Drilling a large diameter counterbore at an angle “freehand” is difficult because the bit will only be in partial contact with the wood when starting to drill and it will have a tendency to skip across the surface. This was the situation I found myself in when I was volunteered to add diagonal braces to […]
Jigs
While building several sets of cornhole boards, I needed a way to create an evenly-spaced painted ring around the hole. That’s when I decided to build this “compass cutter”, which is essentially an over-sized compass with a blade in place of a pencil. It’s used like a normal compass but instead of drawing a line, […]
Compass Cutter
I wish I had made this plywood cutting table a long time ago. It makes quick work of breaking down a piece of plywood into more manageable sizes, especially if using a track saw. Perhaps the best feature of the table is that it is portable, allowing it to be assembled in an area with […]
Plywood Cutting Table
The Dewalt Track Saw has a unique advantage over other track saws: a double-sided rail – a rubber edge strip on both sides – which allows cutting along both sides of the rail. This means there’s no need to flip the track around to cut from the opposite direction and the overall life of the […]
Dewalt Track Saw Crosscut Table
This simple router circle cutting jig was made from a piece of left-over 7/16″ PVC board that I found in the scrap bin. My impetus for building it was that I needed to cut 6″ wide holes for several corn hole game sets and I decided that the manual scroll saw approach with resultant wavy edges […]
Router Circle Cutting Jig
Here is a nifty calculator for making items via splayed joinery that was graciously provided by Gerald R. What exactly is “splayed joinery” you say? Well imagine a tube made from multiple pieces of wood (staves) in which one end of the tube is larger in diameter than the other. An example is a tapered round […]
Stave Calculator for Splayed Joinery
I’ve been the proud owner of a government surplus 1970s-era magnifying desk lamp for more years that I can remember. For most of that time, it sat unused in a closet collecting dust but I finally found a use for it – as a magnifying light for my Dewalt 788 scroll saw! But the trick was to […]
Mounting a Magnifying Lamp on a Dewalt Scroll Saw
I recently decided to try my at intarsia and I quickly realized that it involves lots of sanding. Much of this sanding involves rounding the edges of pieces in order to create a 3D effect and perhaps the best way to perform this task is with either a flex or pneumatic sanding drum. The softness of […]
Intarsia Flex Drum Sanding Station
An angled mortise and tenon joint can be a challenge to cut, especially for those of us who don’t make such joints on a regular basis. That’s where a jig comes to the rescue. Here’s a quick and dirty “semi-adjustable” jig that can be built in a half hour or less that simplifies the task […]
Angled Tenon Jig
If you’re ever in need of a dowel but don’t have one handy, there’s an easy fix: roll your own! The DIY approach not only provides immediate gratification but also allows you to create dowels of custom size or species that may be difficult to find in stores or online. And you’ll likely save money. There […]
Roll Your Own Dowels
While building an Adirondack chair, I needed to create a curved support piece that would attach to the rear side of the back slats. I made the chair from a set of plans that provided templates for all of the other pieces but this particular curved piece was a refinement that I decided to add […]
Chair Curve Layout Tip
After embarking on a mission to create a box load of mini-mallets, I realized a handle forming jig was called for to make each handle the same shape and to keep me from going crazy (no way was I cutting every single handle on the band saw). I came up with the simple router jig […]
Mini Mallet Handle Jig
5 I call this apparatus a shelf deflectometer. It’s used to measure shelf deflection or sag in order to test various shelf construction and loading parameters. (I would call it a “sagometer” but there’s already a device by that name used to measure sag in electrical power lines). The impetus for building it was to facilitate […]
Shelf Deflectometer
1 What to do when you need to make a custom cut? You make a custom jig. While making some bird houses, I was faced with the challenge of rabbeting a 1-1/2″ wide ledge along the entire perimeter of the octagonal base. At first glance, this seemed like a simple job for the tenoning jig but […]