All of my finger jointing to date has been on relatively short lengths of wood, done on my table saw. I am toying with the idea of adding a wall hung tool cabinet to the shop (say approx 40″X40″X12″). I am looking for some suggestions as to the height of the jig backer board I should use on my cross cut sled to support a roughly 40″ tall panel.
Lon Schleining FWW #148 suggests a backer board about 8″X14″ (or 6″X15″ if you look at the drawing) attached to his crosscut sled. He also mentions using this technique to make boxes up to 5′ long but doesn’t say whether he uses a taller backer board for this length.
Just wondering what you folks think about this technique?
Alternatively, I am open to some other suggestions to cut the finger joints. Say making a jig for the router and clamping the jig to the board and securing the board to the workbench etc.
The first approach being to bring the board to the machine the second the machine to the board.
Cheers Greg
Replies
I'am thinking you mean Box joint. A dove tail machine with a box joint comb should do the trick. But through dove tails would be stronger.
Work Safe, Count to 10 when your done for the day !!
Bruce S.
Edited 1/7/2007 1:57 pm ET by BruceS
Thanks Bruce and Thew.
I seem to be in a phase of homemade jig making at the moment so for now I am going to delay the dovetail machine purchase. Besides I wanting to try something different.
I made a blanket box for my girlfriend last year with hand cut dovetail joints and I seem to be looking to use my machines a bit more, hence the bigger Box joint project.
So it looks like the tablesaw will win out on this project.
Cheers Greg
I just did box joints on approximately 4' long case sides. I screwed a 12" tall or so auxillary fence to the miter gauge, and that worked just fine. The "index key" for the box joint is pretty snug and helps keep the board from jumping around.
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