Triway Woodworking

Using the straightforward process detailed here, you can crank out great-looking doors for many applications, including furniture, cabinets, and built-ins. Frames use 3/4"-thick stock with 1/4" panels in various materials and veneers. A general-purpose saw blade will do the job

Whereas solid wood shrinks and expands with changes in humidity affecting its overall dimensions, a frame and panel doesn't. Instead, the panel is able to expand and contract freely inside a unchanged frame.

It isn’t the fault of the tool. The truth is that most woodworkers don’t know the right techniques to make the most of their biscuit joiners, and there are some common attitudes and assumptions that hurt more than help, and don’t speed things up.

After admiring the double and double-double dovetail joints that are capable with the Incra and other jigs, I started thinking, “Why not try this by hand?”

Dovetails are probably the strongest method for joining two pieces of wood, surface to surface, with the grain running in the same direction.

The advantages of biscuit joinersTechnique 1: Join plywood with the bench reference methodTechnique 2: Support narrow face frame parts against a blockTechnique 3: Make biscuit joints in thin materialVideo: How to Use a Biscuit Joiner

dowel markers (dowel centers)

For rough knockdown or outside furniture, the tenon can be cut longer than the depth of the mortise, with a hole drilled into the protruding part of the tenon and a key driven close to the outer face of the member which has the mortise cut into it. When this is done, it is called a keyed mortise and tenon joint.

Make micro adjustments with a disc sander

Knock-off blocks for long miters

Customize a drafting square

The secret was torsion-box construction. A torsion box is a simple grid of slender ribs glued between thin plywood skins. It makes these shelves stiff and flat, yet incredibly light. This rigid architecture means torsion-box shelves won’t sag or twist, and they can be mounted without any external support.

11. Clamp the three shelf components together without glue, so you can check the fit of the miter joints. Use plywood braces to support the upper shelf and hold everything square. 

Project 1: Adjustable height sawhorses

Project 3: Flip-through tool rack