Popular Woodworking 2001-06 № 122, страница 26

BISCUITING A PARTITION IN THE MIDDLE OF A PANEL

The best way to biscuit a partition into the middle of a panel is to use the partition itself as a fence for your biscuit joiner. Here's how: Mark on the panel where you want the partition to be placed.

Lay the partition flat on the panel and against the line you marked. Clamp the partition and panel to your bench.Mark on the partition where you want your biscuit slots to go. There is no need to mark the panel beneath it.

Now remove the fence from your biscuit joiner. Place it flat on the panel and cut the slots in the partition.

The Basic Basics

Biscuits can add strength to a joint, such as when you join a table apron to a leg. Or they can be used as an alignment aid, such as when you glue up a slab using several boards or you need to glue together veneered panels. The biscuits won't add strength here, but they will keep your parts in line as you clamp. In a solid-wood panel, the biscuits reduce the amount of time you spend leveling your joints. In veneered panels, biscuits keep your parts in line so you don't end up sanding through the veneer.

When making a biscuit joint, first put the two parts together and decide how many biscuits you need for that joint. A

Attaching a tabletop to an apron

One of my favorite tricks with a biscuit joiner is using it to cut the slots for tabletop fasteners. Set the fence for ^l/2" (you want the slot to start ⁷/i6" down from the top of the apron) and make your cuts on the inside of the apron (you can do this after the table is assembled).The "Z"-shaped fasteners now slip into the slots and can be screwed to your tabletop.

basic rule of thumb is to place your first biscuit 2" from the edge and then every 5" to 7" or so, though the spacing is really up to you. Draw a line across the joint at each spot where you want a biscuit. Set the fence on your biscuit joiner so the biscuit will be buried approximately in the middle of your material (for example, if you're working with ^V'-thick wood, set your biscuit joiner for a ³/s"-deep cut. Don't worry about being dead-on in the middle. If you cut all your joints on one side, say, the face side, everything will line up). Select the size biscuit you want to use and dial that into your tool. Use the biggest size you can.

Clamp one of your parts to your bench. Line up the line on the tool's fence or faceplate with the line on your work. Turn on the tool and allow it to get up to full speed. Plunge the tool into the wood and then out. Repeat this process for the other side of the joint.

Now glue up your joint. There are at least two ways of doing this. You can put glue in the slots and then insert the biscuit, or you can put glue on the biscuit and insert it in the slot.

For small projects, paint half the biscuit

with glue and insert it into one of the slots. Then paint the other half of the biscuit and clamp your pieces together. This method produces clean joints with minimal squeeze-out, but it's a bit slow.

When assembling big projects, I like to put the glue in the slots first using a bottle designed for this task. Squirt a dab of glue in all your slots and use a spare biscuit, piece of scrap or brush to paint the edges. Put the biscuits in the slots and clamp up. The downside to this method is it's easy to use too much glue, and you're liable to get more squeeze-out.

No matter which method you use, be sure to go easy on the clamping pressure. It's easy to distort a frame made with biscuits. If you're using a regular yellow glue, clamp the project for at least 30 to 45 minutes before taking it out of the clamps.

Where to Use Biscuits

Making the biscuit slot is easy. The tricky part is knowing when to use biscuits and how many to use. Here are some situations when you should be careful:

Long-grain joints: Many people use biscuits to join several narrow pieces into a panel, such as a tabletop. Biscuits help align the boards so they don't slip as much when you clamp them. However, don't let anyone tell you that the biscuits make the joint stronger. In long-grain to long-grain joints, the glue is stronger than the wood itself. So biscuits here are only an alignment tool. Also, be careful to place the biscuits where they won't show after you trim your part to finished size. Once I raised

26 Popular Woodworking June 2001