I'm at a loss!!!!! Help!!

[Russell Tribby]

I have a little down time between jobs and I figured I'd take some time and get everything recalibrated. I got the blade on my ts to within .001" of an inch parallel to the miter gauge slot and I set my fence perfectly parallel to the miter gauge slot. I then went about making sure my miter gauge was aligned correctly (it's an Incra 1000SE). I jointed some poplar so that I had a square reference and then ripped it on the ts. I placed the jointed side against the miter gauge fence and used that as my test piece to calibrate the miter gauge. This is were I am at a complete loss. I'll check my cut with my square and it will be 90 degrees. However, if I take my square and reference off the edge of the board that wasn't on the miter gauge fence there's about a 1/64 to 1/32" gap between the board and the inside of the square. I've done the same thing on my miter saw and I get the same results. What am I doing wrong? The square that I'm using isn't the most expensive thing in the world but I've tested it using the drawing of two parallel lines method and it seemed fine. Help!!!

[Matt Ocel]

Russel -
Do you mean your donnage piece is off? If so does that matter?

[Russell Tribby]

It's not the left over piece that's off. When I place my square against the edge of the piece of stock that was against the miter gauge fence and I check for square then it checks out fine. When I place the square against the opposite edge it's off. I've checked the stock with calipers and it is dead on in terms of uniform width. I can't figure this out.

[Michael Weber]

After making sure the board sides were perfectly parallel by measuring them as you did, run one edge through the jointer again and remeasure. If it's tapering the board the ends would not be at right angles even after putting the board through the table saw to make the side parallel. OR maybe I'm just confused :p
Mike

[Matt Ocel]

I have always assumed my blade as "0".
Then I set my mitre guage and rip fence off my saw blade, is that the wrong way?

[Russell Tribby]

I have always assumed my blade as "0".
Then I set my mitre guage and rip fence off my saw blade, is that the wrong way?

I've always aligned the blade parallel to the miter slot and then aligned the fence parallel to the miter slot, which is what I did today. I think the problem must be with the square. I'm racking my brain and I can't think of any other reasonable explaination. If the two sides are parallel and I make a cut on my miter gauge and it checks out at 90 degrees then it stands to reason that if I rotate the piece and check for 90 degrees (at the same end of the piece) off of the opposite edge that it too should be at 90 but it's not. I guess this is my excuse to get a Starrett or some good engineer squares.

[Russell Tribby]

After making sure the board sides were perfectly parallel by measuring them as you did, run one edge through the jointer again and remeasure. If it's tapering the board the ends would not be at right angles even after putting the board through the table saw to make the side parallel. OR maybe I'm just confused :p
Mike

I'm not sure I'm following you Mike. I measured the width after I jointed one edge and then ripped it on the table saw and it was spot on even. So as far as I understand those two sides are parallel. Whether the ends were at 90 I don't know but that's what I was going to use the miter gauge for. I guess we're both confused:o

[Matt Ocel]

Us carpenters is a little slow.:D

I can't picture what your describing.
If you can, a picture would help.
I'll then try to re-enact on my saw and see if I can help trouble shoot.

BTW I just ran out to the workshop to check blade to mitre slot.
I have a PM 2000 and seems dead on. I then adjusted mitre guage(which is also incra 1000SE) to blade,rip fence to blade, then double checked mitre guage to rip fence.

[Guy Germaine]

Sounds to me like your square may be off. Two things:
Take your square to a piece of scrap with a nice straight edge, and draw a line. Now, flip the square over and check it with the line you just drew. If it's out of square, it won't line up with the line.

Take your scrap piece of poplar and crosscut it again, this time leaving a couple of inches of "scrap". Now, flip the scrap piece over and butt it up against the "good" piece and lay them on edge on the saw table. If your cut is square, the 2 pieces will line up perfectly. If not, you'll see a gap.

Some times your eyes are the best measuring tool in the shop.

[Curt Harms]

That doesn't involve any squares but a caliper is certainly useful, because you're measuring in .001" units. Anyone familiar with this procedure can proof read it--make sure I have it right.

Start with a piece of sheet goods 1' square. One edge must be true. Label that edge 1, the next edge 2, next 3, next 4. Put the straight edge labeled 1 against the miter gauge or sled. Cut just enought of the edge labeled '2' to make sure the entire edge is cut. Put the edge labeled '2' against the miter gauge and cut a little off the edge labeled '3'. Put the cut edge labeled '3' against the fence and cut the edge labeled '4'

Now, cut about 1/2" off the side labeled '1'. Measure the width of both edges. The difference is the error/foot times 4. For example, one end of the strip is .550", the other end of the foot long strip is.555". The difference is .004". .004"/4=.001" error/foot. Does this make sense, and is it correct? This is my understanding of it. I saw an animation of this technique which was very useful, but do you think I can find it again:(?

[Russell Tribby]

Sounds to me like your square may be off. Two things:
Take your square to a piece of scrap with a nice straight edge, and draw a line. Now, flip the square over and check it with the line you just drew. If it's out of square, it won't line up with the line.

Take your scrap piece of poplar and crosscut it again, this time leaving a couple of inches of "scrap". Now, flip the scrap piece over and butt it up against the "good" piece and lay them on edge on the saw table. If your cut is square, the 2 pieces will line up perfectly. If not, you'll see a gap.

Some times your eyes are the best measuring tool in the shop.

Guy, I've done that test with my square and as far as my eyes can tell it lined up fine. That's what stumps me about all of this. I'll try your other suggestion and see what I come up with.

[Russell Tribby]

That doesn't involve any squares but a caliper is certainly useful, because you're measuring in .001" units. Anyone familiar with this procedure can proof read it--make sure I have it right.

Start with a piece of sheet goods 1' square. One edge must be true. Label that edge 1, the next edge 2, next 3, next 4. Put the straight edge labeled 1 against the miter gauge or sled. Cut just enought of the edge labeled '2' to make sure the entire edge is cut. Put the edge labeled '2' against the miter gauge and cut a little off the edge labeled '3'. Put the cut edge labeled '3' against the fence and cut the edge labeled '4'

Now, cut about 1/2" off the side labeled '1'. Measure the width of both edges. The difference is the error/foot times 4. For example, one end of the strip is .550", the other end of the foot long strip is.551". The difference is .004". .004"/4=.001" error/foot. Does this make sense, and is it correct? This is my understanding of it. I saw an animation of this technique which was very useful, but do you think I can find it again:(?

Thanks Curt. I'll give it a shot.