting! :) |
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| Both done! |
This over pretty quickly - it needs to be, as the glue sets up fast. The wedges in the leg tenons form an incredibly solid joint that will never loosen when done properly. All of the mortises have been kept at ambient humidity, and all of the tenons have been "super dried" in the kiln. When assembled, the tenons will absorb moisture from the mortise and swell, while the mortises will transfer moisture to the tenons and shrink - this effectively locks these joints together as well. Not mention the glue as well. Gory details in the
book, of course.
