Cyrus Brewster 7
03-15-2011, 8:56 PM
Andrew Joiner started a thread yesterday about his joy of coming up with ideas and jigs to make his woodworking experience easier; and about how this is sometimes more enjoyable than the woodworking itself. Well... I enjoy both. I find the actual work, as Johnny Means put it, "soothing". I lose time doing it.
Anyway, over the weekend I was thinking about starting a thread on nearly the same subject - I actually mentioned this to my old man. When I read the title I started to laugh. What I was thinking about, though, was more on the subject of fabricating one's own "tools" to help with the task at hand - whether it be jigs or tool upgrades. I am a newbie to woodworking but have been working with my hands for most of my life. And since I am also new to the creek, I felt like writing this so as not to hijack Andrew's thread.
Along with some of my jigs pictured below, I have also built my own router table to the specs that work for me. (As an aside, the PRL with the Sidewinder attachment is absolutely awesome. I would find it hard to, but could, live without it. Being able to "up" plunge into the work with absolute precision has facilitated the production of some of the jigs).
As some of you will no doubt observe, a few of the photos resemble some commercially available jigs - sometimes companies get it right. I also love the things Bill Huber and other on here have come up with - especially Bill's DC for his router lift. With this being said, I do not try to reinvent the wheel. I will look at and borrow what others have done and will maybe improve upon it or tweek it to my liking - as I am sure they have done too. Is this not how things improve with time? Sometimes you realize that what you are looking at is perfect with no improvement needed - commercial or homegrown. My father told me once that there are very few REAL original ideas in the world - most of what we call original thought is really many learned things put together.
My point is that there is always ways to use what we have seen or studied to help in what we do. Anyway, to stop this from sounding like a philosophy class, here are the pics:
186948
Taper jig that rides on the fence
186949
Coping sled
186950
Incra Miter 1000SE in sled
186951186952
Using the same Rockler multi-track for both a low and high fence - helpful for storage and $.
I use the low position most of the time
186955186953
The first picture is the vise (minus wood) I made for my father. It took parts from two specialty deep sea fiber optic cable vises to make it. The second picture is it partially completed.
It is one of a kind so far...
186954
This is the pile of parts that I will use to make a vise for myself.
I really do find this fun!
Anyway, over the weekend I was thinking about starting a thread on nearly the same subject - I actually mentioned this to my old man. When I read the title I started to laugh. What I was thinking about, though, was more on the subject of fabricating one's own "tools" to help with the task at hand - whether it be jigs or tool upgrades. I am a newbie to woodworking but have been working with my hands for most of my life. And since I am also new to the creek, I felt like writing this so as not to hijack Andrew's thread.
Along with some of my jigs pictured below, I have also built my own router table to the specs that work for me. (As an aside, the PRL with the Sidewinder attachment is absolutely awesome. I would find it hard to, but could, live without it. Being able to "up" plunge into the work with absolute precision has facilitated the production of some of the jigs).
As some of you will no doubt observe, a few of the photos resemble some commercially available jigs - sometimes companies get it right. I also love the things Bill Huber and other on here have come up with - especially Bill's DC for his router lift. With this being said, I do not try to reinvent the wheel. I will look at and borrow what others have done and will maybe improve upon it or tweek it to my liking - as I am sure they have done too. Is this not how things improve with time? Sometimes you realize that what you are looking at is perfect with no improvement needed - commercial or homegrown. My father told me once that there are very few REAL original ideas in the world - most of what we call original thought is really many learned things put together.
My point is that there is always ways to use what we have seen or studied to help in what we do. Anyway, to stop this from sounding like a philosophy class, here are the pics:
186948
Taper jig that rides on the fence
186949
Coping sled
186950
Incra Miter 1000SE in sled
186951186952
Using the same Rockler multi-track for both a low and high fence - helpful for storage and $.
I use the low position most of the time
186955186953
The first picture is the vise (minus wood) I made for my father. It took parts from two specialty deep sea fiber optic cable vises to make it. The second picture is it partially completed.
It is one of a kind so far...
186954
This is the pile of parts that I will use to make a vise for myself.
I really do find this fun!