Typical Dovetail Angle

Historically in the western tradition dovetails would be made with an angle of 16 for softwood and 18 for hardwood. Does the angle of a dovetail affect the strength of the joint or is it just cosmetic. A dovetail joint or simply dovetail is a joinery technique most commonly used in woodworking joinery carpentry including furniture cabinets log buildings and traditional timber framingnoted for its resistance to being pulled apart tensile strength the dovetail joint is commonly used to join the sides of a drawer to the fronta series of pins cut to extend from the end of one board.
typical dovetail angle

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Dovetail 23842 a480 a1240 b1660 660 workpiece cl.

Typical dovetail angle. Ok call me lazy. Double angle shank cutters single form threadmills in this example dovetail 23842 has an included angle of 480 and will leave a 660 angle off the horizontal of a workpiece. For additional included angle conversions please see the following page. If you have to machine a dovetail to match an existing feature you have to take accurate measurments to ensure a good fit.

I did a search on dovetail and read about 100 posts. Ive looked at photographed and cut many dovetails throughout my days as a woodworker book author and magazine editor. This has a number of advantages not the least of which is that it translates into dovetail jig ease of use by an operator. Dovetail angles are often described by the ratio of rise to run.

Ive seen 70 90 and 140 dovetail bits and even one that was 750. Many times small articles are cut 60 or 45 degree dovetails for simplicitys sake becuase they are a stock cutter angle even though another angle might be a better choice for the service. Ive written on this blog at least once in the past that the angle used for dovetail layout is in no way consistent in antique furniture construction you can find almost any slope or angle if you take the time to examine a handful of pieces. This equates to about 95 degrees and 71 degrees from normal to the end of the board or basically 95 or 71 degrees away from being a finger joint instead of a dovetail.

But where the loads tend to force the dovetail angles apart tilting loads both on the saddle the top of the knee as when a bp table is all the way to one side wiht a heavy vise part eg a sharper angle is probably better. Our theory was as the material gets thinner we would need a steeper dovetail angle to maintain the holding power. But i didnt find exactly what i was looking for. Dovetail angles are most notably described in degrees but is often stated as a ratio either 18 or 16.

According to at least one scientific study dovetail angles dont affect the strength of the joint and should just be chosen based on your bits and the aesthetics. Length of the dovetail bit varies from 14 up to 1 so the angle changes. What i want to know to be shown how that is to make a dovetail notch for a cabin just using a framing square. Box ways might be even better since there is no wedging effect as the loads increase.

My take on dovetail angles might appear to be strange but i have solid reasons for my choice if i do say so myself.