I have no dovetail experience. I have woodworked for a very long time. I build kitchens and wall units/built ins for a living. I always provide drawers built with rabbit joints. I found a good source for dovetail drawer boxes who even provided me with sample boxes to show my customers. I sold my current customer on dovetail drawer boxes, about 25 boxes. I am at the end of the job, finish out is near complete and when I went to place my drawer box order the source had went out of business. Now I need to learn to dovetail on the fly.
1. Which jig gives me the most bang for the buck, not necessarily the cheapest but rather the best and easiest to use. I watched a lot of youtube video on the leigh super jig and it appears rather simple and good quality. What about the porter cable jig??? Any other suggestions. Woodriver??? I need to be able to set up and cut several pins, several tails as in production.
2. Is it feasible for me to use a tight baltic birch plywood in a leigh jig or will that be a waste of time. Any experience I have had in the past with using a router on plywood was that the plywood just splintered. The source I did have provided me with 2 sample boxes, one was solid maple and the other was 1/2" baltic birch. Both boxes were very high quality and looked superb so I know dovetailing baltic birch ply is feasible.
3. Any other options out there anyone knows of just let me know.
Thanks and happy woodworking,
Jerry