My tablesaw won't cut square!

[Matt King]

Now, it's not much of a saw, granted, but it's what I've got for now. I've got a late 70's Craftsman contractor saw that my Dad used for years. I've added the "Align-A-Rip" fence that actually seems pretty good. Adding a 1000SE miter gauge to it, plus a link belt (on the 2HP motor that Pops added years ago) gave me a half-way decent saw, so I thought. Even though I've aligned it pretty well, it still cuts nearly 1/16 out of square over 6 inches here lately.

I put my dial indicator on the steel base of the 1000SE and marked a tooth on the blade. Starting at the front (with the blade raised basically all the way), I zeroed out the indicator. I slid the gauge back on the saw (it's got zippo slop in the miter slot, by the way) and rotated the blade so that my marked tooth is in the back. I'm .002 off of parallel - not too shabby, says I. I lowered the blade all the way, sliding the fence over next to the miter slot. Slide the miter gauge/DTI back up front, zero out on the fence, very close to the front edge of the table. Sliding it back along the fence, I get .007-.008 tail out at the back edge of the saw. A little more than ideal (.003-.004, from what I understand), I'm thinking, but not too bad and probably as good as it gets without some real futzing with the rather coarse adjustments on the fence head. I then took my 12" adjustable square and checked it against a factory MDF edge, as well as a factory plexiglass edge. Yep, it's square. So, back to the saw I go, checking the perpendicularity of the miter gauge to both the fence (just to be sure - I know not to use the fence and the miter gauge at the same time) and the blade. I can't see any gaps along the way, so I decide to run a test cut on it. I snagged a piece of pine 1x6 from the junk stack, jointed one edge, and labelled it '1'. Putting edge '1' on the fence, I make a cut, making edge '1' and '2' parallel(I assume - i'll measure with the calipers to be sure). Moving the fence out of the way and grabbing the miter gauge, I put edge '1' against the miter gauge and cut edge "3". Well, lookee there, we're out of square both from 1 to 3 and 2 to 3. Seem to me that it's the miter gauge, some how, some way, but I can't seem to find it or figure it out!!!! :confused: :( :mad:

Can y'all give me some hints, here - I'm feeling pretty ole stupid right about now!

Thanks,

Matt

[Bart Leetch]

Matt

Does that fence have the allen screws going through a plate 2 on each side of the fence into the guide shoe that rides on the guide rail? Or something like this configuration? If so back them out & square & clamp the fence so it can't move & then put the screws back in using locktite. I did this on my saw & I never had a problem in 9 years that I had the 1997 saw. Then I traded it for the Ridgid fence I had put on my Dad's 1950's saw. I put the Ridgid fence on my old saw & gave it away. When I put the fence on my Dad's saw it lined right up nice & square.

[Howard Acheson]

>> Seem to me that it's the miter gauge, some how, some way

I would bet on the miter gauge being out of alignment. Here is the way the guys in our shop used to test the saw before using it. Rip a board about 4-6 inches wide about 12-18" long. Now, put an "X" on one end (fairly big) about 4-5 inches from one end and crosscut through the "X". Put the piece that was against the miter gauge on edge on the sawtable and put the cut offs opposite edge on the tabletop. Bring the two together end to end. If you see a tapered space between the two it indicates that the miter gauge needs adjusting. Slightly tweak the miter gauge adjustment and make another cut. Continue until there is no space between the two pieces. This will get your gauge dead nuts on and costs you nothing except the scrap wood.

Oh, the kick out at the rear of your fence is too much. I am a proponent of the fence being perfectly parallel to the miter gauge (at least the the same accuracy as you set the blade parallelism). Simple geometry will say that if it's kicked out in the back, it's not going to rip a long parallel cut.

[Matt King]

Bart - that's the one. I did what you suggested. The repeatability of the fence when clamped comes into play here, it looks like, so I'll just have to live with somewhere between .005-.015 for now. With 'patience', I can seem to pretty reliably get it on the very low end of that.

I've tweaked, fought, played with, cussed at, and finagled it all to be pretty square now it looks like. I believe it's the miter gauge. I guess it'd been knocked around one time too many, and just needed to be realigned VERY carefully. I've got an engineering square on the way now to use as a 'reference' to ensure that my adjustable is staying true. I'll be following up on Howie's post, tweaking the miter gauge a bit more to get it wrapped up.

Bottom line is this - when it comes to stationary power tools, mass is your friend. This saw is 'massively' challenged...... :rolleyes:

I'll be continuing to roll my pennies, saving for a cabinet saw and an Incra fence set up, that's for sure! I probably shouldn't complain as it's more than I had a year ago, and it enables me to get out of the house, but it should be nice to have a "GOOD" tool that just works dead on, every time you fire it up! I guess that's why 'real saws' are many times more expensive than contractor saws, eh?

Thanks for the assistance,

Matt

[Barry O'Mahony]

'sounds like you need to build yourself a crosscut sled.

[James A. Wolfe]

Matt,
I started out with an OLD 9" Craftsman table saw that had no shortcomings in the mass department. I got it from a guy who said he couldn't cut a straight line no matter what he tried. I went through the thing with a can of WD-40, a big rubber mallet and a handful of wrenches and got it lined up pretty well. Still had problems crosscutting so I soon learned to disregard the numbers on the miter gauge and set it using a triangle. I'd still be using that old saw if I could figure out how to get a beismeyer fence and a 10" blade on it. Once aligned, it stayed aligned. My newer Delta saw needs attention every 3 or 4 months but that's the price you pay when trading cast iron for sheet metal.

Jim

[john mclane]

My first saw was a Craftsman with this problem. I got so frustrated back that I stopped a lot of the fancy woodworking and only worked on renovations. I left the saw with the old house since the new owner expressed an interest and I did'nt wat to move it. It was also then a good excuse to getter a better saw. With good tools the frustation is at least reduced.