PDA

View Full Version : DT jig video



Sean Hughto
05-24-2014, 12:02 PM
So I watched Barron's video demonstrating his jig - available on YouTube - around 8 minutes. He seems like a really nice guy who has made a good product. What struck me is how little the jig was really doing, or more precisely, how fleeting the apparent moments in the process where some woodworkers appreciate risk removal. In cutting tails, there is very little risk because the precise angle is not important - you are simply making a pattern from which to mark the pins. The risks are that you will overcut the base line or that you will not saw perpendicular to the face of the board. The jig does nothing to prevent you from overshooting the baseline; that's still on the person holding the saw. All the jig is really doing in cutting tails is making sure you are keeping the saw 90 degrees to the face throughout the cut. Frankly, this is not a hard skill to master with decent marking out. And even if you mess up, a small square and a few swipes with a chisel allow a quick remedy.


So on to the pins. Once again the jig is no help on overshooting the baseline. It helps you saw straight down and at the matching angle to the tails across the board. Sawing straight down - parallel to the sides of the board - is not difficult. Sawing on the angle of the tails across the board is not difficult either. I suppose doing both these things at the precise point of the knife line is hard at first, but is pretty straightforward after an afternoon of so of sawing.


I admit all of this seemed a lot more intimidating to me back many years ago before I had cut my first dovetail. I guess I have also seen folks come into my shop and try to saw something - relative who are not woodworkers, for example, and impress me as having little chance of smoothly operating a saw without weeks of training. I think most of us who are drawn to woodworking, however, tend to have some level of talent with our hands and feel for tools and how to apply them to wood. Maybe not, and for those, this sort of jig may be a godsend. But that person will still have to make baseline cuts, use a "knew concepts" jewelers saw without a jig, do some delicate chiseling, etc. to arrive at Barron's end result. Funny that those few seconds of sawing are where they are afraid to fall down.

Jim Matthews
05-24-2014, 2:21 PM
All the jig is really doing in cutting tails is making sure you are keeping the saw 90 degrees to the face throughout the cut. Frankly, this is not a hard skill to master with decent marking out. And even if you mess up, a small square and a few swipes with a chisel allow a quick remedy.


This is the point where I still struggle - getting the side walls of the tails perpendicular to the reference face of the board.
It's what causes the fitting problems, particularly with resultant fine pins.

The use of a square to verify the side wall geometry was a revelation to me - easier to find the point of deviation with that.

The catch is always what happens nearest the scribe line.

Guides help keep the saw from wandering, at the deepest part of the cut.

That said, I don't find them producing better results, in that they don't
restrict where the saw kerf starts - and can lead to cutting a tail that's too thick
and will require more paring.

I wonder if these could be adapted for chisel use?