TABL ES & C HAIRSTABLES & CHAIRS^114343
make up (two eyes, two arms, and two halves of a brain), or
through human experience (my brother Jim just got the bigger
half of the sandwich) but most people can accurately mark a
point halfway between two other points. The shorter the dis-
tance between the points, the more precise you can be. I can
barely see the^1 ⁄ 64 " marks on my Starrett ruler, but I can easily
see a point halfway between the^1 ⁄ 32 " marks. Try this yourself
and see how you do.
The proof, as my grandmother used to say, is in the pudding.
I darkened the gauge lines with a pencil to make them easier
to see. Here is the ready-to-cut tenon sitting on the mortise.
Good layout is essential to good joinery, but it’s easy to get
bogged down with methods that take forever. Look for tricks
to speed the process and the quality of your work will go up
as your stress level goes down.
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