Making hinge mortise jig

[Alex Horvath]

Hi,

First time making a hinge mortise jig (have to make lots of mortises). I'm using the standard method with a router to cut the mortise. My jig will be made from plywood with cutouts matching the hinge dimensions.

My question is how to make the cutouts. I have never been able to cut a straight line with a jig saw. I'm thinking a dado on the table saw. It's a little awkward since the jig is 6' long but my table will support it and I have a decent miter gauge.

Thanks

[Jerome Hanby]

Or you could make the jig in three pieces back, left, and right and glue/join them together. Even I can cut out rectangles!

[Ken Fitzgerald]

On the piece you want for the final jig, take scraps of wood and temporarily tack them to make a template at each position. Cut them out with a router following the temporary templates.

[Gregory King]

The ply wood jig is easily made with a 1/2" scrap. I cut it on the table saw, set it up against the fence and raise the blade up into the longest cut. Let the cuts overlap each other at the 90 degree corners. The router base is not affected by it any way. Finish nail it on the board jamb where the stop would normally go and you won't need to fill the holes.

[Bruce Wrenn]

Pocket screw the stops to your rail. I do home repair, and often have to replace a door. I use old door as a guide to make template rail for router bit.

[Bill Huber]

Alex, take a look at this, it will step you right though it.

http://www.routerworkshop.com/hingetip.html

[glenn bradley]

I use my bench vise and a piece of scrap to guide a rasp when "correcting" less than perfect jigsaw cuts. This was an enclosed template but the same method could apply to your open ended mortise cutout. In the second pic I rest my hand on the super-sophisticated height setting device and move the rasp and the piece of scrap which rasp-cuts the less-than-perfect cut line to a consistent height and therefor to a straight line ;-)

P.s. Bill's link Rocks; I'd do that.

[Ken Fitzgerald]

Alex, take a look at this, it will step you right though it.

http://www.routerworkshop.com/hingetip.html

Bingo! That's what I so poorly was trying to describe.

[Peter Quinn]

I think your first instinct was correct. There are obviously a number of ways to approach this, but for hanging full size passage doors you really want a template the height of the door opening that keeps the hinges spaced possiyevly in relationship to each other. Trying to route two or three hinges over 80" wi a single hinge template is slow at best and risky to say the least. At work we use 1/2" MDF ripped about 3" wide, I lay out the hinges on the door, transfer this to the template like a story pole, take out most of the waste with a jig saw or bs staying just inside your lines, then cleanup and tune it to fit your hinges exactly with either a series of TS cuts (I don't bother with a dado, I just use a flat bottom blade and multiple passes) or a router guided from above like a mortising jig. A little light sanding gives a smooth bearing surface. Takes maybe 10 minutes to make that way and it's nearly fool proof. Do mark it clearly for top and bottom, dAMHIK!