For this skill builder Iexplored the slotting joint with mortise holes with “dog bone” corners. I tried to figure out the best type of dog bone cornering as well as what my expectations should be in terms of fitting with some ~1/2″ MDF board which does not have a completely uniform width (to a decimal degree). This will help me plan for my table assignment, which I plan to assemble using this type of joint in multiple places, but with Canadian birch.

I actually ended up cutting a second set of the same joints with 0.02″ added to the slot thickness.

Failure — I didn’t make the slot large enough to fit a piece through longways. Hitting it with a mallet didn’t do the trick:

The 0.5″ pieces just fit. After this test I decided to go with 0.02 to my final piece.