What do you think of this dovetail jig?

[jnesmith]

I have the Craftman jig that several of us got for pennies on the dollar a couple of years ago. I've only played around with it a little, but have not been impressed. Seems plasticy and fidgity to me. I'm really only interested in half blinds at the moment, and wondered about this one from MLCS. Goes for $60. I'm thinking of ebaying my Craftsman.




http://mlcswoodworking.com/shopsite_...vetailjig.html

[Rounder]

I spent the extra money and got the Porter Cable 4212 and have not been sorry. You may want to take a look at it.

[final_t]

The MLCS model is similar to the HF/Rockler/Heartfield clones. If you're only into half-blinds you might want to consider the single-purpose plate that MLCS also sells. That being said, it should "do the job", but I will echo Rounder's statment - the PC is a better choice overall.

[LarryG]

I noticed this "new" jig in the last MLCS catalog I received. Although I don't know this for a certain fact, it appears to be the exact same jig as the Hartville Tool GFK1200, which was also sold as the Porter-Cable 4100 series (not the same as the newer 4200 series George mentions). That is, Hartville Tool supplied the jigs to P-C and I'm thinking they're doing likewise with MLCS.

If so, it's reportedly a decent jig, essentially the same basic design and capabilities as the very similar jigs from HF, Rockler, Grizzly, etc. If this is in fact identical to the Hartville jig, that $60 price is excellent ... Hartville gets $100, and the old P-C sold for about that same amount, too.

Like George I have the newer P-C 4212, and since it will do so much more I decided that for me it was the best investment for the long run. But the 4212 is a $150 jig, considerably more than this one from MLCS.

[JimD]

It is OK but I would not get it. If you want to be able to do through dovetails and half-blind, the PC 4212 jig is the way to go. If you only want to do half-blind, the HF jig is better in some ways and about half as expensive. I have a jig similar to this one. An advantage is that you do not have to set the side stops for the dovetail front and side, it is built in. A disadvantage that was important to me is you cannot use 1/2 inch baltic birch plywood for the drawer sides (or anything else even a fraction of an inch under 1/2 inch) and get a good fitting joint. The problem is that the depth of the joint into the drawer front is set by the depth of the slots in the finger guide. You can space the finger guide in and out but this also changes the shape of the tails when you get a drawer side narrower than 1/2 inch. The HF has separate adjustments for the side stops (which I do not think is very useful but does allow you to cut with the wood in the center of the jig) and for the depth of the cut into the drawer front. This is what lets me use bb plywood. The HF is harder to set up but more flexible and cheaper. Either will cut good dovetails.

Jim