Dixie Digital Angle Gauge

[Luckbox]

Does anyone have ant experience with this?
www.ptreeusa.com/edirect_062008.html

It seems like a great price but is it something that would get used?

[LarryG]

It's essentially identical to the Beall Tilt Box and Wixey Digital Angle Gauge, both of which have been discussed here and both of which some here own. Useful if you cut or drill a lot of angles and bevels, as well as for checking tool setup (table saw blade, jointer fence, etc). I don't own any of these myself as I couldn't foresee using it enough to justify the purchase price ... I can do all I typically need to do with a combination square or double square.

The normal price of these gadgets is ~$40 and the ~$30 sale price is not rare from one vendor or another, so if you pass on this one you'll have another chance. AAMOF, at the moment Woodcraft has the Wixey Digital Fence Readout on sale for $99.99 (regularly $149.99) and they throw in a Wixey Digital Angle Gauge for free.

[charliex]

I have the Wixey gauge. Paid full $40.00 months back and I consider it well worth it. Very useful for setting the tables on the BS, TS, DP. Make a jig to set it to zero on earths level and it has many more uses.
Chas

[pelligrini]

I got the Wixey guage for $30 or maybe $20 last year. I like it and it does come in really handy. I just wish it had an auto turnoff like their digital height guage. I've burnt through several batteries.

I don't use mine as much as I thought I would. The main place I set up my table saw is not exactly level. The surface is flat but it slopes in a couple directions. That can affect the readings if you don't keep the guage parallel with your last reading.

[LCHIEN]

I enjoy using mine. It comes in very handy for setting and or measuring odd angles as well as accurately setting vertical fences and blades square to the horizontal table.

Its a physical inclination device which is a bit different from a protractor although they do have a lot of similarities.

As for using it to measure blade tilt on your saw, having your saw on a slight slope is not a problem because the device has a zero button, you set the tilt at zero when it on your table surface then attach to the blade and measure the blade tilt relative to the table top.

[LCHIEN]

I got the Wixey guage for $30 or maybe $20 last year. I like it and it does come in really handy. I just wish it had an auto turnoff like their digital height guage. I've burnt through several batteries.

I don't use mine as much as I thought I would. The main place I set up my table saw is not exactly level. The surface is flat but it slopes in a couple directions. That can affect the readings if you don't keep the guage parallel with your last reading.

If you study trig and geometry, small angle errors are vanishly small.
If your table tilts to the left and to the back a few degrees, when you meaure the blade tilt, ideally you would have to keep the wixey gauge absolutely perpendicular to the blade's (90 degree position).

But, the human eye is pretty good for eyeballing angles, if you can get it within 2-3 degrees, easily eyeballable, and the table tilt to the back is 2 degrees, the total error will be the sin(2°) x sin(2°) or around .1%

[pelligrini]

I did take a few trig and geometry classes, but I like descriptive geometry much better. I still prefer to draw a problem than to try to run the numbers. It's a whole lot easier with CAD now too.

Yea, the difference isn't too much, but I do notice a difference. There's about a 4 degree slope front to back(the worst). I always keep catching myself getting hung up with small tolerances though, especially with the digital guages. I usually end up muttering "Idiot, that's way too small to even care about. just set it & go"

[LCHIEN]

if your saw table is off horizontal by as much as 4°, I'd shim the saw to level, just to make things tidy AND to keep things from rolling off!

[WayneJ]

Harbor freight also sells this angle guage, sku 95998. Not sure, think its about $30 also.
Wayne