The Case for Cylindrical Tenons

For the last 22 years, I have switched back and forth with the type of mortise-and-tenon joint I use to join the legs to the seat in chairs.

At first, I used cylindrical joints, because I couldn’t afford a tapered reamer, and I didn’t know how to make a tapered tenon cutter.

But after Lee Valley began making reasonably priced reamers and tapered tenon cut…