best way for long bevel cut? (7 feet )

[Forrest Gon]

I am making 3 long floating shelves, (7.5 feet), the top, bottom, and middle section all are 45 miter, and with table saw, not matter how careful I tried, the end result of the long bevel board look awful, the left side and the right side of the board has almost 1/16 difference in height.

Is this something that is not supposed to be done on table saw? Or there is some special trick I did not know?

Or tracksaw is the only solution here? Thanks

[mreza Salav]

Can happen. Use router table or shaper.

[Doug Garson]

Watch this video, I think it answers your question. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=osZI-OZ9noA

[Bill Dufour]

If the board varies in thickness the bevels will not meet in the middle. From your info I am thinking it is off by 1/16" side to side. Also any bow,twist, warp will exaggerate the difference. The human eye can see 1/1000' Inch mismatch.
A roundover, cove etc would be a little less obvious.
Bill D

[Howard Rosenberg]

That’s a great video. And that host is a great communicator. Thanks for posting it.

But I disagree - I’ve made many projects using long bevels - and the TS was the easiest and fastest. And a 7-ft bevel is not going to be easy on a router table…

In my case, my TS is right-tilt. I hated the calculations necessary to use the mitre gauge because I was reluctant to trap cuts under the blade against the fence.

My solution is to build sleds that run in the mitre slot. I build them with supports positioned at the angle I need for that particular project. I leave the blade at 90-deg and just run the wood past the blade.

Perfect cuts every time - just don’t hesitate for even a micro-second. Make sure you have a clear outfield table long enough.

I’m pretty confident you’ll be mighty happy.

[Thomas Wilson]

Good advice in James Harrison’s video. I made a bunch of fake beams 16’ long. These were 3 sided beams that fit over a 2x4 on a cathedral ceiling. The only way to do them was a 45 degree bit in a big hand-held router. I got the boards as straight as possible before cutting the miter but tight joints required biscuits and clamping pressure. I borrowed clamps from everyone I knew. Good luck.

[Kevin Jenness]

It is certainly possible to mill a 7' long bevel cleanly on the tablesaw. The same smooth feed and positive control of the workpiece is required on a saw as on a router table. A power feed is ideal but featherboards will do. The setup is similar, with the pieces ripped to width and the cutter buried in the fence, the difference being that the saw requires an auxiliary fence that allows the offcut to fall free of kickback. Sawing will take less power to make the cut.

[Steve Rozmiarek]

It's really easy with a sliding tablesaw.

[Jim Becker]

If one doesn't have a slider, one can fasten a piece of plywood to the workpiece to act as a quick and dirty taper sled to use along the fence of a cabinet saw. Alternatively, a track saw can do the job.

[Scott T Smith]

A track saw is another good option for long bevels. We used ours last week to put 45 degree bevels on some 20' boards.

[Jim Dwight]

My basic rule of thumb is to use the track saw on large pieces of solid wood or plywood and use the table saw for small ones. Either can do both but I think it's fighting uphill to ignore the benefit offered by the other tool. The makita track saw track has a special lip to make it harder to tilt the base of the saw and make the miter wrong. But other track saws should work fine as long as you are careful to keep the base of the saw flat on the track. If I wanted to use a router with a 45 degree bit, I wouldn't use my router table, I would use the router attachment for my track saw track. It works great for long dados so I don't see why it wouldn't work just as well for a long miter.

[Jacques Gagnon]

If one doesn't have a slider, one can fasten a piece of plywood to the workpiece to act as a quick and dirty taper sled to use along the fence of a cabinet saw. Alternatively, a track saw can do the job.

...A variation of Jim's suggestion is the use of an "L-shaped" fence. It provides the precision and addresses the safety aspect raised by Kevin - the offcut having a safe space to fall into in order to avoid kickback.

[Ian Lerew]

I purchased the Jessem TS Stock Guides for this exact purpose and I’ve had very good results. They are slightly angled towards the fence like you would set up a power feeder. Keeps the work piece tight to the fence and table, all you need to do is keep a consistent feed rate.

[Richard Coers]

Don't take the miter cut to a sharp point. Almost everyone breaks a sharp edge on a shelf with sandpaper anyway and if you leave a small flat, you have something to run against the table or the fence.

[Rich Engelhardt]

Or tracksaw is the only solution here?

Let's just say "If you had a Makita track saw, we wouldn't be having this discussion".

As mentioned above, the Makita has a small lip that keeps the saw from tipping over during an angled cut. Not that it's 100% needed, it just a nice touch Makita includes that Festool doesn't have.