Shooting Board Tweaking?

[David Ragan]

Is this why folks talk about having to adjust the lateral adjustment lever on the shoot board plane?

Here's the story:

Too much of my blade was not being used, so I decided to put a small (1/2" BB) piece onto my shoot board ramp yesterday.

Now, I have about 2 1/8" of useable vertical height (blade width) that I can use, but my ends are still not 90*.

I was able to get the 90* only if I made my shoot plane blade way out of square via the lateral adjustment lever.

This first picture demonstrates same level zero on both levels on the bench:
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However-the ramp is off a small amount....this shoot board is made of BB ply all around, etc

395826

Is this common? Should I go down yet another WW rabbit hole in pursuit of "perfection" and make another hopefully perfect shooting board?

I wish I knew the math to figure how much that 0.3* throws me off.

Thanks for sharing your experiences

[bridger berdel]

Experiment with tape under one edge of your BB spacer. Then plane it as needed

[Jim Koepke]

+1 on what Bridger said.

When the weather changes my shooting board may need a piece of tape or two to throw it back into square.

With shooting boards it is always trust but verify.

jtk

[Jim Koepke]

One more thing, it is best to verify with a workpiece. You want a perfect result, forget about trying to construct the perfect shooting board.

jtk

[brian zawatsky]

I wish I knew the math to figure how much that 0.3* throws me off.

You could use the trig function tan to find the difference in elevation across a 0.3 degree angle. You just need a right angle and the length of the side opposite OR adjacent to the 0.3 degree angle. In your case, you'd need the adjacent side, as the opposite side represents the elevation. If you know the length of the hypotenuse, you'd use sin instead. If you really want to know how to figure it out, shoot me a PM ;)

[David Ragan]

I tried a couple layers of tape, and had to go to this brass, 0.016" thick....scooted over next to the screw line:

395842

The final result:

395841

And, yes....finally the work piece is square.

I been off work this week, and all I got done is stuff like this.

The math is cool, but now I gotta work on a device to help cut new saw teeth

Yea!

Thanks guys

[Vincent Tai]

The math is cool, but now I gotta work on a device to help cut new saw teeth

Yea!

Thanks guys

Keep us updated on that device.... very excited when I hear about things like that!

Thanks,

Vincent

[glenn bradley]

Experiment with tape under one edge of your BB spacer. Then plane it as needed

Ding, ding, ding.

[Tony Zaffuto]

Are we overthinking the question? I have no trouble with my shooting board, and I basically use any of three planes on it, with same results (LN 9, LN low angle jack or LV miter plane). My secret? Every so often, I true the edge with a shoulder plane. Also test your work piece between passes, and learn to use same pressure on work piece & plane.

Like anything it takes practice.

[Derek Cohen]

I have build a few shooting boards, and all were built as accurately as possible. Yes, wood moves, but why start off behind the 8 ball? The degree this shooting board is out-of-square warrants correction. I would plane down the runway until it is parallel to the platform. Movement after this will simply require a minor tweak of the blade angle.

Regards from Perth

Derek

[Mike Holbrook]

LV/Veritas now manufactures a number of devices that may help. David’s brass strip added to his board might be considered a step towards LV’s adjustable shooting board track for planes to run in. They also now offer a Veritas shooting board fence that can be clamped down at any angle. Although wood may move, metal at least moves less.

I think Derek has employed older versions of these devices on some of his shooting boards. Certainly one who might not want to spend the money for one of the Veritas devices could use brass, agle iron.....to rig up a device with some adjustability. Aluminum is easy to drill, even elongated holes. There are many commercially designed aluminum “ tracks” available. There are also a number of hard woods which have minimal movement, purple heart comes to mind.

I also wonder if one might alter an old miter saw to make a shooting board.

[Jim Koepke]

I have build a few shooting boards, and all were built as accurately as possible.

Of course, but once you have lemons, it is time to decide how to turn them into lemonade.

My shooting boards are also built with accuracy in mind. They usually only need adjustments with shimming after they have been around a while or if the weather is having an influence.

jtk

[Derek Cohen]

Ok, but now you need to determine whether this runway is out because of wood movement or build, per se. If the former, then determine whether the wood is unstable, that is, it will continue moving this much. If so, replace the runway or scrap the shooting board. If you decide, instead, that it was just the build, then simpy plane the runway parallel to the platform. This should take a minute or so. Then just get on with using it with peace of mind.

Regards from Perth

Derek