For the making of the table top see edge-to-edge joint, [p. 172]. Dress up the top to size, taking special pains with the upper surface. If the grain is crossed, use the veneer-scraper, Fig. 151, [p. 92], then sand, first with No. 1, then with No. 00 sandpaper, finish the edges carefully, and attach to the frame.
For fastening the top to the table rails, several methods are used. The top may be screwed to the rails by the screws passing thru the rails themselves either straight up, Fig. 297, A, or diagonally from the inside, B, or thru blocks or angle irons, C, which are screwed to the inside of the rails, or thru buttons, or panel irons, D, which are free to move in a groove cut near the top of the rail. The last method is the best because it allows for the inevitable shrinkage and swelling of the top.
Chairs may be so simplified in form as to be possible for the amateur to construct. The two front legs and the rail and stretcher between them offer little difficulty because the angles are square.
The two back legs, may, for the purpose of simplification, be kept parallel to each other and at right angles to the seat rails between them, as in Fig. 298, A, and not at an angle as in B. The joining of the back will then offer little difficulty. The principal difficulties lie in the facts that for comfort and appearance the back of the chair should incline backward both above and below the seat, and that the back of the seat should be narrower than the front. By keeping at right angles to the floor the part of the back legs which receives the seat rail, the side seat rails will meet the back legs at a right angle in a side view, Fig. 298. The back legs should be slightly shorter than the front legs, as shown in D.
Fig. 298. Chair Construction.
The second difficulty involves the making of inclined mortise-and-tenon joints, A, where the side rails fit into the legs. The making of these can be facilitated by laying out a plan of the full size and taking the desired angles directly from that. It is common to reinforce these joints with corner blocks glued and screwed in place as shown in A. If there are additional rails below the seat rails, the easiest way to fit them in place is first to fit and clamp together the chair with the seat rails only, taking pains to have all angles perfectly true, and then to take the exact measurements for the lower rails directly from the chair. The same method may be used for laying out a stringer between the lower rails.
If it is desired to bow the rails of the back, which are above the seat rail, this can be done by boiling them in water for 30 minutes and then clamping them over a form of the proper shape, with a piece of stiff sheet iron on the outside, as in Fig. 299. They should be thoroly dried in a warm place. Then the tenons may be laid out on the ends parallel to a straight-edge laid along the concave side. The chair bottom may be made of solid wood, either flat or modeled into a "saddle seat;" it may be covered with cane or rush, or it may be upholstered.
