I do different kinds of joinery and sometimes use dowels. In addition, I use dowels for making hidden flush hinges.
The problem is that store bought dowel is inaccurate in diameter size. And often limited to just a few kinds of wood.
So why not make your own? In this way, you can make any accurate dowel with any wood when you want and how you want.
There are many ways to make dowel. I've made jigs to get the perfect dowel.  I'll be discussing these here. 

My criteria in attempting to make a jig or tool that produces repeatable accurate dowels is based on these points:

1) Must be simple and easy to make
2) Must be accurate. Ideally a desired nominal diameter with a consistent tolerance of +.000/-.003 just after making with no sanding. 
3) Must be made of materials readily available and inexpensive.
4) Easy to use.
5) Easy to store.