# Angled mortise and tenon



## Purrmaster (Jul 19, 2012)

I want to make a stool that will have the legs splayed out a bit. But I'm not sure how I'm going to join the legs to the seat.

A mortise and tenon would seem to be the logical method. But I don't know how to make an angled mortise and tenon. I have a hard enough time making straight ones.

Here's the idea I had:

Use my drill press and a large spade or Forstner bit to drill holes at around a 5 degree angle into the seat. I have a spade bit that's 1 and 1/4 inches wide but I could probably find larger ones.

Then take the legs (tenon) and sand the end portion to be round. To fit in the drilled holes.

Will this work?

I can see several downsides to doing this. One, it will be a pain in the neck to sand the leg ends round. And I'm not going to get the perfect roundness needed.

There will be a substantial void at the bottom of the mortise that won't be filled with wood. I can use polyurethane glue to fill the spaces to a degree. But Gorilla Glue isn't the same as actual wood.

My drill press is kind of dinky and I'm not sure I can fit a stool seat onto the drill press table. Let alone clamp it in place.

I'm open to suggestions. I have a router but no way to get it to rout at an angle. 

I don't have a table saw. I am *not* confident in my ability to chop the mortises by hand. At least not consistently.

Thanks in advance.


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## woodnthings (Jan 24, 2009)

*the larger chisel mortiser's can tilt*

But they are expensive and you don't have one.... :thumbdown:

You could use vertical mortises and angle the tenon. :thumbsup:

You could turn a round shoulder on in a lathe to fit the angled round hole from your spade bit..... no lathe...:thumbdown:

Other than that I have no more suggestions.... :thumbdown:


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## Purrmaster (Jul 19, 2012)

You are correct, I don't have a mortiser or a lathe. I'm going to look into getting a bench top mortiser this year but I doubt it will be able to tilt. (Been looking at the Woodcraft one on sale....).


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## rayking49 (Nov 6, 2011)

Tenon cutter like is used for log furniture?


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## GeorgeC (Jul 30, 2008)

Do you have or have access to a band saw? You could use this the almost make the end of the legs round before sanding.

Or you could find a hole saw that is the size of what you want the leg tenon to be. 

You can eliminate the space at the end of the tenon by cutting it on the correct angle and length.

George


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## Purrmaster (Jul 19, 2012)

I don't have access to a band saw. To sand the legs down I was planning on using my stationary belt sander. I'm using poplar for this project partly because I wanted something soft enough to be relatively easy to sand. I hope.


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## BZawat (Sep 21, 2012)

I have to make a round tenon in the near future as well, and have been scratching my head. My thought is to set a power planer to 1/32" depth of cut and clamp it to my workbench, draw the circle centered on the end of the leg to be cut, and rotate the leg -held flat -against the foot of the planer....


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## Dominick (May 2, 2011)

That's simple with the log tenon cutters. 

http://www.veritastools.com/products/Page.aspx?p=154


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## Purrmaster (Jul 19, 2012)

I'll be able to remove enough material with the belt sander to make a round tenon but it won't be perfectly round. I tested the hypothesis. I'm still going to use this method for lack of any better idea. But I know my "round" tenon will look more like a melted lump in a roundish kind of shape.

Maybe I should just have used dowels for the legs. I can get some pretty fat poplar dowels. But I thought that would be too cheesy looking...


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## BZawat (Sep 21, 2012)

Dominick said:


> That's simple with the log tenon cutters.
> 
> http://www.veritastools.com/products/Page.aspx?p=154


Awesome!! I had no idea these existed lol


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## Dominick (May 2, 2011)

BZawat said:


> Awesome!! I had no idea these existed lol


That's what makes log furniture possible. 
Although you could use a drawknife to make the tenons. But I like the tenon cutters.


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## Midlandbob (Sep 5, 2011)

Veritas also has a series of bits for cutting green wood but the key is that they are used in chair making you can eyeball the line and drill the hole to fit the tenon you made with the tendon cutter..
There are several books and people teaching Windsor chair making. That includes the skills to make stools. It is fairly easy to cut a compound angle mortise with sight. Lines and a bevel gauge.


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## Purrmaster (Jul 19, 2012)

I tried my idea of shaping the ends of the legs into, essentially, dowels. It didn't work, which I'm not terribly surprised by. It was basically impossible to shape the ends properly, especially to the same depth on all the legs.

I'm trying to salvage the project by making dowel pins out of 1 inch dowels. I'm drilling a 1 inch hole (with a Forstner bit) into the tops of the legs. We'll see how it goes.


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## TylerJones (Dec 4, 2011)

I realize that you don't have all of the tools I'm going to mention but I thought it may be helpful if I briefly went over how I do it for post and rung chairs. You may be able to use some of the methods.

I put the leg stock on the lathe and turn the final dimension on the floor end (foot) and then turn the tenon to exact size using either a wrench or calipers to test the fit. The wrench works best. then i taper both sides to a bulge in the middle. I leave a micro shoulder on the tenon, it mostly wedges itself into the mortise. Brill the mortises into the solid seat using blocks for the correct angles. cut the mortise in the center for a wedge. make wedge, size joints with hide glue and let it dry and then final assemble. 

You maybe be able to use a tenon cutter and then shave or sand a taper into it to fit your needs. Hope this has helped.


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## Woodenhorse (May 24, 2011)

As others have suggested I would also recommend a tenon cutter rather than try to sand or hand cut the tenons. For drilling the holes a spade bit would be precarious if not downright dangerous. A spoon bit would be best as they can be introduced to the surface at one angle to get started and then adjusted to the proper angle on the fly. That's what was traditionally used by chair makers who had to drill a angled hole on a round surface.


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## snookfish (Jan 10, 2011)

Are the legs going to be round? If not then I have seen a technique where you make a regular mortise on the bottom of the stool seat. Then cut out the legs like normal. The trick is that you need either a tenon jig or make one for the table saw. Then make the actual tenon at the desired angle (5 degrees you said). If you ever look on YouTube or podcast, look up "the wood whisperer" and he shows exactly what I'm talking about, hence the reason I know about this. I found it AFTER I had already built my step stool and just put screws in the top. But it was for utility porposes so I did not care about the screws.


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## Jory (Feb 19, 2012)

I am not sure that I understand the problem. Woodworkers made stools long before there were power tools. A stool sounds like a straight forward project that can be done, albeit slowly with simple hand tools. Just a chisel and a mallet a knife and a sliding bevel can make fine mortise and tenon joints adding a hand saw to do the tenon further eases the task. Just remove the wood slowly little at a time. Since you are unsure of your skills this would be a great project to improve them while not wasting much wood. Start the project by making the mortises from the top of the stool, this is where a bad fit would be seen. If the mortise gets a little wide cut a slot in the through tenor and insert a wedge.


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## HandToolGuy (Dec 10, 2011)

There is a Moravian Stool in the current issue of Popular Woodworking that answers most of your questions.


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## ecuadee (Jun 28, 2012)

I used a 1" hole saw in a drill press to make round tenons on the ends of some adze handles that I used as table legs.Worked quite well, but hand fitting will be necessary.


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