Replies

1. 
   jazzdogg | Feb 28, 2005 11:16pm | #1

   A hollow mortising chisel, properly tuned and installed, will drill the square holes you want. You may have to spend a minute per mortise cleaning up the sides with a sharp chisel if your hollow chisel mortising bits leave a less-than-accceptable surface, but that's part of the "cost" of the look you're after. It'll probably take you as long to mill the ebony plugs, glue them in place, and profile their protruding tops as it will to bore your square holes. I'd suggest you bore a few square holes on some red oak scrap to test the fit of the square plugs, working out a system with which you can mass produce the ebony stock from which the plugs will be made. I profile the tops of my craftsman-style plugs, after they've been glued in place, using a suitably sized gouge.

   Good luck,

   -Jazzdogg-

   Whether you think you can, or you think you can't, you're right.

2. 
   Pondfish | Feb 28, 2005 11:33pm | #2

   There are two ways to do this efficiently.  One is to use a mortise chisel on the drill press (or dedicated mortise machine).  The problem with this approach is that the holes usually are not square: there will be small, rounded "half-moons" on the otherwise square sides.  These may be too small to notice if you are lucky.  Try a test with your set up to see.

   The second approach is to drill round holes, and taper the pegs to fit into them, keeping the last part square.  The peg is tapped into place, with the square part in effect crushing its way in (with a hard wood for the peg, it will do this easily).  You then trim the peg to have a pyramid top.  The problem with this approach is it takes some skill to do it, and of course, you have to round off every peg. 

   Good luck!  Pegged MT joints are very strong if made correctly, and having a contrasting peg is a nice arts&crafts touch.

   Paul

    

3. 
   Peter36 | Mar 01, 2005 12:42am | #3

   Hi. I did exactly what you are describing myself. I chose the hand tool method but there are sure faster ways. If you use your mortising attachment then for sure do some practice runs. I would set up a fence with 2 different settings. First setting would do all the outside holes, second setting all the inside holes. I would also mark all the center lines of the holes with a marking gauge first and punch the center of the holes with an awl. This will keep your mortising bit more in line, and help avoid the rounded out portions. I would also just drill about half way into the material , that's as deep as you need to go. I milled my ebony to size [just a hair bigger than the hole] and tapped it in place with some glue. I had a scrap of 3/16 ply wood that I mortised a hole in that I would set over the long piece of ebony and used a flush trim saw to cut it off. After they where all plugged and cut off, I took a piece of mylar and cut a square hole in that. I would place that over the ebony piece and then I used a file to chamfer the edges to become like a pyramid. If you are going to leave the ebony flush then watch out for sanding because the ebony tends to stain the other material. I have found that planing is a better option. Good luck and let me know if you have any more questions.  Peter

   
4. 
   Dale | Mar 01, 2005 01:20am | #4

   I used Paul's second method, it's tedious work!  See picture

   
5. 
   3fingers | Mar 01, 2005 01:26am | #5

   White oak panel with ebony plugs.

   
6. 
   Bear | Mar 01, 2005 04:27am | #6

   Paul has the right approach as his second method. Drill round holes,3/8 in dia. Make some square strips 3/8 sq. from hardwood, this is way ebony works well, because the harder the better. Use a pencil sharpener to put a point on the ebony, glue and bang home. Cut off the pin proud and shape with a chisel.

   Bear

1. 
   jazzdogg | Mar 01, 2005 05:46am | #7

   One small caveat: when inserting small square pegs in round holes, it's easy for the pegs to shift so their flat sides are no longer parallel to the cabinet components. It works, but you've got to be a little more careful - definitely recommend practicing on scrap before tackling the real project.Good luck,
   -Jazzdogg-

   Whether you think you can, or you think you can't, you're right.

1. 
   DonC | Mar 02, 2005 07:36pm | #12

   To prevent the pegs from shifting, I hold them in p[ostiion with an open end wrench while tapping them into the recess.

2. 
   Pondfish | Mar 01, 2005 06:44pm | #9

   A pencil sharpener -- darn, I never thought of that.

   To round the pegs, I put them in a drill chuck and held 100 grit sandpaper to the stem to round it.  Worked fine, though ebony dust is nasty.

    

1. 
   pizza | Mar 02, 2005 08:32pm | #13

   One of the popular woodworking catalogs has a drill bit that matches the point on a pencil (which is 16 degrees), check out those. Like Rockler, or Lee Valley , I forget exactly which one.

7. 
   slattekd | Mar 01, 2005 06:11pm | #8

   I am in fact completing a Greene and Greene table with rounded domed square plugs which are largely decorative. On the first set of tables I built, I drilled holes, squared them up with a chisel, machined dark walnut into square stock to fit the holes, glued and drove them home and sawed them off proud of the surface. After that I had the horrendous job of shaping them in situ. The rounded domed plugs required a lot of effort to shape then go through the sanding grades to smooth.

   On the current project, I blew the dust off of my never used hollow chisel mortiser and quickly made the large number of square holes I needed. Then after machining the walnut stock to fit, I modified my technique by preparing the domed ends on the stock before cutting them to length just shy of the depth of the square holes then drove each mini plug home to the depth I needed for uniformity leaving the dome above the surface. I am much more satisfied with this approach and it saved me tremendous time and effort. The mortiser ensured that all square holes were uniformly sized I did not need stock of various subtly different sizes to fit the slightly different hand made holes that I ended up with before.

   By the way, I have found that walnut end grain ends up black as night when it takes on the finish....and cannot be differentiated from ebony by most observers!

   
   

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   Edited 3/1/2005 10:56 am ET by slattekd

8. 
   mike4244 | Mar 02, 2005 03:18am | #10

   If the square pegs stand proud of the stiles, then the round hole idea will work fine. If the pegs are to be flush, then the hole has to be squared, or at least the top uppermost part of the hole has to be square.

   Possibly , after boring the holes you could use a sabre saw to the line, then file  pare with a chisel or sand the holes edge. You would have to nibble away with a fairly fine tooth blade.Then the peg could be entirely square. Might be worth a try in a piece of scrap.

   mike

1. 
   cowtown | Mar 02, 2005 10:34am | #11

   Well. after being faced with the problem of cutting a bunch of 1/2" mortices on an existing stair stringer to accommodate some steel balusters, and having spent a coupla days looking for the morticing atachment that would acommodate angles, and be site usable, modifying my mortice attachment so it would fit on a 1/2" makita drill, it finally dawned on me. It's only a freakin chisel, you can hit it with a mallet. For that job, I bought a cheapo 1/2" mortice chisel (ain't they all cheap nowadays??) and drilled a 1/2" pilot hole and wacked away. Worked quite well- I would use the methodology againDrawbacks? the cheapo steel points on the mortice chisel did flare out, but were simply honed back to flat with a pocket hone. The cheapo steel of the shank of the mortice chisel also mushroomed. It ain't ever AGAIN gonna fit in any imported drill press mortice attachement. That may actually be a good point. Just a "down and dirty" methodology of achieving results. No drill press necessary, besides it wouldn't be able to deal with an on-site stair stringer. In retrospect, none of the tool mongers round mytown were able to solve my tool needs for this job, nor offer creative suggestions to solve it. Not even the stair folks. The answer was within me, and was exquisitly simple, and also inexpensive. The take home message is that you can use mortice chisels as regular chisels and hit em with a mallet. Duh! eh?I know I ain't the only one to have hit on this solution, cause I have since observed it's application in a couple of other balustrades. Eric in Cowtown