Greetings All,

My first (small) frame is progressing nicely. I am at the point of fitting my timbers together in my shop. My question is...When should I drill for my peg holes? Should I drill them during fitting in my shop or should I wait and drill them during my final raising? Is there a benefit one way or another?

Thanks in advance.

You will be very happy if you drill the mortice and after fitting the sections pricking the peg location, turn the drill backwards, pull apart just enough to access the tenon peg hole, off set the tenon peg hole, for the most part a tad closer to the shoulder. Braces are a little different, still closer to the shoulder but away from the but end. This will ensure pegs are pulling joinery together and not pushing apart. Doing it now in the shop means you won't have to pull out a drill during the final assembly, one more thing you won't have to do on a busy day.

I saw couple of videos on the net where people drill all through the joineries the raising day, having joints tight using come along and heavy duty ratchet tie down straps.

Should we offset also the peg hole when the timbers are dried already or is that solution with come along and straps is good enough?

For my own project, I though about using that second method to avoid creating too much tension on tenons.

One thing that I learnt the hard way is that if you drill too far in advance, then the timbers can shrink a little before assembly which means that your holes will be too small. Redrilling them with a standard auger bit won't work as you just push the fibres apart. I split about 3 pegs trying to drive them home and one is still not quite out the other side.

Having said that, my timbers stood outside over the summer while I finished cutting the rest of the joinery so I don't suppose that my experience is typical!

Through the years of participating on this forum I have yet seen any strong proponents of using straps and comealongs to pull joinery together and then boring holes. I would not be concerned with drying of timber changing peg alignment. An exception would be naturally curved timber which should be dried before joinery, like curved brace stock with long tenons.

Again, the sure fire way of ensuring proper peg fitting would be test fit and pricked peg locations with an 1/8 - 3/16 inch draw bore.

Jon, your are not alone, I also worked outside the all summer, but like mentioned Timbeal, I receive my timber dried down to 17-20% from the sawmill, which I guess helped for less twisting, skrinking and crowning, but it still changed a little because of rain, sun and northern wind alternating fast here.

I will drill only the day I assemble the bent for good. are they special recommendations when using strps and come along then?, when i preassemble, it's super tight with 2tons straps and come along all around the bents...

Drawboring is a fine technique. I'd view strap pulled joints as a shortcut, trying to achieve what is better done through offset peg holes. But that's my opinion. So I'd concur with the opinion that you should fit the assembly, mark the holes, then drill them offset by a small margin.
Using straps may be faster (if you haven't much practice) but does not work as well.
That said, some carpenters of the past were known to have used a Spanish windlass for just this purpose, which is a looped rope wrapped around two timbers with a stick between them. The stick is turned, twisting the rope and drawing the ends together. tremendous amounts of leverage can be gained this way, and it is a very useful device for closing particularly stubborn assemblies. Although, if an assembly is stubborn I personally feel as if the joinery should be adjusted until it fits better, not forced together with ropes and straps.

I'm fine adjusting all members at the moment, to avoid forcing like you mentione. And yes I don't have any experience of off-set, that's why I'm thinking about using those straps and come along to avoid any mistake or extra tension of some tenons.. also, my pegs are not tapered as the ones i see on canadian videos. I'm using oversized cylinder pegs that I'm adjusting for the desired fit.

If you are not confident in drawboring, don't do it. It is risky if you don't know it well, you can overdo it and bust the joints if you are not careful, for example.

I actually do not drawbore much, because most of my work does not involve pegging anyway.

that's exactly what I'm afraid of, bust a joint. As I told you my timbers are pretty dried and I can see the checking.

But it looks pretty good in the pre-assembling so far, some millimeters adjustment those days.