Accu-miter. Any info or reviews.

[Kevin Blunt]

Hello, I have a cjhance to purchase the Accu-miter that LEE valley sells for 125.00cdn. I am hoping that some of you folks would be kind enough to shed some light on this product for me and whether or not I should buy it. Right now I am just using the stock delta miter gauge and it leaves something to be desired. Thanks for any input.

[Dana Van Pelt]

The accu-miter by JDS is a wonderful, very precise nice piece of equipment. We have two units here at the school that are put to heavy dailey us. Highly recomended!

[Mike Heidrick]

Hello, I have a cjhance to purchase the Accu-miter that LEE valley sells for 125.00cdn. I am hoping that some of you folks would be kind enough to shed some light on this product for me and whether or not I should buy it. Right now I am just using the stock delta miter gauge and it leaves something to be desired. Thanks for any input.

I own one and would buy a second one for $125 in a heart beat. Very accurate and very substantial build quality. In fact I just spent $45 on a second micro adjust stop and a new 1/2" tape for it. New saw required a new tape. They are excellent. Does it have the hold down attachment?

Anything you want to know about it specifically?

[Kevin Blunt]

Hey guys thanks for the help,

Yes Mike, it doe shave the hold down clamp.

Is there a way to fine tune the adjustment to make it as precise as possible. And how doe sthe clamp work. Th eperson selling it said that it was "OK". Anything good or bad that you can tell me Mike would be great. Especially anything negative. I am going to Lee valley inthe morning to examine it because the one for sale is half way across the country. I have aout five pics of it but can't get my hands on it.

[Mike Heidrick]

Well lets see.

The clamp mounts to a steel rod by way of a set screw. You can raise and lower it as needed and then it is rasied and lowered by a big wooden handle. The clamp pad is also thread mounted and can be raised and lowered.

The miter bar is a big piece of extruded aluminum. It is 18" or 24" long depending on the model. There is another piece that then slides inside and can be slid out and locked in place when needed.

The bar mounts to the miter gauge by two screws and is infinately positionable. It can sit as close to the blade as you want it too.

They sold two styles of stops for the Accumiter. The latest one has micro positioning made possible by a brass screw and the fact that the stop is made of two pieces. It is about $30 for teh new style stop.

The tape is 1/2" and is replacable - I bought a Biesemeyer tape and replaced mine.

The only thing to watch out for is play in the miter bar. the new models have one that can be adjusted. Mine has virtually no play in the new sawstop but had a bit more in the Delta saw I had.

$125 is cheap for this setup. The hold down is worth about $45 alone. If it has the new stop assembly then that makes the deal even nicer.

Just so you know though, the EB3 osborne is about $125 now as well. Many people really like it. I would not trade my AccuMiter for one though.

If you want more pictures just let me know and I will go take some for you.

[Kevin Blunt]

Hi Mike,

Thanks for the reply. If you wouldn't mind taking some pictures of your Accu-miter so that I can compare it with the one I may buy that would be most excellent. I will try and add the pictures the seller sent me to this post. hopefully it works. Maybe you can tell me if the gauge is the newer version or not. I am not quite sure if the it has the newer style stop but from what you have described I think it does.

http://attach.mud.mail.yahoo.com/ca.f381.mail.yahoo.com/ym/ca/ShowLetter?box=Inbox&MsgId=3246_4552594_69114_1890_194965_0_14546_30544 3_2191056239&bodyPart=2&YY=61279&y5beta=yes&y5beta=yes&order=down&sort=date&pos=0&view=a&head=b&Idx=0

http://attach.mud.mail.yahoo.com/ca.f381.mail.yahoo.com/ym/ca/ShowLetter?box=Inbox&MsgId=3246_4552594_69114_1890_194965_0_14546_30544 3_2191056239&bodyPart=3&YY=61279&y5beta=yes&y5beta=yes&order=down&sort=date&pos=0&view=a&head=b&Idx=0
http://attach.mud.mail.yahoo.com/ca.f381.mail.yahoo.com/ym/ca/ShowLetter?box=Inbox&MsgId=3246_4552594_69114_1890_194965_0_14546_30544 3_2191056239&bodyPart=4&YY=61279&y5beta=yes&y5beta=yes&order=down&sort=date&pos=0&view=a&head=b&Idx=0
http://attach.mud.mail.yahoo.com/ca.f381.mail.yahoo.com/ym/ca/ShowLetter?box=Inbox&MsgId=3246_4552594_69114_1890_194965_0_14546_30544 3_2191056239&bodyPart=5&YY=61279&y5beta=yes&y5beta=yes&order=down&sort=date&pos=0&view=a&head=b&Idx=0

http://attach.mud.mail.yahoo.com/ca.f381.mail.yahoo.com/ym/ca/ShowLetter?box=Inbox&MsgId=3246_4552594_69114_1890_194965_0_14546_30544 3_2191056239&bodyPart=6&YY=61279&y5beta=yes&y5beta=yes&order=down&sort=date&pos=0&view=a&head=b&Idx=0
http://attach.mud.mail.yahoo.com/ca.f381.mail.yahoo.com/ym/ca/ShowLetter?box=Inbox&MsgId=3246_4552594_69114_1890_194965_0_14546_30544 3_2191056239&bodyPart=7&YY=61279&y5beta=yes&y5beta=yes&order=down&sort=date&pos=0&view=a&head=b&Idx=0

[Kevin Blunt]

Thanks again Mike for your help.

[Mike Heidrick]

PM sent kevin.

I could not view those links you posted. I took a bunch of pictures and will send them to you once I get an address. Here are a couple I upped to photobucket.

[Doug Shepard]

Well I dont mean to throw a wet blanket on the fire, but I'm not all that happy with the JDS. It's way better than the stock miter gauge that came with my saw (PM66) but I think I can do better, and might switch in the future. If I had to give it a grade, I think I give it a B. Angle repeatability isn't as good as some of the better ones with more detent positions and there seems to be a bit much play in the adjustment to suit me. I dont find the hold-down all that useful either. The times where it would be the most useful are for holding down very small pieces up near the blade and it's just not all that useful pivoted into that orientation. The longer stuff doesn't really need the hold-down as it's just as easy to hold things down by hand. On the plus side, it's real rugged (heavy too), the flip stops are sturdy and lock down tight, and zeroing the scale for accurate length readings off the ruler is easy. But $125 is a pretty good price if you dont mind working with a B student.:)

[S Larkin]

I had an Accumiter for a while but found it too heavy. Sold it and got the Osborne EB3. It was strictly a personal preference thing. Both the JDS and Osborne are much better than the stock miter gauge. Both are very accurate and pleasing to use. I believe I spent about $200 US a couple years ago on the JDS. Good luck.

[Jesse Thornton]

Does anyone have any experience with the Kreg miter guage? How does it compare? I know this is a diversion from the original question, but it could be relevant as it costs new almost the same price as Kevin can get the used accu-mitre for.

http://www.leevalley.com/wood/page.aspx?c=1&p=52405&cat=1,240,41064