Shopsmith Forums

I recently purchased a Shopsmith Cross-Cut Sliding Table. The miter bar that came it fits in the miter gauge slot very poorly. There is a lot of slop and there are no adjustment screws to remove it. Very poorly designed and manufactured. Does anyone have a solution or work around to fix this problem? I can't get true 90 degree cuts until this issue is resolved.

tew648 wrote:I recently purchased a Shopsmith Cross-Cut Sliding Table. The miter bar that came it fits in the miter gauge slot very poorly. There is a lot of slop and there are no adjustment screws to remove it. Very poorly designed and manufactured. Does anyone have a solution or work around to fix this problem? I can't get true 90 degree cuts until this issue is resolved.

Yes, the miter bar could fit a bit more snugly but I believe that the slop you feel (and interpret to be excessive) is actually negligible.

Ignore the slop and align your Cross-Cut Sliding Table as best you can and then cut some panels (something about 12" wide or greater). I think the results will be most acceptable.

This same slop will have the same effect on the Shopsmith Miter Gauge but to a lesser extent because it is smaller.

If you find that the slop is excessive for your purposes, Incra does make a miter bar that is "slop less". I mean it is dead on stable because it is adjustable. The same miter bar is used by Incra on their V120 Miter Gauge.

tew648 wrote:I recently purchased a Shopsmith Cross-Cut Sliding Table. The miter bar that came it fits in the miter gauge slot very poorly. There is a lot of slop and there are no adjustment screws to remove it. Very poorly designed and manufactured. Does anyone have a solution or work around to fix this problem? I can't get true 90 degree cuts until this issue is resolved.

Do you have any problem using the Shopsmith Miter Gauge to make cross cuts. Is there slop there as well?

tew648:

I have two Shopsmith miter gauges. The slop on the two of them is not the same. It could probably be adjusted to make them the same but WHY?

One of them exhibits .005" of slop and the other is now .004". The later was .007" before I adjusted the tapered screw.

Pictures to follow in two separate posts (more than 5 images to show).

[ATTACH]18737[/ATTACH]
Initial Setup

[ATTACH]18738[/ATTACH]
First Miter Gauge

[ATTACH]18739[/ATTACH]
Still First Miter Gauge

[ATTACH]18740[/ATTACH]
Other Miter Gauge

[ATTACH]18741[/ATTACH]
Other Miter Gauge

tew648: (continued)

These images were taken after the taper screw was adjusted. The adjustment was made until the miter bar just began to tighten up in the miter track. Just a little tighter and the bar would be locked solid in the track.

The result can be seen in the last two images.

[ATTACH]18742[/ATTACH]

[ATTACH]18743[/ATTACH], [ATTACH]18744[/ATTACH]

You can see that the slop has been reduced to .004"

CONCLUSION: The Shopsmith Miter Bar and Miter Track are milled with adequate precision to provide the needed accuracy. If yours (on the Cross-cut Sled) doesn't perform in this matter, I would recommend that you contact Shopsmith for further guidance.

If you do not have a dial indicator, the same sort of test can be run using a set of inexpensive feeler gauges available at any automotive store.

I hope this helps.

Thanks for your replies. I have fixed the problem. I used my arc welder to deposit a small bead of metal to one side of the miter bar near each end and then used a bench grinder to remove the excess metal until it fit perfectly. No more slop.

IMHO this is much consternation over trivia.

Lets consider a miter bar with very excessive slop - say 0.010".

Now the miter gauge bar is 16" in length.

The MAX angular error introduced by that slop is less than 0.036 degrees.

Tan x = opposite/adjacent = .010/16 = 0.000625

x = atan(0.000625) = 0.0358...