March 20, 2005
Dowelmax vs. The Biscuit
Some time ago, I posted about dowels, splines, and their kin (plus a completely random tangent about my finger near the end). A reader wrote in to say:
"You talk about this amazing DowelMax doweling jig. But I can get a cheap doweling jig for a lot less money, or a great biscuit joiner for the same price. Is it really worth it?"
The short answer is, YES. In terms of usefullness-per-dollar, this sucker is near the top of my list. It absolutely blows away the competition for accuracy, ease of use, speed, and strength. Pretty impressive for a hunk of machined aluminum.
A full review is forthcoming (the good folks at OMS Tool provided me with a sample so I could stop borrowing Mike's), but I wanted to share the results of one early experiment with you.
I have a pretty good biscuit joiner--a Freud JS100, to be exact. I decided to do a head-to-head, Biscuits vs. the Dowelmax comparison. This was pretty easy. I made two cuts in a walnut board, then doweled one and biscuited the other.
As a side note, I wasn't working particularly hard at aligning either joint, but the Dowelmax one came out perfectly flush anyway, while the biscuit was about 1/16th off. I applied glue to the biscuit and the dowels and clamped.
I waited a full week before giving it a smack. I grabbed the board firmly by both edges and slammed it down on a pipe in the center to distribute the force equally to both joints. It occurred to me that I might bruise my palms bashing this thing against the pipe, but on the very first smack:
I think that pretty much speaks for itself.
It'll take me a while to get the full Dowelmax review up, but if you can't wait, I'll give you a preview: sell your biscuit joiner for scrap metal and hawk the biscuits on street corners. Take your crappy doweling jig and raffle it off for charity. Do whatever you need to get yourself a Dowelmax. You'll thank me for it.
Posted by danshapiro at March 20, 2005 06:28 PM | TrackBackMaybe Im seeing something that others arent, but it looks to me like the biscuit slipped out of its slot, but the dowl broke.
Posted by: Jason at March 23, 2005 11:07 AMHm, the picture may have been confusing. Only the biscuit joint failed--I couldn't get the dowel joint to fail, even after much pounding. The biscuit was clearly properly seated. It snapped, and the glue joint between the smaller piece of biscuit and the wood failed, so the whole joint came free.
Posted by: Dan at March 23, 2005 11:22 AMAh, Im with you now. I was initially thinking "well, the biscuit just didn't set up and came out of the slot" but I see what you are getting at. I haven't had much luck with dowels, or biscuits for that matter. I usually end up using 1/8 to 1/4 wide grooves several inchs long that I put a scrap of mdf into, sort of a super biscuit. Ends up being pretty sturdy and they are about as easy as can be to cut on a router table.
Posted by: jason at March 23, 2005 08:34 PMNot to belabour the point, but... I had terrible luck with dowels too, until I tried the Dowelmax. :) One of the nice thing vs. a spline or a biscuit is that you get registration in two dimensions. That means it gets lined up top-to-bottom AND side-to-side. Biscuits and splines just do side-to-side.
Posted by: Dan at March 23, 2005 08:54 PM