Broken chair back

15 years ago

Hi. I did that thing where you unthinkingly lean back in your chair because the angle of the chair back is wrong (because THE MAN thinks you should always be sitting up straight even if you want to lean back in a moment of satisfaction, or contemplation).

Snap.

Broke the back right where the main wooden back piece sockets into the seat.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/9591713@N06/3293119638/

(you can see some of the other dowels have also come out in that photo, but they just need to be glued back in.)

What to do about that main dowel..?

We've been thinking of driving a nice fat screw up from the bottom side of the seat into the broken dowel, with some glue to help. Any other thoughts?

Cheers,

FP.

Comment (1)

bobismyuncle
15 years ago
Adding a screw is the wrong approach.

Try this instead:
- Pick a strong dowel (I like hickory) with diameter 1/3 to 1/2 the diameter of the broken back.

- Clean the ends of the other, unbroken, spindles.

- From the top, approximate the angle of where the broken back went as closely as possible and drill from in the middle of the stub down through the bottom of the seat.

- Glue the fractured part back on, using epoxy, and let it set up. Glue the other spindles back into their holes; for this you can use regular carpenter's yellow or white glue.

- From the bottom run the drill back up through the hole you drilled earlier and into the back spindle about an inch.

- Glue a dowel up through the bottom. Let the glue dry and trim off the protruding part.
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