Est. 1998 — 27 years of woodworking knowledge
Improved knife setting gauge
Bill Tindall, E.Tn.
This one is based on a dial indicator with a magnetic base. Base sticks to out-feed table. Dial indicator rides top dead center on knife tip. As before the dial indicator provides the target for knife height taken form old knives, where the new knife starts out(start high) and a measure of how far to the target as the knife is tapped into the cutter head.
Re: Improved knife setting gauge
Keith Newton
Bill, Thats the way I've done it for many years, only mine uses a dial indicator mounted on the end of a big walnut scrap block about 3x3x12", with screws for feet giving it a 3 point stance. I picked up the indicator in a miscellaneous box of cutters at auction.
My cutter head doesn't have jack screws or springs either, so I bent a small straight blade screwdriver that I can slip in under either end of the blade and lever it up slowly when I've gone down too far. With the short fulcrum and long lever side, it may even be a little easier to hit the mark coming up than the light taps going down.
I don't know if you pull your knives every time they need sharpening or not, but I may hone my blades in the head with 2x6" diamond plates mounted on wooden handles that are offset enough to keep my knuckles out of the way of the infeed table. I can easily slide the outfeed table back out of the way, and have made a little indexing stop that simply sets on the cutterhead that bumps against the front edge of the infeed table and knife, holding the blade at the top of its arc. I can hone away the shine on the 4 12" knives in about 10 - 15 minutes usually.
Re: Improved knife setting gauge
Barry Irby
Before I change the head on mine to a Shelix I set the knives by slipping the short ends of Allen wrenches under both ends of each knife. MY machine did not have the top dead center setting or jack screws or springs. I used a steel ruler to bring the knives up to the level of the out feed table. By twisting the Allen wrenches you could make very fine adjustments. the trick was to get all threes knives to just snick the ruler on both ends of the knife.
Re: Improved knife setting gauge
William Duffield
Why do you zero the indicator from the old knives, which have been worn down by use? Shouldn't you zero it off the surface of the outfeed table? I have had jointer blades significantly eroded by jointing the edges of plywood when building kitchen cabinets (before I got finish cuts directly off of my tracksaw).
Re: Improved knife setting gauge
William Duffield
I've always had excellent results using the same method. The only difference is I used a double square as the indicator. The head of the square holds the blade on edge with its bottom edge coplanar with the top surface of the outfeed table, and the jointer knives contact the edge of the square's blade. Since there is no lock on TDC on my jointer, I roll the head back and forth with the drive belt, and adjust it until light under the blade just barely appears at TDC. Nowadays, however, that method is getting difficult, since I have to get down on my knees to "read" the scraping of the knives on the blade of the square, so the much easier to read dial indicator is an advantage (but not as much of an advantage as a Byrd Shelix head 
).
reply
Bill Tindall, E.Tn.
Why do you zero the indicator from the old knives, which have been worn down by use? It doesn't matter because I sharpen before there is enough wear to worry about.
I empirically set the outfeed table to just eliminate snipe. I have never worn a blade to where snipe showed up and I had to readjust. As a practical matter on a working jointer the blade tips are going to be in the plane of the outfeed table.
Shouldn't you zero it off the surface of the outfeed table? What you recommend would be best.