556 6
readjust the depth of cut before cutting the last two mortises.
I used a wheel cutting gauge to defi ne and mark the shoul-
ders of the tenons. The fi ne cut left by the gauge is actually
the fi nished edge of the shoulder. I made the cheek cuts for
the tenons on the table saw using a tenoning jig that rides
the saw’s fence, and used the sliding crosscut table to cut the
shoulders.
To avoid over-cutting the tenon shoulders, I left a little bit
of material on the inside corner. I used the cutting gauge to
remove this and refi ned the fi t of the tenons with a paring
chisel and a rasp.
The groove for the panels continues beyond the tenons, so
I needed to cut a haunch on the sides opposite the groove in
the top and bottom rail tenons. Using my adjustable square, I
set the stock on the edge of a rail, and dropped the blade into
the groove.
This provided the exact dimension for the haunch without
measuring. I then placed the end of the square against the
shoulder and marked the cut line. After marking the width of
the haunch, I made the cuts with a dovetail saw. In addition
to fi lling in the groove, the haunch serves to keep the faces of
the rails and stiles aligned.
The Focus of Attention
The panels of the door presented an aesthetic problem. I
started with one piece of material, 1^3 ⁄ 16 " thick and 7" wide.
I resawed it down the middle and planed the two pieces to
a finished thickness of^1 ⁄ 4 ". My original plan was to use one
piece for the center panel, and rip the other in half for the
two outer panels.
The grain pattern was straight on one half of the panel,
but the other half contained a cathedral arch at the bottom.
The three panels together wouldn’t have looked right with an
arch on the left, an arch and straight grain in the center, and
straight grain only on the right-hand side.
My solution was to bookmatch the panels, so I fl ipped one
piece over, and glued the straight-grain portions together in the
center. After the glue dried, I made two rip cuts in the panel,
leaving a wide, straight-grained section and two narrow pieces
with mirror-image arches in the lower corners.
I assembled the door in two stages. First I put the center pan-
el in place ,and glued and clamped the two intermediate stiles
between the top and bottom rails. I let this sit in the clamps
over a long lunch, and then inserted the outer panels, brushed
glue in the mortises of the stiles and completed the assembly.
I did this to help keep the door square. The glue on the
interior joints had set, and held the top and bottom rails in
position as I glued on the outer stiles. I only had to keep an
eye on a few joints rather than wrestling with several clamped
in opposing directions.
Finish by hand. A few cuts with a chisel complete the end of the dado for the top and bottom shelves. The front edge of the shelf is notched and ends^1 ⁄2"
past the end of the dado. The notch is cut by hand with a dovetail saw.Drop-in measurement. With the adjustable square sitting on top of the
groove in the stile, the blade is bottomed out to obtain the exact measure-
ment for the depth of the groove.Dual-purpose tool. The cutter on the gauge removes the remaining mate-
rial where the tenon cheek and shoulder meet. After scoring it with the
gau g e , p ar e w i t h a c his e l.5 52-59_Greene&GreeneMedicineCab.indd 56 2 - 59 _Greene&GreeneMedicineCab.indd 56 3 3/25/13 9:56 AM/ 25 / 13 9 : 56 AM