Box joint jig ideas

[Dave Lehnert]

Looking to make a box joint jig. What is your favorite plan?

[Wayne Gauthier]

Shop notes has a very nice box joint jig with micro adjustment. I made one about a year ago, and it works great. I just looked for the plans I had, but, I am unable to find them.

Shopnotes.com should beable to help you with that plan.

Wayne

[Fred Findlay]

Built the Shopnotes jig 2 years ago and because of the small size of the material used I preferred to use the jig with my router table. Setup was sometimes tedious, results varied from frustrating to superb and were rarely reproducable from one day to the next. Went to the Chantilly Woodworking show Friday and watched the Porter Cable dovetail demo and then the Woodline demo twice. Fell hook, line and sinker for the Woodline Spacer Fence System! Took it home, watched the video while putting it together and headed for the workshop (garage). My first box was dead on! Thinking 'beginners luck' my second and third were dead on too!!! I'm still playing with box joints and haven't tried dovetails yet, but so far it's a winner for small boxes. If this thing turns on me I'll let you know.......

added: very important to keep your material to the table top

[jim gossage]

here are some pics from a fairly simple but very functional boxjoint jig attached to a crosscut jig for the tablesaw. the CCJ is built out of 1/2" MDF on the base, and all the upright parts are 3/4" MDF glued to the base. the front support has a T-slot to allow attachment of stops, clamps, etc. the BJJ is 1/2" MDF, and has a T-slot in the back to allow it to attach to the CCJ via the two black handles seen on either side of the blade guard.

to use the BJJ, you lock it to the CCJ, load the appropriate size dado blade onto the table saw, and cut a slot in the BJJ. then, plane a hardwood key that fits the slot exactly and is 2-4" long, insert it into the BJJ slot, and readjust the BJJ so that it is 1 key width away from the blade (see pic).

to adjust the jig: cut some joints and test fit them. if the joints are too loose (i.e. the pins are too small), then move the stop shown on the front of the CCJ to touch the BJJ, lock the stop, loosen the BJJ, place an appropriate size feeler gauge between stop and BJJ, then relock the BJJ. if the joints are too tight (i.e. the pins are too big), then move the stop shown on the front of the CCJ to touch the BJJ, slide an appropriate size feeler between the stop and BJJ, lock the stop, loosen the BJJ, romove the feeler, slide the BJJ against the stop, and relock the BJJ.

60556

60557

60558

60559

60560

[Wes Bischel]

Dave,
I had made one for the TS a while back, but I am going to switch to a router based version. Not due to the jig per say, but after a few boxes, my back starts hurting from leaning over to see the cut. With the router versions, I won't have that problem.

Just food for thought.

Wes

[Nancy Laird]

If you make a LOT of box joints, or intend to do so, take a look at Woodtek's Matchmaker. It will make 2 or three sizes of box joints, dovetails (although I don't recommend it for dovetails), and will do mortises and tenons all day long. We were making magazine boxes with box joints and using a table saw jig - 256 passes through the blade per box - it took LOML about 3 nights to do 12 boxes. And using the jig meant that the pins were off enough so that it took extra effort to join the parts - mating issues.

We bought the Matchmaker and did 12 more boxes in about 30 minutes--last batch of 24 took less than an hour. You can cut four layers of 1/4" material at a time and the pins just slide together perfectly. It's a time- and frustration-saver, believe me.

Nancy