# Dowel pin strength



## mstockstill (Jan 29, 2010)

This may not be the appropriate place to post this thread but I am contemplating a situation involving a curio cabinet. I have 1/4" tempered glass shelves resting on four 5/16 dowel pins. The shelves are about 24" x 15". I'm not sure exactly how much weight I should put on these shelves. Does anybody have a clue about how much is safe? Thanks.


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## jlhaslip (Jan 16, 2010)

the glass is probably the weak point
the strength of the dowels will depend on the wood they are made from. Each wood has different strength numbers.


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## GeorgeC (Jul 30, 2008)

I cannot imagine anything that you would place on a glass shelf that would overload dowel pins made of any thing stronger than balsa.

Wood has good strength in shear.

George


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## garryswf (Aug 17, 2009)

Mstock,
Here is a photo of the curio that my wife and i built. She stores some pretty heavy glassware on the shelves. The curio is 3' wide utilizing 1/4" tempered glass and we have not had any problems. The door is also 1/4" tempered glass that slides open.


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## oldschooltools (Jan 10, 2010)

Theres plenty of metal dowels or even brass, should you think the wooden ones are not versitile enough? someone has already pointed out as long as the glass is tempered or similar there should be nothing to worry about. I think we call them shelf studs here in England.


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## mstockstill (Jan 29, 2010)

The dowel rods are red oak. The shelf was only going to be used for small things like porcelain objects and souvenirs. I was just going to make sure. I'm rather new to woodworking and never experimented with dowel rods. Thank you all for the help.


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## rrich (Jun 24, 2009)

mstockstill said:


> The dowel rods are red oak. The shelf was only going to be used for small things like porcelain objects and souvenirs. I was just going to make sure. I'm rather new to woodworking and never experimented with dowel rods. Thank you all for the help.


There are products available from most woodworking stores that are designed to fit into either 5mm or 1/" holes. These things are cheap and have been used commercially for many years. They come in plastic or metal.

I would ditch the dowels and use these shelf pins.
Just one example.
http://www.rockler.com/search_results.cfm?filter=shelf+pin&submit.x=17&submit.y=7


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## RLFX (Feb 2, 2010)

I would put a pin in the back wall about at the center mark ,24" is quite long with little support..


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