Shopsmith Forums

After all the talk about straight edges, tracksaws and breaking down sheet goods, check page 6 of the latest (Oct. 2011) issue of Wood Magazine. Intresting idea!

I saw that, looks like a fairly simple and accurate set up.

How about at least a description?


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Saw and router guides are a big help when cutting panels free hand. Instead of this rather cumbersome solution, make one out of 1/4" Masonite and a piece of strip of (1X1.5")aluminum square tubing. Screw the tubing onto the center of a piece of Masonite 12" wide. Using the tubing as your guide trim off one side with your saw, and the other with a router. It is super easy to clamp this guide to a full sheet of plywood or any smaller panel and you know exactly where your saw or router cut will be.

Almost every guide I've seen ginned up for a hand held circular saw involved the operator pressing the saw against the guide. Which when I use it invariably has me wandering off the guide. And sometimes when I push hard enough, I'll shove the guide around.

I've mulled over the notion of making some sort of track that actually holds the circular saw hard against the guide. I've never gotten around to actually making one, but I think it would be a worthwhile enhancement.

A version of this would be easy to make... It could also be done with 2 sets of bandsaw blade guides.

http://www.pennstateind.com/store/PPS-2.html



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foxtrapper wrote:Almost every guide I've seen ginned up for a hand held circular saw involved the operator pressing the saw against the guide. Which when I use it invariably has me wandering off the guide. And sometimes when I push hard enough, I'll shove the guide around.

I've mulled over the notion of making some sort of track that actually holds the circular saw hard against the guide. I've never gotten around to actually making one, but I think it would be a worthwhile enhancement.

A guide to be used with some sort of straight edge to breakdown sheet goods is readily available on the market (including at Shopsmith) but one is equally easy to make using materials in your scrap box.

Which is why you should not call it "scrap box".

Use any straight edge that you have and simply cut the guide to fit. I made this one using 3/4" and 1/4" MDF. If I make another one, the guide will be thicker.

Even with this guide, it could jump the track as stated earlier but to avoid that I try to position myself so that I am applying force down and toward the straight edge.

There are other aspects of the guided tool systems that have received little or no comment.

The first is cut quality. Yes you can construct a cutting guide but unless you incorporate all the features of the a guide like the Ezguide or Festools your cut quality will probably be no better than you circular saw normally does. As many have testified once the cut their sheet stock to size they then make the final cuts on the table saw to sweeten the quality of cut. That is doing two steps where only one should be needed.

The second is dust control. Both Festool and Ez guide have made significant steps in reducing wayward dust. Having personally watched a craftsman using Festool I can attest that saw dust produced is even less than a high quality table saw like Unisaw. There are many testimonials of cabinet makers actually cutting, sanding and manufacturing a whole cabinet in the customers home over the customers fine carpeting. Not many people would consider this using even a good dust collecting unisaw. And that still leaves his sanding and routing operations that he also did.

To me these benefits greatly increase the desireability of a guided tool system.

Ed in Tampa wrote:There are other aspects of the guided tool systems that have received little or no comment.

The first is cut quality. Yes you can construct a cutting guide but unless you incorporate all the features of the a guide like the Ezguide or Festools your cut quality will probably be no better than you circular saw normally does. As many have testified once the cut their sheet stock to size they then make the final cuts on the table saw to sweeten the quality of cut. That is doing two steps where only one should be needed.

The second is dust control. Both Festool and Ez guide have made significant steps in reducing wayward dust. Having personally watched a craftsman using Festool I can attest that saw dust produced is even less than a high quality table saw like Unisaw. There are many testimonials of cabinet makers actually cutting, sanding and manufacturing a whole cabinet in the customers home over the customers fine carpeting. Not many people would consider this using even a good dust collecting unisaw. And that still leaves his sanding and routing operations that he also did.

To me these benefits greatly increase the desireability of a guided tool system.

I agree with everything you say (on this subject) so long as you are talking about a professional craftsman. However, I am a hobbiest and I cannot afford the Festool Circular Saw and will not buy one just because it does a fabulous job of collecting the dust.

I work in a garage shop with windows on one side (open air) and when I may making a lot of dust I turn on the oscillating fan. If I am working with MDF, I wear a mask. I try to do the majority of my sheet good work all at the same time. Then I clean up. Sometimes it is so bad that I have to jump in the pool to clear the dust.

But I am not buying a Festool to avoid all that.

If you all have one - I hope you all enjoy and get your monies worth out of it.

Darn it. I've done it again. This thread was about breaking down sheet goods and not the pros/cons of a tool.

dusty wrote: ...Sometimes it is so bad that I have to jump in the pool to clear the dust.

But I am not buying a Festool to avoid all that. ...

Don't blame you an iota!!!! Any woodworking tool that keeps you out of the pool is certainly not worth $.02:( In fact, if you have one - give it back immediately!