Relatively large-scale joinery with the Domino?

LLesniak

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Joined
Jan 22, 2007
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20
Fellow Festool Users,

As you may know from my previous posts I'm a builder of custom weaving looms and I use Festool products extensively in my work.  I'm currently building a large, heavy oak tapestry loom and I have a question related to using the Domino for a specific joint.  This is a model we haven't built in a long time (certainly not since I've owned my Domino hence the question today) and the joint in question has traditionally been done as a standard mortise and tenon but given the sizes of the pieces involved I'd like to explore using the Domino for this operation.  The pieces are an upright and a foot for the end assemblies of the loom.  The foot is 1 3/4" thick x 5" tall x 40" long while the upright is 1 3/4" thick x 6" wide x 83" tall.  The assembly is essentially a tall post on a foot to provide balance and the part forms the end of the loom.  The usual joint has the mortise cut into the foot using a hollow chisel mortiser with the tenon cut on the end of the upright using a radial arm saw or more recently a router and a jig.  It seems to me that this difficult process could be replaced with Dominos IF I could be sure that the joint would have sufficient strength.  What I'm thinking is to space a series of Dominos in two rows to complete the joint.  I'd use the longest possible Domino (50mm) but the thickness would have to be controlled as I don't want to reduce the strength of the leg-to-post joint.  Do you think two rows of 8 x 50 Dominos would be sufficient for this application?  The attached pictures show the loom and the joint in question just below the tenon into which I'm tapping the pin.  Hopefully these will help you to understand what I'm contemplating.  Any input and advice you could give regarding replacing the old mortise and tenon with Dominos would be appreciated!

Larry
 
I think these would be sufficient although I would like to see the multiple tenons made with the Dominos be in the tight hole position rather than have a space at each end of the mortise as would be in the Domino wider slot widths.  Perhaps a jig to accurately and consistently place the mortises for the Domino would be a useful addition to this approach.  If the tightness of the Dominos is maintained you would have a joint similar to the multiple mortise and tenons done on a Leigh FMT...  The weight/load seems to be transferred down the post and to the foot so I think sufficient strength can be achieved.

Best,
Todd
 
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