[mlundy57]

This question is for any and all of you who have used biscuits to line up the cabinet parts, including internal braces. How do you line up, mark and cut the biscuit positions so that you keep everything organized with each piece where it belongs so that when you glue up the box it comes out correctly?

Thanks,

Mike

[kc8apf]

I mark each board w/ which surface of the enclosure it is (top, bottom, left, right, front, back).  I generally do this during a dry fit before biscuiting.  Each marking is oriented so that it will read normally when the enclosure is standing upright and facing me (i.e. the marking for the bottom panel is on the inside surface with the bottom of the marking closest to the front panel).

I mark biscuit locations by holding the two boards in proper alignment and drawing a set of lines across the seam.  If you want to be fancy, slant the lines such that they taper inward at one end.  Since I do this by hand w/o measuring, the lines are _very_ unlikely to line up with any other board.

I haven't built anything that required precise alignment of internal braces yet.  I'll be starting a 12" sub when I get back from vacation that will need this.  I plan to mark the braces with numbers in order from front to back of enclosure.  Since the braces will meet the side panels at 90 degrees in the middle of the panel (forming a T), I'll need to make reference lines that follow one side of the brace in addition to the biscuit lines.  That way, I can position the biscuit cutter along the reference line and keep them all in a straight line.

[Hank]

In my many years of speaker building, I've never used nor needed biscuits or dowels or any "alignment" parts.  Just butt joints are all you need (but must have absolute accurate, 90-degree saw cuts.  Have fun.

[mlundy57]

Thanks.

I think for the N3TL's I'm going to lay out all four sides side by side, in order so I can draw lines for both brace B's and the Brace H and keep them lined up.  for the other braces I'll probably only use biscuits for attaching the races to their respective baffles.

So far I have used both butt joints and dowels. The dowels helped but actually made aligning multiple parts simultaneously difficult due to the lack of play.  Hopefully biscuits will help with this. I have been practicing with a biscuit joiner and think I have got the hang of it now. Of course this is after I employed the "when all else fails, read the directions" method.

The reason for the biscuits is to try and make the glue up process more accurate, less labor intensive and time consuming. Getting perfectly square pieces with my saws is a pipe dream. My portable job site saw, which I roll out into the driveway to make cuts, is plenty accurate for framing work and even finish work where moldings are used. However, it is not accurate enough for cabinet making so I cut my pieces a little oversize then even things up with a router and flush trim bit.

Mike

[Scott Trebble]

While not really necessary, I like using biscuits just because it makes the glue up process so much easier...  just like Mike wants.
The glue can make things slip and slide while you're trying to clamp it up, but the biscuits help to keep everything lined up.
Also, just like Mike mentioned, biscuits give you some wiggle room that dowels do not.

[jcotner]

If I'm hearing you right. Each piece of wood has a number, each biscuit slot has a letter.
So if a brace is #8 for example and there are three biscuits in that brace,
then the slots are #8A,#8B,#8C.
I then use something like the notation #8A->5J at the slot location to know how to
mate the boards when doing the glue up.
I don't use biscuits on speaker boxes but use them all the time on other cabinets
and this system can support a pretty complex box.
That's how I do it anyway, if the text description makes any sense.
I also use carry these numbers forward from my cut list.

[cody69]

For simple speaker cabinets, marking the pieces top, bottom, right… works fine as noted above. For more complicated pieces that have a lot of parts that need to be grouped together and oriented correctly for glue-up, centuries ago cabinet makers invented a marking system using triangles that allows the maker to pick up a part and immediately identify where the piece belongs.

The system gets taught to apprentice woodworkers and once used, becomes instinctive and automatic -- and is covered in the article below. You can search the web and find many articles and pictures on the subject. Good luck and have fun.

http://stuartfaulkner.files.wordpress.com/2013/01/trinagle-marking.pdf
 

[lacro]

This question is for any and all of you who have used biscuits to line up the cabinet parts, including internal braces. How do you line up, mark and cut the biscuit positions so that you keep everything organized with each piece where it belongs so that when you glue up the box it comes out correctly?

Thanks,

Mike

 I don't have a biscuit cutter so I just used my plunge router to PERFECTLY align spline groves. I cut the top and bottom grooves at the same time which assures perfect  alignment for the sides and braces. The top/bottom groves could be cut beforehand, while the top and bottom was one large piece of MDF. I didn't do it that way, but it would make it even easier.
 My 1/8" splines fit just snug enough to dry fit everything to allow me to check squareness before glue-up. I don't like dealing with the slipperiness of trying to glue without fasteners. I think using splines is a simple method that should assure success without frustration.

[mlundy57]

What seems to be working out so far for me is to identify each piece by position then number the joints i.e. the two pieces that make up a joint will have matching numbers on each side of the joint. 

Mike