Case work: Tail

After getting the bentside attached, I found I still had time for a little dessert, as it were, so I decided to attach the tail piece next. The only tricky part was to determine the bevel on the tail, which slips in behind the overhanging edge of the bentside. Some trial-and-error cutting eventually determined this to be 57 degrees. I found I also had to cross-cut the tail piece at 1 degree off square before cutting the bevel; otherwise a gap occurred where the two pieces met above the liners. Somehow things ended up slightly out of square, but the slight skew in the cut compensated nicely.

The glueup procedure was largely the same as for the bentside, but much more relaxed and without any bending required. I didn't bother pre-drilling the screw holes before gluing as I did with the bentside, as now there were only half a dozen to deal with compared to the 36 I drilled in the bentside.


The slotted rectangular plywood block is an idea I read about in several sources. I don't know if it has a proper name, but someone unofficially referred to it as a "jamb cleat". The liner and case material slip into the groove, then a couple of wedges are pushed in to provide clamping pressure. I installed one right at the point of the tail, a position that would be hard to clamp any other way:


The screws keep the cleat from sliding off the point as the wedge is forced in.