Drawers must work throughout the year. There is no virtue in constructing an ego-feeding science project with a “piston-fit” in February only to find that you, or worse, a client, are unable to open the drawer in August. Let’s take a closer look.

In the “High-End Drawers” ten-part series on this blog that ran intermittently from July to November 2009, and in the article “4 Steps to a Sweet-Fitting Drawer” in Fine Woodworking magazine #224 (January/February 2012), I describe a reliable process for producing a good drawer fit. But just as with a good suit, a good drawer fit means not too tight and not too loose. With wood, however, we have the added complication of the inevitable changes in moisture content that occur with seasonal humidity changes. A zero-tolerance “piston fit” in February will be all wrong in August.

Let’s think it through.

Consider the width of the drawer in its case. In both solid-board and frame-and-panel constructions, the width of the case remains essentially stable throughout seasonal humidity changes, since it is defined and limited by long-grain pieces. Even the expansion of the side walls of a solid-board drawer pocket will occur on the outsides, not within the pocket.

The drawer sides are oriented to expand laterally. (Their expansion in height will be discussed later.) As an example, hard maple, typically quartersawn for drawer sides, 3/8″ thick, will expand .012″ (12 thou) over a humidity increase from 35% to 80%. Drawer sides normally receive little or no finish, so these changes can, at least theoretically, occur rapidly. There are some mitigating factors though, including that the drawer spends most of its time secluded in the case, and the sides are somewhat bound by the joinery, usually dovetails. However, PVA glues retain some elasticity, as evidenced by the tiny elevation of tails above the endgrain of pins in very humid conditions. It should be noted, however, that this theoretical amount of expansion does not seem empirically to fully manifest.

Does this matter? Yes, it does. With the incremental construction method wherein the final step of fitting the drawer to its pocket is to plane the sides down to the level of the endgrain of the pins of the front and back, the drawer width can easily be fit to tolerances of a few thousandths of an inch.

So, if during the dry months, the drawer width is fit like a piston with a clearance of say a couple thou between the sides and the case, it is sure to be too tight in the humid months.

Is this all just theoretical? Not at all. I can tell you from experience that it matters. Years ago, during a low-humidity season, I made some nice drawers with a piston fit. I felt proud and thought that since they were small drawers, all would be fine during the coming summer, and I could get away with this exercise in ego-stroking perfectionism. Not so. The following August, neither drawer could be opened.

That is not practical woodworking. The perfect defeated the good. That Fall, I made things right.

Right now, in an August steam bath here in the Northeast US, drawers in pieces that I made several years ago operate well but with almost no remaining clearance. That’s fine. In the dry winter, the fit of these drawers do indeed have more play in width, but are by no means sloppy.

In summary, if you are building a drawer during very humid weather, fit the width to be very snug. If you are building a drawer in the dryness of February, you must leave some allowance.

Ah, but how much allowance should you make when building in dry conditions? It depends on the thickness of the drawer sides (less for thin sides), the species of wood, and the conditions where the piece will be housed. More play is appropriate in large, practical drawers than in small, delicate drawers. It helps to keep your shop from getting too dry in the winter. This will reduce the range of estimating that you have to do.

To avoid a stuck drawer, stay on the safe side but don’t go so far as to make a clearance that feels at all sloppy in dry conditions. For a small drawer, building in dry conditions, I like to at least get a sheet of paper, maybe two, in there on each side. Experience helps a lot; I go by how it feels. The theoretical expansion amount calculated above will be too much allowance.

Of course, haha, if your piece will be placed in a climate-controlled museum, don’t worry about any of this!

Next, we’ll look at the height of the drawer and appropriate clearances. That’s important too, but less finicky.

Tip #5: Be assertive “to the line.” Timid does not work.

To determine if your saw strokes are following the line, you have to observe sufficient incremental progress to close the loop of intent and result. In other words, you have to see how it’s going.

An ineffective strategy is to go very slow, with the supposition that although such extreme care is time consuming, at least things won’t go wrong. Yet if each stroke is barely consequential, such as when using a saw with too many teeth per inch for the job, it is difficult to know how it’s going and how to adjust. Much like learning to ride a bicycle, being overcautious will prevent you from ever learning. At some point, you have to let it flow, even if sometimes you will fall.

The answer is not a dovetail saw with 32 tpi. This is not to suggest being reckless or careless, but appropriately confident.

A similar problem is taking too much clearance from the line. This leads to excessive clean up maneuvers, creating more opportunities for things to go wrong and to lose direction. One-sided tolerance, an awareness of directional errors (discussed in another post), is one of the key concepts in craftsmanship, but it should not be misconstrued as an excuse for timidly missing by a mile.

When sawing, the visual and physical senses continually inform each other. As you see success developing, your movements gain assurance. The physical sense takes precedence as the cut proceeds, and as assurance builds, speed can increase as an easy flow develops. [In the cuts above, I did the one on the right first, not quite fully assertive, then went at it and split the line nicely on the other three, picking up speed.]

There is a solution to all of this: practice! And if you miss, get another piece of wood. I’ve had a lot of practice at that! Truly, we’re all students.

Happy sawing!

Tip #4: Since you can only watch one line at a time, see one line while you feel the other.

For most sawing, you are viewing a single line while using a physical registration for the other axis of the saw. I will explain.

In ripping with a handsaw, you follow the line with your eyes and the saw after establishing and then maintaining the saw at 90 degrees to the wood surface. When sawing a dovetail tail, most woodworkers start the saw along the end-grain line, establish that 90 degree relationship, and then view and follow the line down the wood.

In both cases your eyes track one line as you feel the angle you initially established with the saw by using an estimate of position (ripping with the handsaw) or another line (dovetailing). In dovetailing, you can use both lines to position the saw before you start. You can also use peripheral vision to sense the saw’s squareness to the length of the bench or a wall behind it. Yet when you are actually sawing, that initial line on the end grain is really only there to start you out. It is not necessary to continue to watch the remnant of it as you cut down the face-grain line, as long as you maintain a true stroke in one plane.

In any moment, the eyes can only watch one detail. Yes, there is peripheral vision, but even a small distance away from the spot you are “looking at” (technically, on which you are aligning the very tiny center of your retina, the foveal center), the vision is not very clear – not clear enough to follow a fine line. So if you attempt to follow two lines at once, the best you can do is to quickly jump your eyes back and forth from one line to another, and this must be done in the rhythm of your sawing stroke. The feeling one might have of actually accurately viewing two lines at the same time is an illusion.

Now, consider sawing a tenon. For some reason, it is often recommended to follow the end-grain line on top of the wood at the same time as you follow the line down the side of the wood. In other words, to saw a triangle into the wood in one motion.

In this method, the two contact points of the teeth biting into the wood grow further apart from each other as the cut proceeds. Yes, by aligning your eye, the two lines could be viewed as one, but the saw teeth are biting at two ends. Again, the best you can do is actually jump the eyes from one spot to the other.

The better way, in my opinion, is to cut the single end grain line first. The eyes follow one line and the saw is held vertical by feel. I like to establish the cut first at the near end, then the far end, work each cut toward the middle, then cut the full width as the saw is established in a kerf. I advance just until the teeth are buried, as seen in the top photo.

[By the way, if the saw blade is shiny, the vertical orientation of the saw can be checked before starting by observing the continuous straight line created by the top corner edge of the wood and its reflection in the blade. See the photos. I don’t find this necessary, but it is a neat trick to know.]

Then I saw the line down the side of the wood, only watching that line. The saw does not bite further in at the far end of the wood, only on the near side, going down the line. The initial kerf established on the end grain is the “line” I feel, as I watch the line down the side. See the photo below:

I proceed similarly on the opposite side. Next, the final remaining internal triangle of wood gets cut almost entirely by feel since there are kerfs all around it. At this point, I do not want to redirect the saw; I’m just going with the flow, by feel, with what has already been accurately established.

A similar sequence is useful in accurately crosscutting beams by hand, such as a 4×4.

Seeing and feeling work together to make accurate sawing.

Next: attitude matters.

Tip #3: See the line with both eyes if you can.

Most woodworkers feel more comfortable and work more accurately sawing with the line and the saw on a specific side, left or right. For right handers, the most efficient setup has the saw in the right hand and the line to the right side of the midline of the body. Both eyes view the line from the left and see the left edge of the kerf splitting the line and the remaining half-line trailing the kerf. The keeper wood in this case is on the left, the waste on the right. This arrangement is likely to be favored even in the minority of cases in which eye dominance does not match the side of hand dominance.

The photo at the top, demonstrating this setup, is the view with the right eye sawing a tenon. Below is the view with the left eye. The small disparity in vantage points permits stereoscopic (high level binocular) vision.

The key element is that both eyes view the line. If you are fortunate to have two good eyes that align properly, your binocular vision is an advantage over seeing the line with just one eye. The eyes also track better working together than alone. Try it.

Sometimes this desirable setup cannot be achieved. A right hander finds himself with the right eye viewing the line from the right side of the saw, as in the photo below.

Since it is usually very awkward to shift the head fully to the right of the saw, the left eye views from the left side of the saw, as seen below.

The brain cannot blend these two very different images. One image is functionally “turned off” and you are then effectively working in the less efficient one-eyed mode. Sometimes this cannot practically be avoided.

There is another situation to consider. This happens commonly at the bandsaw. One eye, usually the left, gets a good view of the line meeting the teeth, as in the photo below.

Oops, the other eye’s view is blocked by the blade guide/guard apparatus:

You may sense less visual precision without being immediately aware of the cause. The solution is to arrange your stance so that both eyes have a view of the line where it meets the teeth.

Because of the many sawing situations in the shop, there are exceptions to all of this. The basic principle is nonetheless helpful, and being aware of it can help your sawing.

Good lighting (angle and distance), a good quality line, and proper visual correction for the distance at which you are working, also contribute to seeing the line properly. And, yes, you do have to blow away the saw dust regularly, especially with Japanese pull-stroke saws.

Coming up: Do you need to see all of the lines? Can you? When does seeing them become less important?

Tip #2: Engage and stabilize your core.

“Core” muscles refer to the abdominals, obliques, hip flexors, spinal stabilizers, and the gluteus muscles. Strong, balanced, and activated core muscles allow the limbs to perform properly. Core involvement is the source of much of the precision and power of a tennis player’s swing, a fighter’s punch, and a sawyer’s stroke. Watch Chicago Bears linebacker Brian Urlacher demolish a ball carrier, or Boston Red Sox little guy Dustin Pedroia belt a ball over the fence, and you’re seeing core strength in action.

Pick up the saw, place one foot forward, and use your core muscles, especially the glutes, to find a balanced, stable stance. From there, the arm can operate with precision, intent, and strength. A stable core does not mean an immobile core, rather it is a controlled positioning and movement of the trunk. If the trunk is unstable, the arm flails.

Do not fall into the saw stroke, move into it. Maintain balance throughout the stroke. Do not use the bench or the work piece to prop up your body. A partial exception is when using a handsaw with a low saw horse or bench. Even in that situation, the non-sawing hand is really just an aid to the core musculature. You should not be falling on that hand with each stroke. Again, move into the stroke with intent and control, do not flail into it. You can still use your body weight for power, but in control using the core.

It was difficult to take photos for this post. I set the timer and quickly moved into position with the saw but I could only approximately convey the general ideas.

Whew, look at this guy. Bad news:

And this guy. Ouch. He won’t last a day in the shop.

In addition to sawing precision and strength, you will also have shop endurance. Woodworkers often complain of low back soreness after a day in the shop, especially with tasks such as sawing joinery and sharpening. The way to avoid this is to use a balanced stance and active glutes to take the excess effort away from the lower back muscles. This applies to machine work too, such as precision sawing at the bandsaw.

Try this: pick up the saw, channel your inner Bruce Lee, and concentrate much more on your stance and core activation – stable, not stiff; intent, not mushy. You may surprise yourself to find following the line is easier and more natural than if you think just about your arm and the saw, forgetting about the all-important core. Be Bruce grabbing the cobra.

The core matters in sawing. I leave it to you to do the homework. 

All would be right in the world of woodworking if we could saw perfectly to the line every time. Joinery would fit directly from the saw, everything would assemble neatly, we would never grow old, and pay no taxes. In the meantime, however, let us consider some ways to improve this ubiquitous woodworking task. The uncommon tips in these posts apply not only to hand sawing, but also machine sawing without a fence such as might be done with the bandsaw.

We know the basics: an appropriately designed, good quality saw, straight, properly sharpened and set. The work piece is securely held in an ergonomic position. The sawyer grips the saw properly with good hand-shoulder alignment, and produces even strokes engaging the length of the saw.

Tip #1: Consider the line and what it means.

The idea here is to have mental clarity as to just what the line represents and thus how you will saw in relationship to it. Mental clarity precedes physical success.

Consider several scenarios.

If the line is produced by drawing against a template as in, for example, sawing curved legs from rectangular blanks with the bandsaw, then the entire line is in the waste wood. If you split the line with the saw, there remains a half-line of extra wood to remove saw marks and fair the curve. If you want more margin for clean up, make a chunky line and saw right up to it without touching it. The key is to be clear about what you are aiming for and why.

If you use a pencil to mark out pins from the tails you’ve sawn, the line is fully in keeper wood. If you split this line, the pins will surely be too small. If you saw to one side of it, and no more, things should work out fine.

If a part is marked to length by registering it with the end of another part which is thus used as a template, the line will be fully in waste wood. Splitting it with the saw will make the resulting piece too long, but perhaps this is a desired allowance to allow for shooting it just right. Sawing to fully remove the line would be an attempt to produce an exact match from the saw. Again, the intent should be thought out beforehand.

As another example, I set my mortise gauge so the two points are at exactly the width of the mortise and mark out the tenon with this setting. I run a pencil line so the point rubs against both sides of the “valley” of the scribed line. I then know that if I split this line with my saw, the tenon will be just right.

Visually, I find it easiest to split a line with the saw. The visual cue is that as the cut proceeds I can see half of the line remains next to the kerf, and this remainder looks half as wide (easy to estimate) as the uncut line ahead. When sawing to one side of a line, it is easy to be too timid and leave extra wood, though if this is not excessive it may work out fine, allowing for a bit of clean up. Sawing to completely remove a line, but no further, is visually difficult since the result looks the same if you have done it just right or if you have sawn too far into the keeper wood.

The key is to be clear about the “context” of the line and anticipate the next step in construction. In all of these matters, the concept of one-sided tolerance is most helpful.

Using a straightedge is easy, right? Yes, but it does pay to use a technique that is both practical and consistent with the tolerance to which want to work.

Pictured above are, from front to back, a 6″ Bridge City rule, the 18″ beveled Starrett #385, the 24″ unbeveled Starrett #380, and a Lee Valley 50″ aluminum straightedge. The photo below shows the thicknesses, from left to right, of the 6″ rule, a Starrett combination square blade, the #385, and the #380. The Lee Valley is about 7/16″ thick at its base. 

Let’s look at three techniques for using a straightedge and consider some of the related features of different straightedges.

1. Eyes won’t lie

This is the way a straightedge is usually thought to be used. You simply hold the tool against the surface and look for gaps against a light. Done properly, this allows the eye to easily detect gaps of 0.0005″ (half a thou) or less.

It is helpful to use a diffuse, linear background light, such as a fluorescent bulb, and a thin edge against the work, such as a beveled edge. If a wider edge is used, ensure that your line of sight is parallel to the surface. A false impression of accuracy will result if the light under a gap is blocked from view simply because there is an angle between your line of sight and the width of the tool’s edge.

This technique can be awkward and tiring because you have to hold the tool and the work up to the light, or bend and maneuver to view a stationary surface. It is good for testing a plane sole or other small, very precise work. The #385 or an accurate small rule are good choices. Avoid tipping the straightedge which can introduce errors caused by any slight bow of the tool along the length of its face.

2. Shim it, shim it again

Here you lay the straightedge on the surface and use feeler gauges to seek out gaps. Look for hollows near the middle of the tool, but also press down near an end to check for gaps at the opposite end created by a bump somewhere in the middle.

A good way to work to a specific tolerance, say 0.001″ for a plane sole that you are lapping, is to put a leaf gauge under a wide-edged straightedge, and then gently pull the leaf to see if it drags the straightedge or slips through freely. The former indicates you are within tolerance (as long as there was no previous rocking of the straightedge), the later indicates a gap. Decide how large and where you can tolerate errors.

This technique is also handy to test a tablesaw top or jointer bed which you cannot lift and where bending is difficult or impossible to get your line of sight parallel to the surface.

The #380, or any tool with a similar wide edge, is a good choice for this technique.

3. Swing it easy

The first two techniques are slow and almost always overkill for wood preparation. So here’s the quick, easy, practical method that I suggest for dressing stock.

Set the straightedge on the wood, grasp and unweight one end, but do not lift it, and gently swing it along the surface. See where the tool “grips” or pivots. If it pivots just barely at the opposite end, the surface is slightly concave. If it pivots somewhere in the middle, you’ve got a bump. In woodworking, bumps are generally undesirable so you work with a one-sided tolerance, flat or a trace concave. You’ll quickly get the feel of this method.

Here is where a heavy, wide-edged, metal straightedge gives you a nice feel on the wood. The steel Starretts or the big Lee Valley aluminum work well.

This is convenient – no lifting or unclamping the work – and it quickly tells you what you want to know – that one-sided tolerance. It allows you to work in rhythm with your craftsman’s intuition.

In conclusion, the straightedge, while the simplest of tools, requires matching the technique to the task.

That title may make my spam-comment filter work overtime. Anyway, this post continues the discussion of managing figure in wood. Let’s look at the orientation of the annual rings in the rectangular blanks from which curved legs will be cut. Short sections of Douglas fir will be used to illustrate the principles.

All of this refers to legs which curve in three dimensions (planes). The curves may be cut on all four faces (e.g., a cabriole leg) or just two adjacent faces. Legs in which the curves are cut only on two opposite faces are curved in only two dimensions (picture the leg sandwiched between two flat sheets of plywood) and are a somewhat different matter. Bent lamination legs are an entirely different matter. Please do not ask me about legs which alter the time-space continuum.

The photo above shows the three possible basic orientations. The dot on the end grain indicates the inside corner of the legs. The two faces adjacent to this corner usually each have a flat portion where the aprons are attached with mortise and tenon joints.

In the three legs, from left to right, consider the endgrain patterns:

• The annual rings are approximately parallel to one face and perpendicular to the other, producing one flatsawn face and one quartered face.
• The annual rings are approximately 45° to all four faces and run “across” the inside corner.
• The annual rings are approximately 45° to all four faces but run parallel to an axis from the inside corner to the outside corner.

For simplicity, I cut the curves into two adjacent faces. The effects would be the same if curves were cut into all four faces such as in a cabriole leg.

Let’s look at the results.

The leg on the left is bad news. The irregular figure produced by cutting a curve into the flatsawn face is unpleasant in itself, and the inconsistent figure among the faces distracts from the shape of the leg.

The middle leg is an improvement but, to my eye, the figure lines fight the curves of the legs. There is too much run-on and run-out of the annual ring lines.

I like the leg on the right. By cutting the blank from approximately 45̊ riftsawn stock and orienting the growth rings in this way relative to the inside corner, a good lookin’ leg arises. The shape of the leg (though uninteresting in this example) coordinates with the figure.

Here are closer views: 

Note that another disadvantage of the leg on the left is the exaggerated consequence of a small knot intersecting the cut line. Small pin knots, such as are common in cherry, can be difficult to avoid, but the middle leg demonstrates that they will have much less consequence with that grain orientation.

It is hard to find a thick, purely riftsawn board from which to make leg blanks, but most fairly wide flatsawn boards contain some effectively riftsawn stock toward the sides. I examine the end grain and face grain and carefully select the best sections of such boards. I pay attention to the straightness of the figure along the length of the board, recutting the edge to “straighten” the figure lines if necessary. I also try to somewhat coordinate bends in the figure with bends in the leg design.

Of course, you can choose however you like to use figure, but the key is to be aware of it and manage it. Making your design and the beauty of the wood work together, each enhancing the other, can bring class, beauty, and quality to your woodworking projects.

Happy woodworking to you.