The Weakness of Joinery

Dismissing mitre joints and butt joints as non-joints, the mortise and tenon joint is the single most used joint used universally for just about any frame joinery you care to name in the world. No other joinery type come close. It was in the USA where I first heard of something the call "the thirds rule." which is not much of a rule at all and neither is it any kind of guide for new woodworkers to adopt. The time when a thirds rule might apply is when you use stock of equal thickness to make a mortise and tenon from and the best one might be 3/4" thick stock where the mortise might be a quarter-inch and therefore so too the corresponding tenon. It's a sensible equation for that scenario. It would also work for 1 1/2" thick stock, but I'd stop there. In 95% or more, we never have equality in component sizes. Legs are mostly square stock much heavier than the rails. Timber-framed buildings made from a mix of locally sourced temperate hardwoods have tenon-ended rails a fraction of the…

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