This will be the last job I do before we move, a friend from church asked if I'd be interested in repairing her grandfathers dining table, it's a nice piece, I've always liked the mid century dining elegance. I am deciding how to repair this and what steps I'll take. I have the leg base off to the side, the top is beautiful, the table is mahogany, and the top is a substrate with Mahogany veneers and a boxwood banding on the edge separated by an inlay.
I've proposed two methods for repair to the owner, one is to duplicate the turnings from scratch, but as you can see the dowel joint was a bad design, and left it prone to breakage as it did.

Or, I can cut the damaged portions down to the good wood, and make up the height with an ornamental block of mahogany for both sets of legs so they are the same.

This'll be fun!

I dug in a little with AI, according to AI in the 50's through early 60's they used Urea-Formaldehyde or PVA (Tightbond), so the joints could be a bear to separate, and I'll have to do some separating on other parts of the table. Production was in high gear during this time for this North Carolina manufacturer, and they started using the modern glues. There is a small chance it's assembled with animal hide glue, so here is my question to the community.

Does this sound correct for determining which glue is present?

Perform the Alcohol or Vinegar Test

Because you cannot identify the exact batch choice visually, you need to apply a small amount of liquid to a hidden bit of squeeze-out on the joint to see what breaks it down:

• If it is Hide Glue: Dabbing a small amount of rubbing alcohol or warm water onto the joint will cause the adhesive to turn slightly tacky, gummy, or soft within a few minutes.

• If it is Urea-Formaldehyde or PVA: Alcohol will have zero effect. Instead, applying warmed white vinegar will slowly begin to break down the bond and turn it chalky or soft.

Interested to see what you choose to do.

2 minutes ago, lew said:

Interested to see what you choose to do.

Welp, just got done talking to the owner, and she wants me to get creative and do the blocking, trim down the damaged parts to good wood, and cut down the turnings on the good leg assembly so it's all visually equal, and make up the height with mahogany blocks. I'll blend the blocks in so they look period correct.

Turning a replacement part is pretty much a cut and dried procedure. I presume the parts connect to the leg base via a dowel connection, so that could go past the repair part. As a matter of fact you could turn the part with integral dowel on both ends. The top looks to be in excellent shape.

Heating the part at connection point with a hot air gun will soften a joint held with hide glue but not PVA. It does take some patience and care not to actually burn the wood.

11 hours ago, Gerald said:

matter of fact you could turn the part with integral dowel on both ends.

That's brilliant Gerald!

11 hours ago, Gerald said:

Turning a replacement part is pretty much a cut and dried procedure. I presume the parts connect to the leg base via a dowel connection, so that could go past the repair part. As a matter of fact you could turn the part with integral dowel on both ends. The top looks to be in excellent shape.

I think that would be a stronger solution,

I agree guys, after settling into the project and pulling parts apart, I'm going to duplicate the section and turn round tenons integral with the piece, thanks Gerald! I'll do a practice run first.

The legs and turnings are African Mahogany, through a bit of research I learned Sapele is purt near close, and I have some on hand.

Sounds like a plan. Assuming from the early photos that the dowel extends down a bit further into the leg. That is one of the methods I used to repair broken parts.

When a cross grain break occurs in a leg or spindle:

• Pick a side with some turnings/details (side A)

• Drill into that piece past the turning

• Cut off at the turning point

• Glue the cutoff back on to the other side (side B)

• Use the hole already drilled iin the cutoff to drill into the other side (side B)

• Glue and insert a dowel spanning both sides A & B, a little glue on the cut line won't hurt

This is much easier than trying to center a hole in two sides with uneven grain breakage.

@KEITH you are saying not to make the dowel integral to the piece?

Some progress images

In my post above I tried the story stick method and chucked up some Ash I had laying around, not great for turning but it's only practice, my first run was horrible, I am not a turner.

Feeling defeated I figured I'd try a template, so since the section has to be cut off anyway, I went ahead and cut it off cleanly by hand, I went around the circumference with my hand saw and slowly cut from all sides (circles don't have sides) and moved into the center for the final cut and came off with a pretty straight section.

The turning was originally halved, you can see the glue line.

(Correction, per Gerald in post below, two halves were glued up to make a turning blank for these spindles originally. Thanks Gerald!)

I took it to the disk sander and sanded half away for a clean profile so I could trace for a template.

I traced, and filed till I have a template I can use at the lathe.

Not bad!

I still have some tuning up to do, but it's pretty near close, I think I'll run one more practice and then move on to the Sapele. The practice piece below has some bulk that needs to be removed, and in one area I removed too much. I am impressed I got it this close.

Per Gerald's suggestion, the round tenons are being used instead of a dowel. I tried to wrap my head around Keith's suggestion but my pea brain couldn't grab it.

The good leg base at the rear of this image is what I am shooting for. Like I said, the last practice is close, but not good enough, I think my next practice run will look more refined and delicate as the original does. Thanks for following!

Looking good, John!

I've often used one of these to duplicate profiles-

Of course nothing is better than being able to create it directly from the original

10 minutes ago, lew said:

I've often used one of these to duplicate profiles-

Dang Lew! I forgot all about those thangs, my dad had em all over the shop it seemed as a kid, I loved just playing with them, I'd stick it on my face and get a profile of my nose.

But ya, I'll have to get one of those, thanks for the reminder!

Actually John it was not two pieces turned . It was a glue up to get the right size timber. Note most furniture is not solid but is some kind of a glue up , I would guess it is for both economy and stability. It would take a long time to get a thick piece dry enough to turn so they use the 1x kiln dried and glue up whatever size is needed.

Actually, circles have 2 sides: inside and outside.

On 7/16/2026 at 7:31 PM, John Morris said:

@KEITH you are saying not to make the dowel integral to the piece?

Just a related repair method. What you did in later photos looks great.

11 hours ago, Gerald said:

Actually John it was not two pieces turned . It was a glue up to get the right size timber.

That's a big DUH isn't it Gerald! Jeez, why was I thinking it was two turned halves, I tend to over complicate at times, thanks for that correction Gerald, and I'll correct it in the post too so we don't mislead anyone. Thanks sir!

2 hours ago, kmealy said:

Just a related repair method. What you did in later photos looks great.

Thanks Keith!

I got it pretty darn close. I feel like smoking a cigarette after that one, and I don't smoke!

Looks mighty good from here!