Member
OK, that's cool. It makes me see the biscuit joiner is a whole new light. While I sold my Lamello after I got my Domino and it sat for a year unused I still have a PC and I need to get it out and just stare at it without thinking of it as a biscuit hole cutter.Originally Posted by Larry Edgerton
Of all the laws Brandolini's may be the most universally true.
Deep thought for the day:
Your bandsaw weighs more when you leave the spring compressed instead of relieving the tension.
Contributor
I have a Dewalt unit, don't use it a lot but do like using it to attach face frames to cabinetry and align edges for glue ups occasionally. I've never understood the shaming among some woodworkers for using a biscuit jointer. It's a very handy, easy to use and inexpensive tool. The more tools in your inventory, the more options available for your projects is the way I look at it.
Member
Thank you. At last I have a reasonable explanation for the US mates have a such prejudice against biscuits.My introduction to biscuit joinery came from New Yankee Workshop and I'll bet I wasn't the only one. New Yankee workshop was sponsored in part by Porter-Cable who made the biscuit jointer shown though he did user other brands initially. For a while it seemed like no matter the joinery question, the answer was biscuits. I guess people used biscuits where they weren't a good solution and concluded that they were no good for anything anywhere. I can't recall having an appropriately placed biscuit joint fail.
All the best.
Member
Wish I could find a Ryobi mini, I'd like to use it to reinforce miters in boxes I build.
Contributor
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They come up quite often out here on CL. I have 2.
Don't use mine too often anymore. But I just had a difficult glue up of what looked like a ladder (sides of a bookcase). They came in real handy to hold things together and in line. Not putting my Dewalt on CL anytime soon.
NOW you tell me...
Contributor
I have the dvd archive of FWW on my computer and failed to find any article by a Micheal Fortune. I did a more general search for biscuit and found that, in 1993, Woodworkers Supply sold some sort of device that lets you mount your joiner upside down on the bench.
But more interesting would be a kit sold at that time by WoodHaven for your router table. It's just a biscuit sized slot cutter. It sounds kind of scary to me.
Issue was Jan/Feb 1993
Looking at the Woodhaven site, I see the biscuit slot kits.
https://woodhaven.com/search?type=product&q=biscuit
Looking at the WW Supply site, I came up empty.
Contributor
My wife gave me a PC joiner years ago and I never really used it. But lately, I've been making treads for our spiral staircase. I used it to help align 5/4" oak. Maybe I'm not doing it right but, so far, I've been about 1/64" off. The wide drum sander is taking care of it but I would rather be right on the money.
3 down, 19 to go plus two landings.
Contributor
Having failed to find the Micheal Fortune article in FWW, I tried some other magazine archives. In Fine HomeBuilding, I found a tip where some guy uses a Biscuit Joiner to patch flooring. He sets the joiner up so that it cuts straight down. He sets the depth so that the cut is exactly equal to the flooring plank width. Then he plunges the tool to cut away as much as possible and cleans the rest out with a chisel. He adds the caveat that you should use an old cutter in case you hit a nail.
Kind of a neat idea. He turned his biscuit cutter into a plunging skil saw.
Moderator
Make sure you're referencing off the same face for every piece...for biscuits, Dominos, tenons, dowels or splines. The "what" doesn't matter in that respect. It's also very important that the cutting machine be fully in "flat" contact with that reference face for the entire cut. If something gets even slightly angled up or down, misalignment can occur.
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The most expensive tool is the one you buy "cheaply" and often...
Contributor
I save my shaming for Kreg jigs.
Member
Here's a link to the first of nine pages of links to articles and videos by Michael Fortune on Fine Woodworking's website. The article you want is on page 4.
https://www.finewoodworking.com/auth...hael-c-fortune
Contributor
Here you go Mike, finally had a chance to take a few pics. This jig allows quickly and easily cutting slots for biscuits to reinforce door or window casing miters.
DSC_0299a.jpg
Above shows the jig, a couple of templates used to adjust the jig, a spacer used to hold the casing up so the biscuit slot is properly positioned, and two cam clamps I use to clamp the joint for gluing. I make left and right sample templates for each size/style casing with a line marking where the center of the biscuit should be. This allows quickly adjusting the jig for different casing sizes. Once it's set up, all the slots can be cut in all the pieces without further adjustment.
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Above is a closeup of the jig. The side and center adjustments allow for different width casings. This jig covers the sizes I use most often, but it could be resized as needed.
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Above shows the spacer in place...I made it double ended and just move it from one side to the other as needed. The spacer is only needed when doing thinner casings.
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Above shows how the casing fits in the jig. You can't see the spacer, but it's underneath the casing.
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Above shows the end result. I generally use a #20 biscuit. On thin 2 1/4" casing you might have to use a #10.
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Final pic shows a cam clamp in place. They are purpose made for clamping molding miters and are worth the investment if you are doing more than a few doors or windows. They make it trivial to line up and clamp the joint after applying glue and provide lots of pressure across the glue line. The pins do leave marks in the edge of the molding; I just fill them when I am filling the nail holes. I almost always pre-finish before cutting and gluing, so all I do after installation is touch up the nail holes. Pre-finishing makes it trivial to wipe away glue squeeze-out as well.
Member
I got a good deal on a lamello zeta p2. Purchased mostly for their unique self clamping fittings and 'knock down' fittings but i've started using it as a regular biscuit joiner quite a bit. Don't use my domino all that much now as for mortise and tenon joinery, breadboards and so on, i prefer a real mortise and tenons.
Contributor
That's what I noticed especially when cutting biscuit slots where the fence was registering off a 3/4" edge. It was hard not to tilt the machine when plunging it so the biscuit wasn't perpendicular to the work piece. I jointed and planed a piece of 2 X 4 and clamped it flush with the edge of the 3/4" material. Now instead of the fence sitting on a 3/4" piece it was sitting on a 2"+ piece so didn't rock. Seemed to work better.
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