Today was a day of going slightly batty about battens:
An end view showing the connection more clearly:
It seemed like a suitable point to record a short video of some of the assembly process:
Done – in the sense of, ‘these aren’t coming apart again’:
It has to be handled very carefully, due to the susceptibility of POC to dent at the slightest provocation.
A look at the face of the door panel assembly:
There are decorative domed nails – chi-chi kanamono – to go on the front yet. They are unnecessary for any fastening purpose, however they are going on in an effort to maintain a continuity of aesthetic to the old gate’s paneled areas. On the old gate, mind you, the decorative nails were in fact concealing Phillip’s head screws, as there was no dovetail connection between the battens and panels. I have no further comment about that.
The upper and lower rails of the door are ready to be attached, however the stiles needed some more work yet, especially the left side stile which accepts the hinges. This was a tricky bit of work but came out well:
I found that a piece of 1/2″ copper pipe fit the hinge socket perfectly, which allowed me to gauge the alignment of the hinge leaf in two axes once it is inserted into its decidedly odd-shape mortise:
A view down the fixing pin hole for the hinge shows a slight drawbore present, which is just what I was after:
Then a look at how the decorative hinge plates would mount:
As these plates have a 90˚ inner arris where they fold around the inside front arris of the stile, I had to terminate the chamfering of the stile adjacent to the hinge plate, otherwise there would be a gap, which would look bad and be a place to trap dirt and moisture:
I could trim these transitions more squarely, though the gradual transition from sharp corner to 45˚ arris makes the most sense to me. May change my mind on that detail – I’ll assess later on when the door is all together.
I think these hinge plates look pretty nice against the planed POC:
That’s it for today’s news. Tomorrow should see me through the completion of the final assembly of the side door and a good amount of progress on the main doors.
Thanks for visiting the Carpentry Way. Post 67 is up next.
I am loving the door construction details. the dovetailed battens make tingle inside.
Chris
You make it look easy, but l know how cantankerous sliding dovetails can be.
Tom
Tom,
I'm just lucky, or maybe the wood gods were smiling, who knows?
~C
Hi Chris,
Do you taper those sliding dovetail joints? That is amazing hardware. Are we going to see how the plates and hinge sockets connect?
Peace,
Harlan Barnhart
Harlan,
good to hear from you. The sliding dovetails are not tapered.
I'll post up pics when I mount the hinge plates, etc.. Thanks for asking.
~C
Chris, you are very unkind to your hand when you use it as a mallet!
Tico,
oh, you are quite right about that. I don't rehearse the fitting before turning on the video camera, so I ended up, under the 'pressure' of the camera rolling, trying to put a batten in which was a hair tighter than expected. I don't make it a habit to use my hand like that, and generally employ a rubber mallet – it would have been better if I walked off camera and grabbed my mallet. Anyway, no hands were harmed in the filming!
~C