CMS Setup

[1oppo]

I have a 12" Porter Cable CMS and am having trouble getting it set up right. I can adjust the left side so that it cuts 90 deg. and the 45 deg. is pretty close. When I try to set the right side to match the left side the 45 deg is off 2 deg. What am I doing wrong?

Thanks
Ed

[LCHIEN]

there are a number of possibilities.
One is that the fence is bent... it happens frequently because of the thin join between the right and left halves. If this is the case, then short cuts on one side may be right but the short cuts on the other side of the blade will be off. Long pieces cut will give yet a third answer as they will bridge the bend.

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[poolhound]

Do you mean as a miter cut on the table or a bevel cut. Not sure if you CMS is dual bevel?

If you mean just cutting a regular miter with the stock flat against the table and fences check that you right side fence is perfectly in line with the left one. I dont own the PC (I have DW) but these fences are usually cast from one piece but they can still be out by fractions, although 2 degrees sounds like a lot. Mine was and here is what I had to do.

first remove the fence then take a solid piece of HW the bigger (within reason) the better and clamp it to both sides of the fence in as many places as you can. This should make both L & R fences pull into alignment. Now with the wood still clamped on reatttach the fence. Remove the wood and now recalibrate the miter scale and try again. This is a PITA to do so dont do it unless you can tell that the fences are out of alignment.

The miter scale is should have positive detents (at least for the 45degs) so no matter what realtionship to the fence if you made 2 cuts at 45deg R&L then the angle should be 90. Try clamping a piece of wood to the table so it wont move on either side then cut to both 45degs and see what you get. If its not 90 then there is your problem. No matter how you set the zero/90 position one side or othe will be out.

I dont really see how this could happen but as we all know S..T does!

[1oppo]

I will try this procedure again. What I did was set up the left side, then put a straight edge on the left side and aligned the right side and was off. Hope this works.

Thanks
Ed