Marking out

[modernist]

I am making some fairly straightforward if heavy duty workshop cabinets to hold ginders and a mill drill with drawers below.

Construtuction is post and rail with offset over and under tenons into the posts and the posts and rails grooved to take rebated glued mdf panels for strength.

The front rails are not grooved owing to the drawers.

This lot, although simple, makes 16 rails with different combinations of offset tenon, groove and over or under which got fairly confusing when they were all in a pile awaiting machining.

Is there a standard way of marking such components to avoid mistakes to identify their position at least, short of marking each one out seperately?

Brian

[jfc]

Do you meen 16 batches or 16 singles ? In any case i number them . If 16 batches each batch gets put together and a line struck across them . If 16 different parts i number each male and female joint .

[engineerone]

you know brian you have opened a can of worms for which we must endure a jacob talk about rods


actually in this case, the rod does seem the most sensible method of ensuring accuracy.

having made mistakes myself, i think the other important thing
is to mark the pieces properly and keep to the system. however, this can later cause problems if you wish to finish before gluing up
one thing i have learnt is to mark on the ends of for instance the tenons, whilst if possible make a similar mark around the mortice.
since i have used shouldered tenons, i find this quite useful.

paul

[modernist]

It's just two units with 16 rails but I now realise they are all different owing to the offset tenons and higher top shoulder on the upper rails to leave longer grain in the post.

Having been persuaded by the arguements here I did use a rod for the first time and it was really good for lengths and shoulders etc but didn't help when it came to over and under tenon cut offs (which is where I went wrong) perhaps I haven't fully sussed the "rod" yet.

I'll do a few pics tomorrow to illustrate the problem.

Brian

PS to Mods

I'd written much more than this but answered a pm flag which wiped out my musings We need a save to draft auto option

[mrgrimsdale]

Yep - afraid so it does sound like a suitable case for a rod . "Spare the rod..." etc
And systematic face and edge marks, depending on the design i.e. all stiles and rails having edge/face marks facing in, or not, as appropriate.

cheers
Jacob
PS The face and edge marks are an essential part of the system i.e. gets the components oriented in a systematic way

[modernist]

I was wondering if there was a standard system like the triangle for frames which could be applied to framed and panelled carcasses?

Brian

[mrgrimsdale]

Rod + face and edge marks is the standard system.

[jfc]

So you only need four or eight with different offset shoulders ? Then just mark those . Woodwork is simple , why over complicate things .