Good Dawgs

As some of you may know, I've built most of my back bench, and I've put a few dog holes in it. I've used the holdfasts in the dog holes, but I need some bench dogs.

There are a lot of them on the market;

Lee Valley makes these


Lie Nielsen's are here


Ulima ones

I also found these dogs, made from wood, with a catch on the side.....

.... I like the idea of a spring, not a catch, because at a certain point the catch would no longer work, as it would be above the table.

Lee Valley also makes the "Wonder Dogs", which are VERY cool, and I'll own some one day, but they are not quite what I want, I just want some bench dogs for now.

I'd rather have wooden ones, so I decided to make some up myself


Using the magnetic featherboard, I cut my pieces at 22mm, my holes are 21mm, this give me just a bit of wiggle room, as you will see.


Once cut to 22mm square, I then use the tablesaw to cut a groove down the middle of each piece, just a little over half way through the piece (say 12mm deep).


With the groove cut, I then cut the long pieces in half, as it is a LOT safer/easier to do these cuts on these thin pieces with longer stock.

Over to the lathe.........

Point #1:


Point #2: So far you've used a TS, and now you're going over to the lathe... Errr, are you in the wrong sub-forum, Stu? (Neander)

On the lathe, I'm using a safety drive center headstock, this works well for this, as the point fits right into the groove, and the cup holds everything well.



I just rough out the dog, nothing special, smooth it to the 21mm size, I can take it on and off the lathe and check it in a dog hole.


Next I cut a thin piece of wood to fit into the groove.


I cut the piece so it just sticks out a bit proud of the groove on one end and slightly inset on the other. I just use my block plane to do this in the vice.


I then glue it in place at a very slight angle, so the one end of the thin strip sticks out from the groove about 1/4" Again, you can use the block plane to adjust the fit of the wooden strip into the side of the dog.


If you have not guessed by now, the thin wooden strip acts as a spring to keep the dog in position wherever you set it.

I'm not sure if I'll cut a flat on the top of the dog, like most of the metal ones have, may not need it

Well, that is what I came up with, I don't know if anyone else has done this, I could not find any pics or such, I have seen this over and over with "Square" dogs, but not round ones. In the last two pics you can see the spring compressed.

I hope someone finds this of use.

Cheers!

Art Mulder said:

Point #1:


Point #2: So far you've used a TS, and now you're going over to the lathe... Errr, are you in the wrong sub-forum, Stu? (Neander)

Click to expand...

I'm using the lathe and the tablesaw to "Make" Neander tools