The Morty
Back in June, I preordered the Morty Loose Tenon Joinery Jig from Woodpeckers. I received the jig about a week into February.
Five days after receiving the Morty, I received an email from Woodpeckers alerting me to a problem with the Guide Bushing Locking Ring. It was manufactured to be slightly too thick such that it would not fit in the storage rack. The new locking ring arrived on March 7.
Dear Valued Customer,
Thank you for your order of our Woodpeckers Morty Loose Tenon Jig. At Woodpeckers, customer satisfaction is something we take very seriously. Anything less than ensuring you are completely happy is unacceptable.
Unfortunately, we have identified an issue with some of the Bushing Nuts that have shipped out. The Bushing Nuts work in the Morty, but do not fit in the storage Rack-It.
Replacement Bushing Nuts are already being machined and will be sent out in the next week. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause you.
Sincerely,
Woodpeckers
Email from Woodpeckers
About a week ago, I finally got around to unboxing the Morty. I built a simple board to allow me to hang the storage rack on the french cleats I have on the walls of my shop. Then I used the jig to create a few test joints.
See here for more information on using french cleats for storage in your shop. Go here to see a tour of my shop where I use a lot of french cleat for storage.
What Is Loose Tenon Joinery
Loose tenon joinery is like a traditional mortise and tenon joint except that the tenon is not part of either part being joined. That is where the word loose comes from in the name. It is not because it is a loose joint.
Because the tenon is a separate piece, you must cut mortises in both parts being joined. The tenon is then cut to length and inserted into both of the mating pieces upon assembly.
You could also say that loose tenon joinery is similar to using dowels for joinery. In fact, the best way to describe loose tenons may be to say that they are a combination of dowels and mortise & tenon joinery.
See this article from Woodcraft for further discussion of loose tenon joinery and plans for a simple loose tenon router jig.
Mounting the Storage Rack on a French Cleat
The first thing that I did after unboxing the Morty was to build a simple board upon which I could mount the storage rack. This board included a cleat on the back so that the Morty could be hung on the french cleat storage that covers the walls of my shop.
This was a simple process and you can see what I did in the video embedded above. Basically, I found a scrap of 3/4″ plywood that was close to the size I need. After cutting it to size, I rounded over all of the edges and sanded the board smooth. I then attached a cleat to the rear of the board and applied a couple of coats of shellac. Once the shellac was dry, I attached the rack to the board and stored everything on the wall of my shop.
Actually, I did do one other thing with the board. Since I had two locking rings but only one would fit in the storage rack, I added a small dowel to the board to make a place to store the spare locking ring. All of this is shown in the video above.
Testing It Out
With the storage for the Morty taken care of, I moved on to making some test joints.
My first joint which isn’t shown or discussed in the video was not very successful. Basically, my technique with the router was horrible and the mortises I cut were too big. The tenon fit too loosely. The joint lined up fine and could have been salvaged if needed but it was sloppy.
My second test came out great. Everything lined up perfectly and the joint fit nice and snug. Unfortunately, this isn’t the one that I filmed.
My third joint came out almost as good as the second but my technique failed me again a little bit on one mortises. I let the router wobble a little too much causing the top of the mortise to widen out a little and creating a slight misalignment in one axis of the joint. Overall, it was still a nice tight fit but there was a slight misalignment along one edge after assembly.
All this showed me that even an expensive and well crafted jig cannot overcome poor tool technique. I do look forward to using this jig on my upcoming project to build a corner hutch.