Hello TIMBEAL,
Please don't think I'm being too critical, I mean not to be, and I found the video of the young lady making pegs adorable, but I'm afraid that peg would be a reject. Jim's observation was I think, "a wooden carrot."
Being a traditional timber wright, I tend to research exhaustively a vernacular style, then render my components to the same degree and nuance. So, if you don't mind, I have to make some observations about your feed back. Please, feel free to engage me if I seem to be inaccurate on any point; I will try to address each.
Most joinery is in compression and hardly needs to be peg.
Though we can rely on gravity for many types of joints, such is the case with many types of "housed lap joints." Those with tenons, even "thread tenons" and "teasel tenons," are often pegged, (and should be,) for seismic and climate events.
Let's not forget draw bored holes are not all equal, a tapered peg allows for just the right snugness needed to pull the joint together during raising.
If you are saying "equal," in application, I agree. However, if you are saying there not equal in size, I'm not sure how that can come to pass considering they are drilled. If you are saying they don't line up the same, that is a condition of layout that really should be address. In the countless number of vintage dwelling and barns that I have been part of, I would agree that many present with different degrees of craftsmanship, and yes you can find errors, but as a body of work, they are relatively consistent within a certain style, particularly the bore holes, both in North American and European frames, as well as, the chiseled types of Asia.
If you have a 3/4 inch peg hole and a rived octagonal peg the corners will be larger than the 3/4 and will dig into the round bore hole of the mortice, in effect causing it to wedge the tenon and risking blowing out the relish on the back, if driven too hard.
If a peg is out of proportion enough to cause relish failure, you have a trunnel that needs to be replaced and/or shaped more accurately.
Many old pegs I see are a standard size with little taper and a sharp point hacked on the end. I find this odd in comparison to my preferred longer tapered pegs.
You should not find this odd at all, this is the way a trunnel is suppose to be made. This is how they are found, in most heritage frames, here, in Europe and Asia. The long taper you are describing is not the way they are suppose to be made. Now if you find them to you liking and they fill the bore hole well on both sides of the joint, then that is to your choice. However, emulating the methodologies of our timber wrights of the past, tends to render a trunnel in a speedy and timely manner, as well as one that is in good proportion. These techniques are many and well tested.
I have no concerns with strength of a tapered peg. On true tension joinery the scale of the joinery is increased, larger hole, longer relish at the ends and perhaps an added wedge. Much different than your typical post, girt or brace joinery. My pegs in this case are still tapered but not as much.
I may be missing some points here. Wedge through tenons, (like you would find on a Swing beam of a Dutch barn and a few of the Bull beam barns,) are wedge then peg at a later time. This nuance is lost to many not knowing that these bore holes are made after wedging and/or not at all. True draw trunnels, whether round or square, rely on the accuracy of both layout, bore mortise execution, and trunnel formation.
A video showing a tapered peg. It is nice to be able to go through the box of pegs and select just the right peg for the drawn peg hole, they vary in size.
Simply put, they should not vary in-size to the degree that one will not replace the other. If they do, they are not shaped sufficiently, and the technique of manufacture must be refined.
Regards, jay
