Stiffening up the fence on my exising table saw.

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Stiffening up the fence on my exising table saw.

Post by Not your average framer »

At present, the fence on my table saw can flex of line a little to easily and I am thinking about how hard it would be to strengthen it so that it stays on line better. The fence is not a full length fence and only clamps in position on one end only. I wondered if anyone else has needed to address the same issue and has any advice about solving this issue. I have seen quite a few YouTube videos about solving this on other types of table saw, but adapting these ideas to suit my saw is more difficult.
Thanks,
Mark.
Mark Lacey

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Re: Stiffening up the fence on my exising table saw.

Post by JFeig »

My first thought is to use a carpenters square to align the fence to assure that it is truly square to the table and saw blade. Some locking mechanisms are just not that strong to repel the forces of you pressing against the fence with whatever you are cutting. The cheapest and easiest solution is to have an extra clamp secure the distant end of the fence.
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Re: Stiffening up the fence on my exising table saw.

Post by Not your average framer »

Hi Jerome,

Yes, the would be ideal, but fence does not travel the full length of the table, so that I can not reach it with a clamp. I am expecting to need to extend the fence to where I can reach it with a clamp. The existing fence is hollow and made of paper thin aluminium. I probably need to plane down a piece of wood to fit inside the existing fence, so that I can clad both outer fraces with flat pieces of wood and add an addition spacer to keep both pieces of flat clading properly spaced rignt to the end.
Mark Lacey

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Re: Stiffening up the fence on my exising table saw.

Post by fusionframer »

The position of the fence should not generally be positioned the full size of the saw. It is ok for cutting sheet material as that is stable and will not bind. When ripping timber, the fence should end at the midpoint of the blade, although i do keep mine towards the back of the blade. This is done to avoid the risk of kickback. If the timber bows in after cutting, the riving knife will stop it pinching on the blade. If it bows outwards, having the fence well beyond the blade will cause the timber to tighten on the blade and cause kickback. Having the fence stop end will release this pressure and avoid kickback. Even if you don't get kickback, it will stop the blade burning the timber. So i wouldn't be messing around trying to extend the fence to clamp tbh.

The bottom line is that with a cheapish table saw, you are generally going to struggle to get accurate cuts. But i guess that is the same as most tools. When i first started framing, i was told to not bother with cheap logan cutters, but go for keencut or fletcher. Much more expensive, but for a reason.

Nick
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Re: Stiffening up the fence on my exising table saw.

Post by Not your average framer »

Thanks Nick,

I mostly want to extend the fence enough to be able to reach the end with a clamp, to stop the slight bit of flexibility in the fence. The fence is a little springy and does not stay in line when a little pressure is apllied to the free end of the fence. I don't have a planner thicknesser, so I plane one side or face flat on my surface planner and use that to run against the fence on the table saw and the plane the saw cut side flat on my surface planner. I suppose that I could always but one of those cheap planner thicknesser, but to be honest it's not something which I would use very often.
Mark Lacey

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Re: Stiffening up the fence on my exising table saw.

Post by Hali »

having a bit of bad luck trying to rip some 45-degree edges on some QS white oak. I’m trying to make 44-inch tall posts that have all QS on the outside. I’ve spent a good deal of time selecting the right ones. My idea is to rip 45-degree edges perhaps spline them together and glue them up.

I’m ripping them on a brand new Delta 10″ Contractors saw with a Biesmyer Fence and a Forrest WW2 blade. I’ve added a piece of wood to make it flush with the top so the sharp edge doesn’t dig under the fence. The auxiliary fence extends just a few inches past the blade. I’m pretty well convinced my saw is close to perfectly set up, I used a dial indicator to make sure the blade and fence, and miter slots are all within .005. The fence falls away from the blade maybe .003.

My problem is on the end of the cut the board is tailing away from the fence binding the wood and actually cutting it on a curve. Actually kicking out a couple of inches at the end of the cut. Scary! I got it all close and am now just shaving about 1/32 off to make a perfect 45-degree cut. I’ve seen this product called Board Buddies that seem to hold the boards down and pull them into the fence. Did anyone use them?
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Re: Stiffening up the fence on my exising table saw.

Post by Not your average framer »

I know the problem well! A perfect set up on contractors saw is not really what the scales and angle measurements on a contractor saw are made for. The angle of blade setting according to the markings of the saw are not made to be super accurate, and if you are expecting the fence to super accurate, well that's not always how it's going to be either. I set my blade angle using a digital angle gauge, it is either set dead accuarate, or it's wrong. Not every fence is going to lock solidly at both ends lots of fences have a lot of residual movement even when they are locked into position. How do I know this? I also have a contractor saw. There an old saying that you get what you paid for. Well it's definitely true about contractors table saws. So what do you do about this? Well you can make it better, or alternatively there are work arounds. Most of us find it easier to do the work arounds, so that's often using digital accurate alternative measuring equipment and clamping a piece of wood behind the fence to prevent any movement of the fence, when it is set up correctly.

Gluing two freshly sawn surfaces together is not the best idea. Before gluing these sufrace together, you eithar need a joining plane, or a surface plainer to get two dead flat and completely square surfaces to glue and clamp perfectly together. I have both, believe me it makes a lot of difference and it matters! I see that you are doing this with oak, that a lot of really hard work with a jointing plane, but it's also not all that easy with the surface planer either. I'm not joking heavy cuts with an electric surface planner will hammer the blades and will be very bad for the sharpness of your blade. I'd be a little bit particular about the type of wood glue you are using as well. Some of the cheaper PVA glues are a bit thin. If you want a strong joint I think that it better be a reasonable quality glue. I make a point of not trying to avoid blunting my planer blade of oak and after cutting with a table saw, I belt sand the sawn surface flat and smooth with a belt sander and it takes a lot of care and experience to get this right. it is much easier to rip and sand longer lengths first before cutting them to length afterwards. It is also a lot easily to cut the glued up pieces of wood after they have been already glued together.

I guess that you thought that this is going to be a lot easier and much less work that this? Well we all do at first, I know that I did as well, So welcome to the real world! I've got plenty of woodworking power tools, but I do my best to minimise how much I rely upon re-working too much of anything. Time spent doing woodwork far too easily runs away with you and time to often costs you a big chunk out of your intended profit. Sorry to be blunt about it, but there is always a battle between quoting the customer a competitive price and controlling you labour time to protect your intended profit margin. I mostly make changes to "off the self" picture frame mouldings in order to be able to fit mouldings together as stcked moulding frames, or else I an slicing up pieces of waste into slips, spacers, or liners. It's not as simple as it sounds, you need to know when some things are just not going to be finacially not worth doing. I've been doing this a while, but it's not alway a smart move to do this. It's often very tempting to convert some pieces of waste mouldings into somethig more useful, only to find that what you produced to be useful, was less useful than you had thought.
Take care,
Mark.
Mark Lacey

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Re: Stiffening up the fence on my exising table saw.

Post by vintage frames »

I suppose you could devise some sort of cradle to support the wood as it comes out of the saw. And maybe just over-size the lengths by 2 or 3 inches so that you can cut off the faulty bit at the ends.
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Re: Stiffening up the fence on my exising table saw.

Post by Not your average framer »

Table saw safety is a real big deal and I'm not joking! You can get seriously badly hurt on a table saw. It's one of the most dangerous pieces of machinery in most work working shops. One mistake might be enough to kill you. Have really good look at some of the safety videos of youtube. Most contractors saws do not make it easy to use feather boards and other anti kick back devices. I also have two Grrripper safety push blocks as well, they are very necessary safety equipment when using table saws and table planers. Take it seriously, it matters!

But the way, the saw blade needs to be exactly parallel to the mite slot and the fence needs to be exactly parallel to the saw blade. Consider making and using a table saw sled with a safe means of clamping small bit of wood in place with clamps not your fingers. The table saw is a lot more powerful that your fingers this is not a disputable thing, this is an undisputable fact.
Mark Lacey

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Re: Stiffening up the fence on my exising table saw.

Post by Not your average framer »

What are you using to set up your saw, what level of accuracy do you need to work to and what is the specification of the saw blade fitted to your saw? If as it sounds that the fence is not necessarily set as parallel to the saw blade, you need to accurately determine this and reset the fence to be accurately be set to be parallel to the saw blade. Accuracy in doing this needs to be perfect. If the distance between the fence and the saw blade closes onto what is being cut as it passes through this is very dangerous and can cause a serious risk of kick back.

Believe me you don't want to be standing in the wrong place if you get a serious kick back. Every year Kick backs kill people who are unfortunate enough to be hit by the piece of wood being thrown at them a the full speed which the teeth of the saw blade in travelling at. This speed is often about 170 miles per hour. If you get hit in the head by a moderate sized piece of wood at that sort of speed a broken scull is not all that unlikely. Please be aware how dangerous this can be and how vitally important it is to ensure that this is set correctly.

Before using the saw after readjusting the fence angle please check that the fence is set absolutely parallel to the blade. Don't take any chances. It really matters!
Mark Lacey

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Re: Stiffening up the fence on my exising table saw.

Post by fusionframer »

How are you pushing the timber through? It is best to use 2 push sticks, one on top with forward and downward pressure. The 2nd is to apply pressure to keep it against the fence. The 2nd stick is removed a couple of inches before the blade, but by this time, the first stick will do the job.I have seen, especially on contractor saws people push through part way, the go and pull timber from back and that will cause the timber to generally pull away from the fence.

What will make it easier to get good cuts is to have an outfeed table level with saw. It makes using the saw far easier. It can be a temporary thing, even an existing table raised on bits of timber. Alternatively, you push through with push sticks and have a helper pulling through.

If your saw is set up accurately as you say and all but last part is the problem, it has to be the way you are sending timber through.

As vintage frames says, if you make it a few inches too long, then you can cut end off after.

Nick
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Re: Stiffening up the fence on my exising table saw.

Post by Hali »

Anyway, I have run Moulding heads in radial arms and tablesaws for about 30 yrs now, and if you ain't at least a little scared , your crazy. Just the sound of it ramping up to speed is so unlike a normal blade, you had better pay attn. There is a such a thing as too much safety, it's when you are so scared you can't focus and control the work, and may have a weak link in your pushing style, this will cause chatter and possibly kick back. Normally I listen to the little voices, if it says "man this is an accident looking for a place to happen" I rethink it.
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Re: Stiffening up the fence on my exising table saw.

Post by Not your average framer »

Man, you not kidding radial arm saws are seriously scarey and dangerous. I definitely don't want one of those! Much too scarey for me! I do have a sliding compound mitre saw, which will actual cope with cross cut widths at 90 degrees at 14 inches across. That almost counts as being able to perform some radial arm type tasks of a more limited cutting length, but at least this has a proper blade guard on it. I have only used it on a limited number of occasions, but I got it thinking that it would be great for cutting MDF backs for some frame sizes. Your a brave man, using a radial arm saw!
Mark Lacey

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