Popular Woodworking 2006-04 № 154, страница 42

The side panels are assembled as a unit, then fit in a groove in the leg, and butted at the bottom to the thicker arched rail.

developed shows quartersawn figure on all four faces of the legs, and is relatively simple to mill and assemble.

I could have laminated the legs from thinner stock and then veneered the edges, but I have seen too many old pieces constructed this way that have cracks in the veneer. Quartersawn wood moves more in thickness than in width, so there's a good chance that this method will eventually fail.

Mitering four pieces together is a logical alternative, but without some way to keep the pieces from sliding during glue-up, assembly can be very difficult. In the early 1900s, Leopold Stickley devel

oped a method that used rabbeted miters to form what he called a quadralinear leg. It's a good method, but without the custom-made shaper cutters he used it is difficult to mill.

Looking for a simpler method, I realized that by making the front and back pieces of the legs a different thickness than the sides, I could make two of the pieces with simple miters, and use a small rabbet on the thicker pieces to keep the parts from sliding during assembly. The photos on pages 40-41 show the steps I took.

When I had the legs assembled, I used a plunge router with a fence to cut the stopped grooves for the side and back panels, then laid out and cut the mortises in the front legs for the rails at the front of the carcase.

The side panel assembly is placed in the groove in the leg, and the arched bottom rail is placed in its mortise. The two

The web frames are notched around the legs and attached to the side rails with pocket screws. The front and back edges will be glued to the rails as they are assembled.

pieces are then glued and butted together where they meet before the second leg is put in place. With the left and right leg and panel sides together, the entire carcase can be assembled.

With one side panel and leg asssembly face down on some horses, I notched the corners of the web frames around the legs, and held them in place with pocket screws. The back frame was then put in the groove in the rear leg, followed by the front rails in their mortises. The butt joints between the rails and the front edge of the frames were glued and clamped at this time, as were the joints between the web frames and the back frame.

Putting the second leg and panel assembly on is straightforward, but there are a lot of parts that need to come precisely together. I made a dry run, and then got some help to fit it all together and apply the clamps.

Several joints must be fit at one time as the second panel and leg assembly is put in place. Get some help so both sides can be fit and clamped at the same time.

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