Can you cut a TENON with a drill press?

hi guys I'm James Hamilton from stepping up his woodworking journal and a couple weeks ago we made a video about fast and easy mortises with a drill press and a Forstner bit at the end I said this speaking attendants what if you cut one of those with a Forstner bit - that sounds like a subject for a future video well this is that video wait a minute before you hit the pause button and head to the comments to call me an idiot for even suggesting that you cut a tenon with the for sir a bit when you could do with the router table or a table saw let me make the case I admit that a forester bit isn't the most efficient way to cut a tenon it's actually not very efficient at all but if you only have one or two to do and you already have you're forcing a bit out because you cut your mortises with it why not try it and even if you don't do it it's fun to see what's possible and this video will also give you a few tips about Forstner bits themselves that will serve you in other applications so let's get started the first step is to lay out your tenon I use a combination square to measure the depth of my mortise and I subtract just a little bit for glue space in the bottom and then I use that to mark the length of the tenon on my new workpiece no matter how I plan on cutting a tenon whether I do it this way with a Forstner of it or I use a table saw or a router table I always like to score the lines with a knife this is going to eliminate cross grain tear out and in the case of Forstner bit Tenon's it's going to make the cleanup later a little bit easier as you'll see I marked the thickness of my tenon by aligning it with the mortise I'm gonna mark on just the edge at first these marks are just guides will fine-tune this fit later now time to choose a Forstner bit I've used fish bits for years they're the best on the market hands down and I found that you can do a lot more if you have high quality well-designed bits that stay sharp and travel straight without drifting in the wood we made a video a year so back about how Forstner bits work and the different styles that are out there you should check it out you really will learn a lot about the rim designs of different bits and what works best for which tasks it's an essential tool and it'll make you look at it differently I'll put a link to that video in the notes below this one just click show more if you're on YouTube now I like to use a larger bit for this task that will mean a little more cleanup or along the shoulder line of the tenon later but it will mean less work at the drill press I use my lines on the edge of the workpiece to set my drill press depth stop it's better to make my tenon a little too thick then to bort to deeply and end up with a tenon that's thin and fits loosely in the mortise so you may want to hold up just a little shy of these pencil lines at first you can always go back and remove more wood later it's really tough to put that wood back on I set my foster bit so the rim will cut right on my shoulder line then I use my drill press tables fence as a reference so I don't have to align each successive hole by eye you could also clamp a scrap of wood on top of your drill press table if you don't have a fence it's really important to do something like this because it will ensure that you get a straight shoulder line that's even on all four sides of the finished tenon the first cut is made with the bits point about an eighth of an inch from the edge of the work piece I want to bury that point in the wood as close as I can get to the edge without it busting out as I cut down into it these wavering bits are much better for cuts like this then the Sawtooth bits are because they won't drift out of the cut as easily the next cut is made on the other edge now this one's a little bit more tricky because the direction the bits spinning will make it one to walk off the workpiece on this right side so hold your workpiece firmly you may chip off the edge of your tenon over here again because of the direction the forester bit is spinning that's okay we're gonna trim that off later now you can remove the rest of the waste in the middle just make sure that with each hole that you bore the point of the bit is buried in the wood and as long as you have a good bit you should have no problem boring overlapping holes like this a little bit of waste that remains is just enough to sink that point right in its center and cut away the final bit once this space is done flip the workpiece and do the other side after the second side is done check the fit in your mortise if your tenon is way too thick then you can adjust the depth stop so you can bore a little bit deeper and use those same little pilot holes that are in your tenon to bore in the exact same spots removing a little bit more material but if you only have a little bit to remove to get it to the right thickness I say just wait and we'll tune it with sandpaper later at the bench I did get some tear out on the right edges of both faces but this has easily cleaned up when I do the edges which I mark from the mortise and then I cut in the same way with the same Forstner bit at the bench I use a chisel to clean up with a Forstner bit left behind this will be a pretty quick process you only have to remove a few little triangles along the shoulder that was left between each of the holes you drilled with your Forstner bit you can drop your chisels edge right into the knife line that you cut earlier and you should get a nice clean shoulder that way I made my tenon a little bit fat and I can use the chisel to pare away the excess thickness a little bit from each cheek to fine tune the fit but I find that a sanding block works just as well if its coarse enough you can use any block of wood with 60 grit or so paper but I have these carbide sanding blocks that I like for jobs like this I'll link to these in the notes too they're great because they last a really long time but I also like that the sides are bare and square to the abrasive face remember how we use the fence at the drill press to make sure our shoulder lines were all even all the way around the tenon well if I'm using a sanding block that's wrapped in a piece of paper I have to be careful I don't abrade that shoulder while I'm sanding my cheek if I do I'll end up with uneven shoulders and gaps in my assembled joint with the sanding block though I can put the bare wood face against the tenon shoulder and I'm only abrading the cheek that way if I did want to clean up a shoulder a little bit then the block square side works just like a shoulder plate it will keep the shoulders Square to the Tenon's cheek as I fine-tune it this makes quick work of the tuning and in the end I have a nice snug fit inside my mortise so there you have it you can not only cut a mortise with a Forstner bit but you can also cut the mating tenon now this may not be the fastest and most efficient method probably isn't gonna be your method of choice but it requires no special jigs no special setup and if you tell your woodworking buddies you can cut a tenon at the drill press I bet they won't believe it till they see it for more great tips tricks and tutorials designed to make you a better worker check out stumping up it's woodworking journal you can read and subscribe for free at stuffy nubs dot-com

Channel: Stumpy Nubs

Views: 56,055

Rating: 4.9197249 out of 5

Keywords: woodworking, stumpy nubs, drill press, mortise and tenon, joinery, forstner bit, fisch, tormek, sjobergs, tip

Id: bdHbwguBhXE

Length: 7min 20sec (440 seconds)

Published: Thu Oct 25 2018