I recently acquired some mahogany, unfortunately it was full of screws. I had to use a ‘screw extractor’ to get them out, now it’s full of 3/8″ holes. I’d like to plug them with dowels but do not own a lathe – can I use a 3/8 round over bit in my router table to round over some stock fill the holes. Plugs are tapered so I don’t want to use them the wood is 2 by and I’d like to have it resawn into 1 by to make cabinets. Should I have it resawn before filling the holes?
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Replies
Yes , resaw before filling any defects to avoid the plugs tearing out .
If you turned dowels on the lathe seems you would have end grain showing on the face of the boards .
After the boards are resawn you could use a plug cutter / maker on the drill press and fill each hole with matching face grain plugs , they are not tapered plugs .The plug cutters come in a set of 3 sizes usually .
regards dusty
Thank you
Lie-Nielsen makes a heavy metal plate that you can use to make your own dowels in the standard sizes.
Cut square stock to rough size, pound piece through hole on plate to make a uniformed sized dowel.
I've got one, and it works fine -- I use it for making dowels in wood species that are not commonly available in dowel stock.
$50
http://www.lie-nielsen.com/catalog.php?sku=DP
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"It is what we learn after we think we know it all, that counts."
John Wooden 1910-
Hi nikki ,
Long time since I've seen your posts , where you been ?
Glad your back my friend
dusty , boxmaker
Use plug cutters. really simple and very fast! grain orientation is the correct way. works fastest on a drill press but you can use a hand drill as well! I plug cutter is a few bucks at Home depot and can cut thousands of plugs
Lee Valley makes sets of tapered plug cutters which work several orders of magnitude better than standard plug cutters.
View Image
The 3/8" size is listed at $16.90 (Canadian) on their website.
If you match and orient the grain carefully when you insert a tapered plug, the plug just plain disappears after you trim it flush and sand the stock. No tell-tale 'ring' at all. Awesome.
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