Dowel Joint Glue-Up Question

[steve-norrell]

I am building some furniture for one of the bedrooms - a library-type table and an end table. I am using dowel joinery and everything has gone well and worked as advertised.

Most amazingly, everything fit together and it is almost perfectly square.

The question has to do with the final glue-up. The LOML wants to stain the wood (poplar) before final assembly and I am concerned about getting stain and finish on the faces of the joints. I am not too worried about the dowels or holes because they can be taped or plugged. The tables will have to carry only minimal weight -- trinkets and linens, etc. -- so weight bearing is not a problem.

So - - assuming that stain and finish will find its way to the joint faces, will the glue on the dowels be strong enough to work?

Thanks in advance for what I know will be excellent advice. Regards, Steve,

[JR]

There was a thread along these lines not too long ago. The upshot was that you should try to keep stain away from the areas you'll be gluing. Stain can weaken the glue bond.

You can use painter's blue tape, cut to fit the joint area. Stain, remove tape, glue up.

Of course the panels will benefit from most from "pre-staining". If you stained them onlly after glue up, you could expect the unstained portion to get exposed as the panel shifts.

JR

[cabinetman]

I've never had good luck with the taping off jazz. It always seems to seep when I'm not looking. So, my habit is to do all the glue-ups, clean up, and then stain. Just a note about gluing dowels. Use fluted dowels, or the spiral cut dowels, as they allow for air to escape and room for excess glue. Swab interior of the hole, but don't get gobs of glue in there. Lightly coat the dowel. As the dowel enters, it will push the glue down the sidewalls, and the glue will skim up the dowel. If you have too much glue in there its possible you won't be able to insert dowel, or the pressure will force it out. So, care has to be taken on your gluing technique.

I wet wipe all squeezed out glue as soon as possible. There's been discussion that doing that will cause the glue to saturate deeper into the wood. I disagree with that theory. A good clean up is the answer. Continually turn the rag and wipe off the glue. Continued wiping with a wet clean rag seems to work for me.

[mpc]

I haven't tried this myself, just an idea that pops into my head:

leave the pieces with dowels a little wide, assemble the frame, and stain it. THEN trim the edges with a spiral router bit (not a tablesaw... want a nice edge) on a table set up for "jointing" with the router to get them to the final size. That should remove the stain on the edge. Drill for the dowels and assemble.

I've often wondered if butting a sacrificial board against the workpiece might work better than taping.

mpc

[drumpriest]

mpc, good idea, but a bit late for that given his photos. The dowels should be pretty strong, but are nothing when compared to the strength of a long grain to long grain glue joint. You could certainly try to tape off, and you'll get some stain in the way, and likely some not, which could be strong enough.

Along the line mpc's suggestion, some hand tools could work also, such as a hand plane. One more thought is tape off the sides, then wax the part that you don't want stained, remove tape, and stain. I would try this on a scrap piece to see if it worked ok.

I personally stain what I can (stuff that isn't to be glued), tape off for the glue up, glue it up, wait for the squeeze out to harden a little, then clean up. If something has too much glue on it, use a card scraper or a sharp chisel to remove the offending bit.

[Bruce Cohen]

Steve,

First off, that's a nifty looking table you're doing.

I bought this from Lee Valley, initially to coat my jointer beds, but the other use, preventing glue saturation seems to work well, too.

I've tried it a few times and its worth giving it a try.



Bruce

[steve-norrell]

Thanks for all the advice. As usual the forum has come through with plenty of great help.

Problem is that drumpriest is right, the dowels are glued (won't do that again) into the side and front panels. Actually, though, it should be fairly easy to keep the stain off the ends of the panels. I like Cabinetman's suggestions, but I always manage to miss some glue that almost always ends up in a very visible spot. Mpc's suggestion is interesting but I don't think it work very well on the legs and I don't have a planer -- must use the router for that so I am limited to relatively thin boards (when compared to the legs). I want to try the Waxillit suggested by Bruce, but time is short and it would have to be ordered from somewhere down in America. Maybe next time!

I am most concerned about the faces of the table legs. That's where it looks like tape may be the easiest answer. Worst case scenerio will be a reduced glueable surface on the table legs.

Thanks again for all the help. I attached a 'progress report' photo of the "just-before-finishing-stage". The blue tape is holding the drawer faces in place.

Thanks again and regards to all, Steve

[Jeffrey Schronce]

You can use painter's blue tape, cut to fit the joint area. Stain, remove tape, glue up.

Of course the panels will benefit from most from "pre-staining". If you stained them onlly after glue up, you could expect the unstained portion to get exposed as the panel shifts.

JR

BINGO! On both points/ideas.

A lot of folks on other forums have had a lot of success with Waxillit.

While you may get a small amount of seepage under the tape, I don't think it would be to the point of impacting the joint. It would be a very small % of the glue surface area it would leak onto, and 0% of the dowels which provide the vast majority of the joint strength.

BTW, that is some darn fancy doweling you did there bud. I kind of skipped doweling as it seemed more complicated than M&T! You did very well getting everything lined up.

[Jeffrey Schronce]

BTW, are you married to stain? Why not dye the wood? That would not impact joint strenght if it bleeds over plus you have a better shot at matching up the color differences in material between the frame/legs and the drawers.

[steve-norrell]

BTW, that is some darn fancy doweling you did there bud. I kind of skipped doweling as it seemed more complicated than M&T! You did very well getting everything lined up.

Jeff, thanks for the compliment. I used one of those dowling jigs that automatically center the jig for drilling the holes. Then a pin-like piece that is inserted in the hole and used to make a mark on the other piece. I use a DP to drill the matching holes. It has worked quite well for me. I have also used Kreg pocket screws with good success.

I am not familar with dyeing wood but will look into it for the next project. The LOML prefers staining and, as of this writing, has both tables completely stained. We will do the glue-up next, before the final finish is applied.

She likes Minwax products and used Minwax Prestain Conditioner and oil-based stain. She wants to try Minwax Lacquer as the top finish (I prefer poly wipe on but its her choice).

Thanks for all the advice. Regards, Steve