dovetail jig

[jeff oldham]

I have been looking at dovetail jigs,,,i know they make a lot of different ones,,i wanted to find one that is the easiest to set up,,i have been watching on you tube and I have seen some that seem very easy such as the dovetail wiz,,,the keller,,and the gifkins jig,,does anyone have these jigs and can give some input on them,,,or any kind for that matter that is easy setup,,thank you

[Charlie Jones]

Up to now I either cut dovetails by hand or on the table/bandsaw. Someone gave me an old Porter cable Omni jig. It is built like a tank. It was missing the guide bushings. After studying how it works I gave up and bought a Keller. It is very simple and easy to use. It does only through dovetails.I can deal with that. Now I use the Omni as a vise when I am using the keller. I recommend the keller.

[Wade Lippman]

First you have to decide what you want to do with it. Some are more flexible than others. Any piece of junk will do half blind; better ones do through, and really complicated ones to variable spacing.

Charlie thought the Omnijig was unusable. I agree it is tough to set up, but once you get it, you can turn out any number really easy.

[Dave Cav]

The Keller jig is the easiest to use by far. Set up and operation are very simple. If you have two routers (one for pins, one for tails) it is very fast to use. The operating instructions are on one sheet of paper. The Omnijig and Leigh jigs have long manuals.

[Kyle Iwamoto]

INCRA jig?

[Jeff Ramsey]

I had a Keller and upgraded to a Leigh D4 Pro because of its flexibility. And I agree with others; the Keller is easy to use. And once set up, the Leigh is easy to use, as well. It depends on what you want to cut. If you're only cutting drawer carcasses, I'd get the Keller.

[William Young]

I purchased the Porter Cable Omnijig a few years ago and have no experience with any other jigs. So, I can't compare. However, I do find that the Omnijig is quite sturdy and accurate, but the setup can require several steps with some trial and error. I have used it mainly for drawer boxes and have ended up modifying some steps that has simplified things for me. Maybe others will find it useful.

The Omnijig has stops on each side which position the left and right sides of the drawers. I decided that most of the time it is easier to cut the sides and front wider than needed by the width of a couple of dovetail fingers. I then ignore the left and right adjustments and center the boards relative to the jig fingers by eye. Once the tails and pins are cut, I fit the pieces together and mark where the edges should be to line up and then rip them to fit. This way, the top and bottom edges of the left and right sides line up perfectly. The dovetails on the left and right can even be slightly misaligned relative to each other and it doesn't matter.

[Mark W Pugh]

Or do it on your router table.

https://sommerfeldtools.com/sommerfeld-s-dovetail-jig?filter_name=dovetail%20jig

[Bradley Gray]

The Keller with 2 routers is fast and easy.

Buy the Keller and a 2nd router for less $ than the fancy ones.

[David Kumm]

I know this choice is high end but if you have lots of drawers, a jig gets old in a hurry. I found a used Omec 650 ( Dodds is the same machine ). Pneumatic clamps, and a single bit you have a choice of 4 sizes and once set up, you can bang through a drawer in about a minute. Dust collection is fair and the machine doesn't take up too much room. I think I have about 2K in mine. Dave

[rudy de haas]

I bought a nice simple one - almost exactly like this one from grizzly: http://www.grizzly.com/products/Dovetail-Jig-w-Aluminum-Template/D2796 - at a garage sale for (I think) $20. When I needed to make dovetails I couldn't make it work... so I sold it and got the Porter Cable "deluxe" 12" kit (this one: http://www.grizzly.com/products/12-Deluxe-Dovetail-Jig/T22082 ). As it turned out the fault with the original was largely mine (I wanted to make half blind dovetails in really hard wood and the wood kept slipping the clamps) but the porter cable has been idiot proof for the little use I've had to make of it.

[johnny means]

I can't tell you which one is easiest, but i can guarantee that it isn't the 24" Porter-Cable.

[Jon Nuckles]

I once had a Leigh jig and it was well built and the variable spacing was nice. Unless you use it frequently, however, you will need to refer back to the manual to remind yourself how to set it up to cut. The manual is very complete and clear, but I wouldn't call the jig easy to use for this reason. When I learned to cut dovetails with hand tools, I gave mine away.

Recently, I decided to do my own kitchen cabinets in a remodel and had 25 or so kitchen drawers to build, over half of them 8+ inches tall. That's not something I wanted to do by hand, so I bought Porter Cable's current jig -- the version that only does half blind dovetails -- for about $100 including the appropriate router bit. It does both the pin board and the tail board in a single pass and is pretty easy to get dialed in to cut tight joints. The joints are very clearly machine cut, but fine for kitchen drawers. Nothing fun about routing joints in 100 corners, but it worked well and the price was right. I should mention that it is nowhere near as solidly built as the Leigh jig, but the price reflects that.

[Mark Hennebury]

Keller! Simple, fast, precise.

[Ted Phillips]

I gave up trying to adjust the jigs... and bought a new dovetail saw from Mark at Bad Axe Tools. Best decision I ever made.

TedP

[lowell holmes]

I have a Leigh jig. It is an excellent jig, easy to use.

[John M. Smith]

I have a Leigh jig that works well once you get the hang of it. Haven't used it in years. Thinking of selling it.

Currently I use the older ported cable jig. The one that's cast aluminum. Works very well. I always finish my drawer parts at 5/8". Keep a router setup with a dovetail bit. Only need to get it all out and I'm ready to dovetail. No setting up .