Shooting miters *LINK*

Donkey Ear *LINK*

Ed Mulligan, Cape Cod

>Dale -

I've had good luck shooting miters with a donkey ear. Jeff Gorman has some good info on it at the link below. For your flag case, you would need two donkey ears, one for each miter angle.

Ed


Donkey Ear

question

Bill Tindall, E. TN

>That device looks to be awkward to use, but perhaps the picture is misleading in this regard. Do you (or anyone else) have any personal insights on how easy it is to successfully true a miter with it, especially compared to just adjusting such a miter free hand.

Re: Donkey Ear

Dale Lenz, Tahlequah, OK

>Thank you for your help. The device on the bottom of the page is exactly what I built, never seen one before. I will study it longer tonight, I'm doing something wrong!......Thanks again....Dale

Re: question

Ed Mulligan, Cape Cod

>Bill -

I use a donkey ear frequently to shoot miters for the octagon boxes I make. My goal with these boxes is to get the miters perfect from the chop saw but sometimes a bit of tweaking is needed and the donkey ear is invaluable for that.

It works very well for small stock. It would be cumbersome with larger stock. Jeff mentions this and shows an alternate jig for big stuff.

The donkey ear clamps in the face vise so your plane is moving parallel to the bench length. In practice this works well. I have an end vise and could clamp the donkey ear in it so plane movement is across the width of the bench but haven't felt the need to do so.

IME when you use a 'regular' miter shooting board, the stock tends to 'self-feed' into the plane. No such problem with the donkey ear.

Ed

Re: Shooting miters *LINK*

Wendell @ Murphy, TX

>I've read several place that the faces of a Miter Jack are covered with brown craft paper or veneer.

The paper/veneer is replace once it get chewed up by the plane. You might be able to apply this idea to your jig. I am planning to make a Donkey Ear shooting board for an upcoming box project. Examples of both the miter jack and the donkey ear shooting boards are shown in the Handmade Woodworking Tools section of Mr. Shepherd's website.

Wendell


Stephen A. Shepherd's website

thanks, advise?

Bill Tindall, E. TN

>That is just what I need but was reluctant to invest the time to build if it was difficult to use. Your personal "testimony" was the motivation I needed.

Is there any construction advise you would offer that is not obvious from the pictures?

PS: that is two puzzles. I have owned both lamb's tongues and donkey's ears but never made the connection to their woodworking namesakes.

Re: thanks, advise?

Ed Mulligan, Cape Cod

>Bill, you are most welcome.

The photo shows an end view of my 22.5 degree donkey's ear. For scale, it's made of 3/4" ply.

IIRC the 3 horizontal pieces were glued up into one unit, squared up, and then the 22.5 miter was cut.

The part your stock lays on, I'll call it the 'table', is dadoed to receive the fence. Use a spacer block when attaching the table to the 3 horizontal pieces, to keep the fence at a right angle to the plane motion.

The part that fits in the vise is screwed on.

Apply some candle wax to the surface the plane rides on.

Ed

Re: thanks loads ED!

Dale Lenz, Tahlequah, OK

>I think I'm going to mess around with a few donkey ears. Although, I called my corner angles on my flag case 22.5*. They are actually a backward 22.5*, or a 67.5* kinda confusing mathematical, as their is 180* in a triangle. But, anyway, I think the DE thingy will be more efficient to plane both the "22.5*" angles and the 45* for the flag cases. As someone mentioned earlier in this thread, do you put a sacafiscal (sp) face on the cutters� leading edge and replace occasionally?

THANKS SO MUCH,

Dale

Sincerely,

Re: thanks loads ED!

Ed Mulligan, Cape Cod

>Dale -

Glad to help.

There is no sacrificial area on the donkey ear, and so no paper used.

The fence that the work piece registers against will have a shaving taken from it when you first use the jig, but just that one time. If your jig is getting chewed up, get back to us as something is not right.

Ed