Tilted rip fence(s)

[wbsettle]

I purchased my BT3100-1 during the last days of its retail existence back in 01/06, during the $199 - $50 rebate deal. Anyway, I noticed during a project this summer that while the rip fence is parallel to the blade, the fence is not perpendicular to the table. In other words, the top of the fence is ever so slightly closer to the blade than the base and its consistent for the entire length as checked from both sides of the fence.

Searches revealed a few people that had discovered the same issue. Most solved the problem by filing down the powder coat around the bolt holes in the locking mechanism. I thought I'd try going the warranty route since I was still covered. Just picked up my replacement fence today...the aluminum extrusion got the crap beat out of it in shipping, different issue...and guess what, the warranty fence has the exact same degree of tilt as the original.

Could it really be that most/all fences shipped this way and only a few of us have noticed? Anybody have a late '05 manufactured 3100 that doesn't have this tilt?

-Brent

[eweu]

It's possible that a lot of fences shipped that way. My 21829 had the same problem and filing the bolts on the fence mechanism worked well. I've been parallel ever since.

It's a relatively easy fix, but I'm not sure I would have figured it out without help from this forum. Still, it was disappointing. One would expect those things to be quality checked before packaging.

[cgallery]

+1 what Eweu said. I'll go even further and theorize that maybe they didn't identify it as a possible issue at the factory.

I'll go even further and mention that I've been reading about some PowerMatic 2000 saws that have been delivered where the raise/lower mechanism is non-linear. So, as you raise the blade it also moves away from the fence at the front of the blade, and towards the fence at the back of the blade.

So I'll forgive Ryobi this relatively minor problem that I didn't even identify for the first 2-3 years of the saw's use.

[sparkeyjames]

This also seems to be a problem with the Sears 21829. Shown in this
thread is the solution I and others took to remedy the problem.


http://www.bt3central.com/showthread.php?t=27210

[gwyneth]

The tooling for the fence probably didn't change a bit for the 21829 and possibly not even for the change from 3000 to 3100.

I was wondering if my 21829 fence was slightly off but hadn't gotten around to looking at it until the other day when the other side of it was serving its router table fence role--ruined two successive pieces of ash when it drifted backwards during the cut.

After the first, I'd tightened, etc., and was really surprised when it happened again. It looks as if the little foot may not be inserting far enough into/under the back rail lip to get a good grip.

But probably all fence issues are related...

[JimD]

If you take the fence extrusion off the casting to fix this, I recommend you put it back together with anti-seeze on the bolts and with hex head bolts instead of the original allen heads. Mine were simple 1/4 coarse bolts - very easy to find - and I only had to take a little off one side of the slot with a dremel to get a nut driver on them. Steel bolts in aluminum seeze which makes it hard to adjust the fence.

Jim

[eddy merckx]

Hi Brent

If you haven't tried it yet, make sure that your table top is absolutely level. Both side to side and fore/aft. If the table isn't level, it will twist and bring itself out of square with the fence. You need to make certain that the fence rails are level as well.

I had to shim between the saw body and the base with washers to get mine level (uneven garage floor). After I did that, I had no more fence issues.

Eddy