Here is something that was sort of adapted from/inspired by the dado sled in Bill Hylton's Power Tool Joinery.
Tom Hintz's mobile stand calls for a bunch of half laps. I'm using a bunch of thick, recycled oak that's slightly funky.
The half-laps at the ends of the pieces barely went ok for me with the All-in-one and router on its plate (my shortest all-in-one is 24" and whether I did one piece at once, two, or all four, it wasn't going well and my first try at the half laps in the middle of the pieces was grim.)
I sighed and put together the 21829's router stuff with the funky fence. It worked pretty well, actually, for evening out the end laps but I couldn't see moving the fence back at least six inches from the bit to do the laps in the middle and pushing long oak pieces across an unguarded bit.
Hylton suggests in passing that if you insist on doing laps in the middle on the router table, one way is 'the dado sled". I was looking at those plans, which involved a sheet of thin material with a slot in the middle for the bit, ledges that fit on either side of the table, a big fence in back, and an end butt piece "to prevent the piece kicking to the right", which then has spacers added to control the width (length?) of the lap.
As I was trying to figure out which thin material to use it dawned on me that with two slots on the BT/Craftsman's accesory table, putting the ledges on was completely unnecessary. Then I decided the sheet was superfluous, as well, its function being to connect the ledges.
This left the fence. I cut two little pieces of UHMW (cutting board) and bandsawed a crude arch in a long piece of oak for the bit to pass through. The UHMW runners are attached to the fence (and to small stabilizer blocks of oak on the back of the fence).
The thing at the far end of the first picture was my attempt to replicate the end butt/block. But its grip on the fence wasn't firm enough (as long as it was adjustable) and I was having second thoughts about loose spacers traveling happily along with the workpiece and fence.
I decided I'd have to made a sturdy L-shaped thing and figure some complex way to attach it. Meanwhile, power tool curfew was about to hit and I wanted to test the glider concept to see if it was worth it.
So I grabbed a strange, large plastic C clamp (two of them came with a collection of clothespin clamps) and used it to attach a workpiece to the glider.
What a happy accident! It secures the workpiece much better than Hylton's design (which involves holding in place against the right butt piece) and serves as a handle, too. My hands do not touch the workpiece in its travel across the table.
It worked so well that I was able to improve or start eight separate laps in the next fifteen minutes. The thing that was supposed to be the heavy-duty right hand butt piece is fine as a stop block.
Excuse the funky light--all the glass on the back porch sends strange reflections. The first picture shows the glider by itself; the second shows the strange clamp/glide handle holding a workpiece (if the fence looks a lot like the workpiece, it's because I've got a lot of recyclable oak.)
Tom Hintz's mobile stand calls for a bunch of half laps. I'm using a bunch of thick, recycled oak that's slightly funky.
The half-laps at the ends of the pieces barely went ok for me with the All-in-one and router on its plate (my shortest all-in-one is 24" and whether I did one piece at once, two, or all four, it wasn't going well and my first try at the half laps in the middle of the pieces was grim.)
I sighed and put together the 21829's router stuff with the funky fence. It worked pretty well, actually, for evening out the end laps but I couldn't see moving the fence back at least six inches from the bit to do the laps in the middle and pushing long oak pieces across an unguarded bit.
Hylton suggests in passing that if you insist on doing laps in the middle on the router table, one way is 'the dado sled". I was looking at those plans, which involved a sheet of thin material with a slot in the middle for the bit, ledges that fit on either side of the table, a big fence in back, and an end butt piece "to prevent the piece kicking to the right", which then has spacers added to control the width (length?) of the lap.
As I was trying to figure out which thin material to use it dawned on me that with two slots on the BT/Craftsman's accesory table, putting the ledges on was completely unnecessary. Then I decided the sheet was superfluous, as well, its function being to connect the ledges.
This left the fence. I cut two little pieces of UHMW (cutting board) and bandsawed a crude arch in a long piece of oak for the bit to pass through. The UHMW runners are attached to the fence (and to small stabilizer blocks of oak on the back of the fence).
The thing at the far end of the first picture was my attempt to replicate the end butt/block. But its grip on the fence wasn't firm enough (as long as it was adjustable) and I was having second thoughts about loose spacers traveling happily along with the workpiece and fence.
I decided I'd have to made a sturdy L-shaped thing and figure some complex way to attach it. Meanwhile, power tool curfew was about to hit and I wanted to test the glider concept to see if it was worth it.
So I grabbed a strange, large plastic C clamp (two of them came with a collection of clothespin clamps) and used it to attach a workpiece to the glider.
What a happy accident! It secures the workpiece much better than Hylton's design (which involves holding in place against the right butt piece) and serves as a handle, too. My hands do not touch the workpiece in its travel across the table.
It worked so well that I was able to improve or start eight separate laps in the next fifteen minutes. The thing that was supposed to be the heavy-duty right hand butt piece is fine as a stop block.
Excuse the funky light--all the glass on the back porch sends strange reflections. The first picture shows the glider by itself; the second shows the strange clamp/glide handle holding a workpiece (if the fence looks a lot like the workpiece, it's because I've got a lot of recyclable oak.)
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