Drawer Slips

[jacon4]

OK, i am throughly confused now. Glue blocks on the drawer bottom? I dont get it.

[gvforster]

glue blocks on drawer bottoms- see John Seymour furniture

[Chuck Bender]

To help clear up the confusion a bit, I've posted pics of the drawer bottom construction. These are the photos I took of the original piece that Glen copied for the article.

In the first picture, you can see that the drawer bottom is beveled on the edges and the glue blocks fasten the bottom to the rabbeted drawer sides. In the second photo you can see how the glue blocks run the length of the drawer. The drawer bottom on this particular piece is nailed into the drawer front but I've also seen the front beveled and glue blocked as well. If this still doesn't make sense, let me know and I'll see if I can post something that's clearer.

http://www.acanthus.com/SAPFM/IMG_0613.JPG

http://www.acanthus.com/SAPFM/IMG_0624.JPG

[Adam Cherubini]

Thanks Chuck.  That's a huge help.

What I'm seeing looks like standard Philly/London drawer construction to me.  Only difference between this piece and others I've described is the rabbeted drawer sides.

Don't mean to sound snarky in any way- I don't understand what the reluctance is to recognize this as true period construction.  So many of my friends insist drawer bottoms were let into grooves plowed in the drawer sides and that just isn't so.  I'm sure somebody did that in the 18th c, but I don't think I've ever seen it.  Nailed up bottoms seem quite typical.  Secondly, when shown this sort of construction, I don't understand why guys don't reproduce it.  I think guys have decided these nailed up bottoms are a terrible idea and therefore never existed.  What's funny about this is every one of these I've seen is in as good shape as this one.

Thanks for clearly this up for us Chuck. You rock.

Adam

[jacon4]

Chuck,
Neat, thanks for taking the time to provide pic's, it's alot easier to understand when one can see a photo as opposed to text only when describing a construction detail. Although i am not familar with Philly/London drawer construction, if Adam says it is typical, thats good enough for me.

I have seen & own 18th century period pieces with drawer bottoms both  nailed on directly to drawer sides and with a slot cut into the drawer side to accept the drawer bottom. I think  construction details depended mainly on where the immigrant was trained, there were differences in joinery technique between England & Germany for instance.

I didnt know that many of todays woodworkers deny that nails were used to attach drawer bottoms, maybe it's like paint decoration, many dont like it either so it NEVER HAPPENED! LOL

[Jack Plane]

I concur; from the early eighteenth century, drawer sides had shallow rebates (rabbets to you) in the lower internal edges to accommodate the drawer bottoms and drawer runners which were glued into the rebate. The front edges of the drawer bottoms were let into a groove ploughed into the inside bottom face of the drawer fronts and the back of the drawer bottoms were nailed to the under side of the drawer back.

Incidentally, I have also seen the drawer runners made up with short (presumably scrap) pieces of wood.

Drawer slips didn't appear until the early nineteenth century.

[Chuck Bender]

The short blocks is the usual way I see this type of drawer construction. The photos I posted were, in my opinion, odd construction using only a single block up each side. Sometimes the front was rabbeted as well and the drawer bottom blocked as it is along the sides.