Jim Koepke
10-31-2015, 6:40 PM
Recently Frederick posed a question about dovetail squares:
You know, the ones that have a blade that's only a couple mm's high? They are intended to make it easier to slip between close-set tails to check for squareness across the grain. Sterling Toolworks and Chris Vesper both sell versions. (You can get Vesper's version at Highland WW now, BTW.)
Are they as useful as they appear to be?
Thanks!
Fred
Just for fun I decided to try one.
Looking at the selection at Highland WW was a bit of a shock.
http://www.highlandwoodworking.com/search.aspx?find=dovetail+square
So what the heck, I started rummaging around the shop for wood and metal to make one. After finding a bunch of brass and deciding an old brass pump organ reed could not only make a good blade but also a metal edge for the registration it dawned on me how to do this the easy way. After all, my plan was to see if I liked it or not.
So a little time was spent making a piece of scrap alder as square as can be. Then a 6d nail was cut and smoothed. The nail was chucked into the drill press and pressed into the piece of alder. Fortunately it is easy to turn off my drill press with my foot.
324418
Checked it out for square and it looks good from all directions.
It likely won't make me saw any better, but it will show me how much better my sawing needs to be.
jtk
You know, the ones that have a blade that's only a couple mm's high? They are intended to make it easier to slip between close-set tails to check for squareness across the grain. Sterling Toolworks and Chris Vesper both sell versions. (You can get Vesper's version at Highland WW now, BTW.)
Are they as useful as they appear to be?
Thanks!
Fred
Just for fun I decided to try one.
Looking at the selection at Highland WW was a bit of a shock.
http://www.highlandwoodworking.com/search.aspx?find=dovetail+square
So what the heck, I started rummaging around the shop for wood and metal to make one. After finding a bunch of brass and deciding an old brass pump organ reed could not only make a good blade but also a metal edge for the registration it dawned on me how to do this the easy way. After all, my plan was to see if I liked it or not.
So a little time was spent making a piece of scrap alder as square as can be. Then a 6d nail was cut and smoothed. The nail was chucked into the drill press and pressed into the piece of alder. Fortunately it is easy to turn off my drill press with my foot.
324418
Checked it out for square and it looks good from all directions.
It likely won't make me saw any better, but it will show me how much better my sawing needs to be.
jtk