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From: warren@ihnss.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.rec.wood
Subject: Any cures for Klutziness?
Message-ID: <1799@ihnss.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 14-Nov-83 14:15:28 EST
Article-I.D.: ihnss.1799
Posted: Mon Nov 14 14:15:28 1983
Date-Received: Tue, 15-Nov-83 08:32:50 EST
Organization: AT&T Bell Labs, Naperville, Il
Lines: 90

The recent item on matching edge-glued boards struck home, having
just spent considerable time planing away all of those little
mismatched edges.  I agree with the suggestion of doweling, and
would add another suggestion of groving the edges to hold alignment
and give you more gluing surface.  You can groving
attachments for table saws or shapers that cut various tongue and
grove patterns on the edges of boards.  Both of these approaches,
however, are only as good as your basic ability to work without
error, which brings me to my main point.

Anybody have any suggestions for alleviating basic klutziness in
woodworking that do not involve the purchase of exotic, expensive,
or space consuming tools?  I presume that I am not alone in my
difficulties in the areas outlined below, but I have seen little
helpful advice on the subject of how to be precise in woodworking
books or journals.  I am sure that ideas would be of interest to the
net.  Here are some areas in which I find my precision lacking:

Lining up edge joints:  Yes, a dowling jig helps, but I still wind
		up with slop due to slop in the jig and/or drilling
		at an angle.  A drill press would help, but I don't
		have room for one.

Getting edges REALLY straight.  I am amazed at how difficult this
		seems to be.  I gather a jointer would do this, but
		I don't have one.  I have tried shaving the edges
		with a planing blade on a table saw, but trying to
		hold an edge straight over anything more than about
		3' is really tough.  Anything I use for a guid seems
		to bend over that length.  I have also tried tuning
		up with hand planing, but this seems really tough.
		
Cutting true right angles.  I often end up with 91 or 89 degrees. 
		After a lot of experimentation, I made myself a
		home-made right angle jig for my table saw,
		consisting of a piece of plywood with a strip of
		wood on the bottom to slide in the slot and a strip
		on the top for a fence.  Better, but certainly not perfect!
		
Making precision cuts in large pieces.  In my current project, I
		will soon be faced with cutting dados in 6 foot long
		pieces.  I would just love to use my table saw, but
		see no way to control it on things this big, at
		least near the edges.  I will probably wind up using
		a hand saw and chisel or acquiring a hand router for
		this.  Table saws are lovely when the work fits on
		the table, but hopeless for anything large.
		
Precise measurements:  Many times I have wound up with slop because
		the measuring device slipped, or more commonly the
		saw or drill wouldn't bite into the wood where
		marked because of the grain.
		
Warp:		Maybe some woods never warp, but I never met them. 
		Even if everything is true when you start, I
		frequently wind up with warp before final assembly. 
		Maybe the secret is to finish quickly, but that is
		hopeless for me.
		
To start, I will contribute two tips on table saw woodworking that I
learned in a seminar that do seem to work fairly well:

1)	Cut miter joints with a jig with 2 sides set precisely at 90
	degrees from a good square, and then set at approsimately 45
	degrees to the blade.  You put the sides on a sheet of
	plywood and put a slat to fit the guide slot on the bottom. 
	You can get the joints as accurate as your 90 degree square,
	usually much better than any sort of adjustable setup.
	
2)	Cut finger joints (in which alternating fingers of both
	pieces overlap in the joint).  with a jig consisting of a
	peg the exact width of your blade protruding from a cross
	piece you can slide through the blade.  The peg should be
	exactly one blade width back from the blade.  Start the
	joint with one piece up against the peg, cut through, and
	then move the cut to fit over the peg.  Keep cutting and
	moving until you go all the way accross the piece.  Start
	the other side by taking your first side, turning it around
	and putting the last cut over the peg so that the edge now
	lines up with the blade.  This lets you cut the corner off
	to start the cuts on the second piece to precisely fit the
	first.  This really works well, if you get the thing lined
	up right to begin with.

-- 

	Warren Montgomery
	ihnss!warren
	IH x2494