Looking for advice, horizontal boring, edge joining with dowels and glue

[edflorence]

Would love to hear of experiences from others with horizontal boring for large panels, or any other joinery method you want to mention here. Also, if anyone has had great luck with large panels without joinery, it would be useful to hear of those experiences as well.

Just a second thought or two to add to this thread: I have never drilled a series of dowel holes in a long workpiece, but I have more than once drilled mortices at different locations along the edge of a long workpiece, using sometimes the horizontal boring mode and sometimes the drill press mode. I will say that sometimes it is easier to keep the table from flexing by using vertical supports under it when in the drill press mode. Might be something to consider if you are worried about table flex or fence movement when drilling in horizontal mode.

As far as the large panels without joinery issue, it seems to me that the keys to success are jointing technique and clamping technique. I have done a number of large panels, up to about 24 inches wide by nearly 60 inches tall. This sometimes requires 2 or 3 glue ups, depending on the number of pieces in the panel. And the panels I have made have been forgiving in that the final thickness was not critical, and so that allowed for a bit of clean-up planing, sanding and scraping. I think if I were trying to make a panel whose thickness had to be a certain dimension, I would mill the stuff a bit thick, joint and glue as wide a panel as would fit my planer, plane to the required thickness and repeat as needed until the panel width was achieved.

[RFGuy]

Ed,

Thanks. All good tips and I hope all of this has been useful for Pete. Yeah, we talked about horizontal vs. vertical on a previous thread and I agree with you. I may get back to doing more with horizontal boring one day on my Mark V. Last time I used it, I did use the tip of clamping to the main table behind the fence to minimize slippage. I have never considered myself a "gorilla engineer", so I am always setting bolts to torque specs (no more) and that sort of thing. So, I am just not comfortable with increasing the fence adjustment more than I already have to prevent slippage in horizontal boring mode. Though I know this was suggested on previous threads. I may be too conservative on this, but so be it. For sure, when vertical mode is applicable and adequate support can be provided underneath the table, I agree with you and think this is the preferred solution. Sometimes I think we (Shopsmith owners) get caught up in the fact that it "can" do horizontal boring that we "must" do horizontal boring. IF one solution is more accessible/easier than the other, then it should be pursued.

[DLB]

... I am just not comfortable with increasing the fence adjustment more than I already have to prevent slippage in horizontal boring mode. Though I know this was suggested on previous threads. I may be too conservative on this, but so be it...

Do you lubricate your 520 fence cam locks? I use powdered graphite for this, I'm sure other dry lubes would work. I only ask because I know sometimes it feels tight when it isn't. I probably set mine kind of tight, but there isn't much lever arm there.

- David

[RFGuy]

Do you lubricate your 520 fence cam locks? I use powdered graphite for this, I'm sure other dry lubes would work. I only ask because I know sometimes it feels tight when it isn't. I probably set mine kind of tight, but there isn't much lever arm there.

- David

David,

Thanks, and no. You are right and bring up a good point. I lubricate basically everything else on the machine, but have adjusted the fence cam tension so infrequently that I haven't thought of that. Also a bit gun shy on overdoing tightening on this one since I have seen/heard of more than one who have had lever handles break off of their 520 fences. Certainly something to take a look at. Thanks.

[jsburger]

FWIW, I lubricate my 520 fence lever regularly. I use dry spray lube. I also almost never adjust the tension but I can sure tell when it is time to lubricate. The lever gets very tight to move. That could give one the sense that the adjustment is over tightened but it is not. The dry lube makes all the difference in the world.

[RFGuy]

FWIW, I lubricate my 520 fence lever regularly. I use dry spray lube. I also almost never adjust the tension but I can sure tell when it is time to lubricate. The lever gets very tight to move. That could give one the sense that the adjustment is over tightened but it is not. The dry lube makes all the difference in the world.

Thanks John. Good to know. I use dry lube a lot maintaining my mountain bike, but have been slow to incorporate it more on my woodworking machines. Definitely going to do this now. I just never had need to do this on my 510 fence mechanism so really haven't thought about it now that I have a 520 fence. Probably the only place I don't lubricate on the whole machine. Thanks.

[woodhead52]

Hey There! Miss Me? Hahaha

Man, you guys are going out of your way to educate me. So much good stuff here that I can see I'm going to be typing for a while. With that in mind, I'm going to back up a bit to acknowledge some things better than I did earlier. I'm going to try and hit the items that I found particularly helpful. That's not to say that I'm minimizing any of it, it's just that some of the information that's been shared covers things I already knew. So, I'll cover what I'm learning here and from other sources and I'll try and be clearer about what my intentions are, for now at least. So, to do this with some continuity I'm cherry picking bits of quotes from some what's been posted and then pasting them in order. Hopefully I don't make a mess of it. I'm not finding quoting in this forum so easy since this thread now spans a few pages and using the (") tab doesn't seem to allow me to then go back for more quotes. So, I'm sort of having to copy and paste. Here goes.

Regards,
Pete

Rarely have I ever had boards that came out perfectly flat (after planing and jointing) with no bowing or twisting that could impact edge to edge glue up. I find that some means of vertical alignment, e.g. dowels, dominos, etc. helps greatly on alignment for my glue-ups and tends to result in a more perfectly flat panel afterwards. I don't think going the route of horizontal boring with a Mark V is going to be easy to get bulletproof alignment for dowel joinery on a panel glue-up like this.

JMO,

I'm finally getting somewhere with my milling operations. I'm not saying that I have it licked, but I am saying that I'm pretty pleased with how well it's going. My jointer and planner efforts are yielding smooth flat and square edged boards. AT this point I've been dealing with pine, poplar and soft maple (which ain't that soft, ) I haven't tried to do anything fancy like rabbets on the jointer, but I have seen a couple videos by youtube influencers that show how to run two boards through together to get perfect edge joints and I'm going to give that a try next when I prepare some wood for edge gluing. Also, at this point again following the advise from folks like Steve Ramsey and others I plan to keep my individual boards fairly narrow like no more than 3-1/4" in width. As for length, I'm not going to begin by getting carried away. Somehow I think I gave the impression that I was planning on making a large table top, but for now I'll probably be limiting my first attempts to around 2' by 2', maybe 3'. I don't even have any real experience with a hand planning yet,but, it's all on table, so to speak.

Because, of all the good feedback I've received about dowels, loos tenons, biscuits, etc., I've been busy researching. More on that in a bit.

The inner faces of the cauls are covered with strapping tape or wax paper to prevent them from sticking to the glue, and some people recommend that the cauls be gently curved on their inner faces such that the center of the caul is about 1/4 inch or maybe 3/8 inch thicker than at the ends. That little bit of curve ensures good pressure along the full length of the caul.

Ed,
Thanks for bringing me this information about cauls. Here are two (2) links for anyone that is interested in seeing a couple of good little videos by Stumpy Nubs and WoodWorkWeb on the subject of cauls.

Well, I don't claim to have done a lot of doweling on the Mark V, but over the years I have done some. About a year ago I had to edge join some picnic table legs that were angled on the inner faces, and the glue-up required temporary clamping "ears" for the clamps to press against. Since the glue-up was going to be a little tricky, I decided to use dowels to make sure the pieces were aligned and did not slide around when I clamped them. With my 500 in horizontal drilling mode I clamped a board to the main table at the correct angle and drilled for the dowels.
The legs are redwood, so the drilling was easy and the clamped board provided enough resistance against the quill to keep the table from flexing. In the case of a harder to drill wood I have had to do things like clamp the main table to the auxiliary table and/or use the fence backed up with boards clamped at right angles to the fence to counter the deflecting forces. Even so, it is still necessary to drill with minimal pressure on the quill, withdraw the bit frequently and take small "bites" to avoid moving the table.

Ed,

Thanks for sharing this and the pictures of the cauls and the table leg joinery.

When I mention vertical alignment I am referring to two boards side-by-side, edge glued where you want the top to be perfectly flush. So, the desire is to have vertical alignment between the two boards such that the top surface is the reference to achieve a flush surface. Note that biscuit joinery gives you this with vertical alignment, but they don't give you any horizontal alignment, so the board ends could be askew relative to each other. For panels you don't have to have horizontal alignment from the joinery, but must make sure you achieve this on glue-up or you will need to trim both ends of the panel instead of simply sanding them. Dowel joinery isn't very forgiving because they provide both vertical and horizontal alignment - in other words their placement needs to be precise. Consequently any error in placement will either result in a panel that won't assemble or result in a top surface that isn't flush. Loose tenon joinery, such as the Domino, can give both vertical and horizontal alignment. On a large panel like a table top, you can mortise the first mortise on one end of the board with the tight setting. Then the rest of the mortises down that board can be done on one of the 2 optional loose settings that they offer. This results in a mortise that has more side to side play but keeps the same mortise height in the vertical dimension. As a result, the one Domino on the panel ends (one in each board to board connection) sets the horizontal reference so that all of the boards will be flush on the end, while the interior dominoes will maintain the vertical alignment only. This makes panel assembly easy and quick which is helpful considering the glue sets quickly during assembly of a panel. Without this feature, making all of the domino mortises tight fitting would have the same problem as dowel joinery and require absolute precision of every mortise or the panel would not assemble, i.e. holes in the wrong places.

P.S. I know a picture would really help with this, so below is a pic illustrating the 3 different width settings of the Festool Domino. The one on the left is the standard (tight setting) and what I would use on one end of a panel. Then subsequent mortises down the length of the board would be done on the 2nd setting (loose setting). In such a way, the 1st (tight) Domino sets the vertical and horizontal alignment between the two boards and each subsequent loose Domino down the length of the board holds that vertical alignment to give a flush top surface to the panel. This gives some small horizontal play of each loose Domino so that a panel can be easily assembled at glue up. Unfortunately you can't do something similar with dowel joinery. Biscuits give a little bit of horizontal slop and make assembly of panels easier, though not all biscuit machines are equal in quality...

DominoSettings.jpg

JMO,
Thank you for breaking this down for me. It was really enlightening and it truly helped me grasp everything you were conveying. It all makes perfect sense, I get it. Probably not going to buy a domino, but now I understand what makes them so sexy.

IF you are set on doing dowel joinery on a large panel, I would recommend a dowel joinery jig such as Jessem's or any other good name brand. Doing approximately 80 dowel holes and mating them all on a large panel can be done with a Mark V, but it isn't going to be easy or fast. I think you will get better alignment and better results doing that with a dowel joinery jig IMHO. For smaller projects, fewer horizontal borings like what Ed showed, the Mark V is fantastic for this. Just my opinion and there may be others on the forum who disagree with this. Taking the Shopsmith out of the discussion, I think the real question becomes do you need/want joinery in your large panel that you started discussing on this thread? IF so, you may be better off with other joinery methods. The Festool Domino is fantastic, but expensive. Biscuit joiners are more accessible and give only vertical alignment, but that is all you really need for a panel provided you take care on assembly to keep the ends flush and square. For small panels, such as a cutting board, you may want to forgo joinery altogether and/or give it a go with horizontal boring and dowel joinery on the Mark V. JMO.

JMO,
I took the time to do some research on Horizontal boring using the Shopsmith (520 in my case), and doweling jigs. There is even a diagram for making a doweling jig specifically for horizontal boring with the shopsmith in Power Tool Woodworking for Everyone (PTWFE). It's Figure 11-9 on page 131 in the 4th Edition. Normally, I can pretty easily grasp the jigs I've seen in PTWFE, but this one is not coming to me easily. His description on the build properties is minimal to say the least and his drawing is not super clear to me. I think I kind of get it, but I'd love someone elses ideas about it. Based on some others (that are hand held) that I found online, both DIY and manufactured, I think I can make it and even improve on it a bit, thanks to some of the videos I've watched. Anyway, I'd still be interested in what you or anyone following can make of it. Following your explanation of the importance of the first Domino for vertical and horizontal positioning, I think the same goes for the first Dowel and while I agree with how much more important horizontal accuracy is after that for Dowels, I think that is where the PTWFE jig comes in, for horizontal boring, even vertical boring for that matter. For anyone who's interested here's a link to a guy named Earl Davidson and this is his third DIY dowel jig. This one is for joining long boards.

I'm curious about how you came up with your 80 dowels number? How far do you feel they should be spaced apart? Figuring spacing of about 1' apart it wood take 6 dowels to join two sides of 5' long boards. Figuring 8, 3" wide boards to make a 2' wide table (which I admit is narrow), I arrived at 42 dowels (84 holes). All this is conjecture on my part because I have absolutely no idea of what it takes. So, if you were thinking more along the lines of 5' x 4' and my conjectures concerning spacing are close, then we're definitely getting to 80 dowels and beyond.

This entire thread is highly informative.

I will just mention that my first Shopsmith WW project in 2007 used horizontal boring and dowels to help glue up a wide desktop I made. It is still perfect and gap-free 15 years later. I do remember running a handplane over the finished joints, before sanding and finishing.

nuhobby,

If you are still following, I'd love to hear some more detail on your desk build as it pertains to the dowel joinery, type of wood used to make the top, overall dimensions, dowel spacing, struggles, etc. Obviously it was a decade and a half ago, but whatever details you do remember would be interesting to me. I'm sure we'd all like to see some pictures if you'd care to share.

Just a second thought or two to add to this thread: I have never drilled a series of dowel holes in a long workpiece, but I have more than once drilled mortices at different locations along the edge of a long workpiece, using sometimes the horizontal boring mode and sometimes the drill press mode. I will say that sometimes it is easier to keep the table from flexing by using vertical supports under it when in the drill press mode. Might be something to consider if you are worried about table flex or fence movement when drilling in horizontal mode.

Ed,
I can certainly see what you are saying here. I would think it would be much easier to support the table when drilling seriously hard wood in the vertical drill press mode. I've used it in Drill press mode and horizontal mode, but not for what I'm intending. I'm really looking forward to finding out what I am able to do in both vertical and horizontal.

As far as the large panels without joinery issue, it seems to me that the keys to success are jointing technique and clamping technique. I have done a number of large panels, up to about 24 inches wide by nearly 60 inches tall. This sometimes requires 2 or 3 glue ups, depending on the number of pieces in the panel. And the panels I have made have been forgiving in that the final thickness was not critical, and so that allowed for a bit of clean-up planing, sanding and scraping. I think if I were trying to make a panel whose thickness had to be a certain dimension, I would mill the stuff a bit thick, joint and glue as wide a panel as would fit my planer, plane to the required thickness and repeat as needed until the panel width was achieved.

I've actually seen this done by some on youtube. They get everything pretty close thickness-wise and then glue up sections of panels that will fit through their planner and run them all together before joining the sections together. As I recall, it was very successful.

Ed,

Thanks. All good tips and I hope all of this has been useful for Pete. Yeah, we talked about horizontal vs. vertical on a previous thread and I agree with you. I may get back to doing more with horizontal boring one day on my Mark V. Last time I used it, I did use the tip of clamping to the main table behind the fence to minimize slippage. I have never considered myself a "gorilla engineer", so I am always setting bolts to torque specs (no more) and that sort of thing. So, I am just not comfortable with increasing the fence adjustment more than I already have to prevent slippage in horizontal boring mode. Though I know this was suggested on previous threads. I may be too conservative on this, but so be it. For sure, when vertical mode is applicable and adequate support can be provided underneath the table, I agree with you and think this is the preferred solution. Sometimes I think we (Shopsmith owners) get caught up in the fact that it "can" do horizontal boring that we "must" do horizontal boring. IF one solution is more accessible/easier than the other, then it should be pursued.

JMO,

Well by now you know how pleased I am with the response to my questions. I really appreciate all of the time and energy everyone has contributed. I've learned a ton. I hope this has or will be beneficial to others.

As for the fence I get where you are coming from. I've tweaked mine to near perfection.

Do you lubricate your 520 fence cam locks? I use powdered graphite for this, I'm sure other dry lubes would work. I only ask because I know sometimes it feels tight when it isn't. I probably set mine kind of tight, but there isn't much lever arm there.

- David

I've also used graphite powder for my levers. It made a huge difference. I also learned a nice trick from a Doug Reid video on the 520 Fence and how to move it accurately by pushing it up against the infeed side of the table when sliding it back and forth.

FWIW, I lubricate my 520 fence lever regularly. I use dry spray lube. I also almost never adjust the tension but I can sure tell when it is time to lubricate. The lever gets very tight to move. That could give one the sense that the adjustment is over tightened but it is not. The dry lube makes all the difference in the world.

Hi John,
Thanks for this post. What type of dry lube spray do you use? I bought some that WD40 makes, but have been reluctant to use it.



Whew,
This was a lot of work, but then it was also worth it. Thanks again everyone. I apologise for any typos and stuff that I missed and might not make sense. I've tried to edit this thing, but it's a lot. Hahaha

Regards,
Pete

P.S. Haven't done a lick on the Shopsmith in the past week. Just been busy with life stuff. I'm hoping to change that soon. My grandson is getting married this weekend, and my wife and I are helping out, so I doubt it will be this week.

[RFGuy]

Pete,

We tend to use shorthand here, while I am a fast typist and can be verbose at times, I can also be lazy. "JMO" is Just My Opinion. "OP" is Original Poster, which I referred to you as initially before I saw that you included your name, Pete, in a post. Feel free to use my screen name which is RFGuy to refer to me and it indicates what I used to do for a living. I got a good laugh when you addressed me as "JMO".

Yeah, I realized that my earlier descriptions needed more detail and really pictures. It sounds like with my descriptions and the many tips from others here you are well on your way. Steve Ramsey is the GOAT (Greatest of All Time) of YT (YouTube) woodworking and I love his presentation style. I don't watch his videos as much lately, but he definitely knows what he is talking about most of the time. Similar for Stumpy Nubbs (Jim Hamilton), though I don't always agree with his suggestions, but that is natural as there are many different ways to accomplish a given task in woodworing and we are all unique. The bulk of my woodworking education was Norm Abrams via public television, so YT vids only served to refine my techniques. You may want to also check out the Wood Whisperer (Marc Spagnuolo) and he has a Woodworking Guild with some free project videos and many pay project videos that are superb in quality that you may find interesting. Also, please check out Nick Engler both for his Sawdust Sessions on Shopsmith equipment but also his YT channel Workshop Companion.

Yeah, you got it exactly on the "80" number, but not 80 dowels - 40 dowels, 80 drillings. I was thinking a 6' table, 6" wide boards and perhaps a dowel every 1' or so. I was lazy and didn't do the math and pulled that number from nothing. Doing the math, it'd be more like 30 joints for 12" spacing (6 boards in total), not 40, so 60 total horizontal borings (one each side). So, I was a bit high in my 80 estimate, but not by much. Point being if you are trying to keep lumber that isn't perfect well controlled you "might" drill every 12" and this is A LOT of horizontal borings. This could be overkill and you may choose every 24" instead. I started out buying S4S lumber from big box stores (e.g. Home Depot or Lowes) and I'll let you Google what S4S means with regard to lumber. Today I tend to buy S2S, but it still always comes fairly rough from my lumber supplier in town and I have to finish plane it to final thickness and joint edges. Honestly I know of no one buying less than S2S unless you have a buddy with a bandsaw mill cutting up a tree. Still, a 10' long and 8-10" wide S2S board when cut to length and planed and jointed in my shop still has considerable cupping and twisting that has to be taken out. Usually there is enough thickness in the board that I can correct most of this, but unless I am taking a 2" thick board down to 3/4" thick it isn't always possible to get a perfect board at the end of the day. Also that would be A LOT of waste. Don't forget that the wood is continually adjusting to the humidity in the environment, unless you are buying kiln dried stock. As soon as I bring ANY wood home it starts to cup and twist just getting it in my shop. Then after planing it will adjust again. So, I tend to work quickly once I have lumber dimensioned and I recognize that a milled board that is near perfect is never perfect by the time I go to glue it up. I do live in a fairly dry climate (desert location) so my experience may be slightly different from others posting here, but I think everyone will have to deal with these moisture problems, i.e. rarely is the shop and final destination of the furniture at exactly the same humidity of where the tree was felled. Also, humidity varies in any location throughout the year. With "wonky" lumber, even after milling, but then acclimating in your shop, joinery "may" be necessary to try to bring it back to true up a table top a bit, but of course there always is hand planing to correct any deficiencies!

[nuhobby]

Hi Pete,

You asked about my desk from years ago... here is a link to the final look. The top was made of long oak planks joined with glue and dowels:
viewtopic.php?p=11464#p11464

Good luck in your endeavors!

[woodhead52]

Pete,

We tend to use shorthand here, while I am a fast typist and can be verbose at times, I can also be lazy. "JMO" is Just My Opinion. "OP" is Original Poster, which I referred to you as initially before I saw that you included your name, Pete, in a post. Feel free to use my screen name which is RFGuy to refer to me and it indicates what I used to do for a living. I got a good laugh when you addressed me as "JMO".

RFGuy,

Okay, Thanks for clueing me in. Hahaha It doesn't take much to go over my head apparently. The JMO definitely tricked me.

Yeah, I realized that my earlier descriptions needed more detail and really pictures. It sounds like with my descriptions and the many tips from others here you are well on your way. Steve Ramsey is the GOAT (Greatest of All Time) of YT (YouTube) woodworking and I love his presentation style. I don't watch his videos as much lately, but he definitely knows what he is talking about most of the time. Similar for Stumpy Nubbs (Jim Hamilton), though I don't always agree with his suggestions, but that is natural as there are many different ways to accomplish a given task in woodworing and we are all unique. The bulk of my woodworking education was Norm Abrams via public television, so YT vids only served to refine my techniques. You may want to also check out the Wood Whisperer (Marc Spagnuolo) and he has a Woodworking Guild with some free project videos and many pay project videos that are superb in quality that you may find interesting. Also, please check out Nick Engler both for his Sawdust Sessions on Shopsmith equipment but also his YT channel Workshop Companion.

Yup, Steve is great. I'm very familiar with everyone you mentioned. Norm Abrams, of course from long before there was internet let alone Youtube. I've been a Youtube learner for well over a decade. I don't always remember the influencers names, but I know them when I see them. I watched all of Nick Engler's Shopsmith DVDs and I became familiar with his youtube channel a couple of years ago. He's really down to earth. He's probably one of the smartest guys on Youtube in the woodworking category, but also an excellent teacher and super laid back.

Yeah, you got it exactly on the "80" number, but not 80 dowels - 40 dowels, 80 drillings. I was thinking a 6' table, 6" wide boards and perhaps a dowel every 1' or so. I was lazy and didn't do the math and pulled that number from nothing. Doing the math, it'd be more like 30 joints for 12" spacing (6 boards in total), not 40, so 60 total horizontal borings (one each side). So, I was a bit high in my 80 estimate, but not by much. Point being if you are trying to keep lumber that isn't perfect well controlled you "might" drill every 12" and this is A LOT of horizontal borings. This could be overkill and you may choose every 24" instead.

Well , great minds... Hahaha
Since for me at this point it's still hypothetical, I'll see what happens when I start digging in. I will share what happens and my experiences and thoughts. As for the width of my boards. I'm going narrower, because I've heard it time and again from other experienced woodworkers that narrower boards are less likely to cause problems with cupping and warping. That actually has more to due with moisture content, but narrower and thinner wood is easier to to control in that regard. So, if the wood is acclimated before going crazy on it and then and finished well on all open surfaces it should behave pretty good. Especially since most of us live in climate controlled homes.

I started out buying S4S lumber from big box stores (e.g. Home Depot or Lowes) and I'll let you Google what S4S means with regard to lumber. Today I tend to buy S2S, but it still always comes fairly rough from my lumber supplier in town and I have to finish plane it to final thickness and joint edges. Honestly I know of no one buying less than S2S unless you have a buddy with a bandsaw mill cutting up a tree.

So, I actually do know what S4S and S2S are. While woodworking is still a newish experience for me. I've been in construction and construction related work for most of my adult working life.
So, my foray into wood working is that I've made furniture over the past year, but it was all mostly plywood with edge banding and pocket hole construction. That actually turned out pretty nice, but I want to branch out. I've also purchased S2S lumber, Poplar and Soft Maple, to be exact, from one of the lumber yards in my area. I'm fortunate to have a few local suppliers of furniture quality wood. Most of that wood is kiln dried. There is also a guy in the area that has a portable bandsaw mill and he will come to someone's property and mill slabs from their downed trees. So a few more options here in Virginia than probably exist in a desert community.

Still, a 10' long and 8-10" wide S2S board when cut to length and planed and jointed in my shop still has considerable cupping and twisting that has to be taken out. Usually there is enough thickness in the board that I can correct most of this, but unless I am taking a 2" thick board down to 3/4" thick it isn't always possible to get a perfect board at the end of the day. Also that would be A LOT of waste. Don't forget that the wood is continually adjusting to the humidity in the environment, unless you are buying kiln dried stock. As soon as I bring ANY wood home it starts to cup and twist just getting it in my shop. Then after planing it will adjust again. So, I tend to work quickly once I have lumber dimensioned and I recognize that a milled board that is near perfect is never perfect by the time I go to glue it up. I do live in a fairly dry climate (desert location) so my experience may be slightly different from others posting here, but I think everyone will have to deal with these moisture problems, i.e. rarely is the shop and final destination of the furniture at exactly the same humidity of where the tree was felled. Also, humidity varies in any location throughout the year. With "wonky" lumber, even after milling, but then acclimating in your shop, joinery "may" be necessary to try to bring it back to true up a table top a bit, but of course there always is hand planing to correct any deficiencies!

I have very little experience hand planning, but I actually do have a pretty good knowledge of how moisture affects wood, and a lot of other things for that matter. I'm sure I'm not telling you anything new when I tell you that because you live in a dessert area you are dealing with really low humidity compared to where I live and especially compared to where most hardwood trees grow. I agree with you, and would recommend really trying to get kiln dried slabs if possible. I'm know that it costs more, but it is worth it. But, it may not be possible everywhere, so, forgetting that, then knowing where the wood came from, when was it milled, if it was kiln dried or not, and where it has been stored and for how long since it was milled would be very helpful to know. This information should be readily available.

Since you live in such a dry part of the country, depending on where the lumber has been, and for how long and whether it was in a climate controlled setting before being shipped to you will tell you a lot about how long you should allow it to acclimate in your shop before working on it. You can also ask them for or check the current moisture content of the wood you are considering. As an example, on builds where we'd be installing milled (not engineered), kiln dried, unfinished hardwood flooring (usually oak), we would have the wood delivered to the job site and then we'd have to let it sit on stickers (off the floor) in the house or building for 2 to 4 weeks before installing it. We monitor the moisture content of the wood. That would tell us when it was acclimated. Since our climate required the wood's moisture content to be about 15% and it normally arrived at about 8% we literally had to wait for it to absorb moisture. If it was installed, sanded and finished to soon, it would not be long before it looked like waves in the ocean. That's just one story, I've seen moisture ruin cabinets, trim, doors, etc. I've seen humidity cause the finish of a very old and expensive antique Armoire to completely crack and peel due to the wood swelling and shrinking when it was moved from London, England to Baltimore, Maryland. I've seen moisture split and heave concrete slabs. Humidity and moisture can flat out make for some crazy changes.
If you don't have a good moisture meter to check your wood it would be a great investment. A good one isn't cheap, several hundred dollars, but it's not Festool expensive.
I really believe this would make your woodworking a smoother experience. See what I did there. ,

Didn't mean to go on a rant, but I rarely see woodworkers talking about moisture as it relates to wood movement as you were. I mean they do, but not in a really knowledgeable way. A lot of wood movement issues are really moisture issues and a lot of them could be avoided or at least mitigated when forearmed with some knowledge on the subject.

Thanks again,
Pete