Shop made marking gauge advice

[Daniel Rode]

I've been planning to make a marking gauge for a while and I'm finally ready to get started. I mostly use wheel gauges today. I have one cheap pin gauge that's mostly worthless and doesn't get any use.

I wan't a small-ish gauge with a 6"-8" reach on the beam. It will have a knife style V shaped cutter attached at the end of the beam. I already have blanks for the cutter but that's the only thing set in stone.

Never having made anything like this, I'm looking for advice on design and tips on building it.

Thanks in advance!

[lowell holmes]

http://www.popularwoodworking.com/articleindex/mystery_of_the_marking_gauge


Check this link. Pop Wood had an article a few years back. I've made 3 or 4 of these.

You can download a pdf.

[David Weaver]

Triangular section for the beam but with a flat bottom facet cut on it, and a metallic fitting on the end a fastening screw (either wingnut or knurled screw) that fixes the beam in place.

Triangular sections always edge tight when locked down and never develop slop like a square section.

I'd make a kebiki style body for it, I've not yet had a situation where I felt like the larger kebiki bodies got in the way (vs. the square section on a pin gauge).

[Daniel Rode]

The triangular beam makes a lot of sense. I wonder why more weren't made that way. Maybe they are harder to make in a factory setting?

I'd like to use some kind of screw mechanism to fix the beam rather than a wedge but I'm not quite sure how to go about it. Pictures really help me. Does the screw go into a captured nut of some kind? Also, any issues with the screw damaging the top of the beam?

What do you like about the kebiki shape? I have a rough idea what shape they are. Rectangular with a sloped end, beam is off center towards the square end, right?

[David Weaver]

The larger kebiki shapes are just easier for me to reference to the side of a board getting marked. I could be swayed by the fact that the blades in them work through wood more easily than a pin gauge (as in, maybe I'm misguided and it's the blades that are the improvement and not the larger body).

See here for the kind of thing that I'm describing - it's like a foot at the bottom of the screw. You drill a hole part of the way through the foot so the end of the screw sits in it or bend the sides up so that it's captured on the gauge as long as the beam is in it.

(i'm not advocating Bode's Tool Site...Walt Quadrato sold me a stanley 85 1/2 years ago for $25 plus shipping, but bode's site has a picture that shows the shoe)

http://www.jimbodetools.com/STANLEY-SWEETHEART-No-85-1-2-Rosewood-Panel-Gauge-p30410.html


I'm not sure if an insert in the tightening screw is needed for strength (as in one of those threaded inserts that are sold by ww suppliers), if you had a coarsely threaded screw and accurately tapped a hardwood gauge, I think that would be fine.

Check the stanley 65 for the triangular beam. You could make a bigger flat on the bottom if you were putting a knife blade in it, or attach the knife blade on the end of the gauge via screw. Note the facets on the side of the beam, too.

Link to Gauge Pictures (https://www.google.com/search?q=Stanley+65+marking+gauge&biw=1920&bih=979&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=IcyFVLODCYb6yATV34HYCA&ved=0CAcQ_AUoAg#tbm=isch&q=Stanley+65+triangular+marking+gauge)

[Pat Barry]

Take a look at this:
http://logancabinetshoppe.wordpress.com/2010/11/19/episode-29/
Bob goes through the process for making a marking gage. Pretty informative