Marking gauge question

Re: Marking gauge question

Brent Smith

>I had a look at a few of mine and the only reason I could come up with for the 2 rounded sides was comfort in use.The rounded sides feel better against the hand than square corners would. My .02 for what it's worth.

Brent

Re: Marking gauge question

Jim Crammond in Monroe, Mi

>Frank,

I agree with Brent, there is no functional reason for the bar to be rounded. Some gages were made with a square shaft but these were the lowest quality gages made by the manufacturer. They were rounded as a sign of quality and to be a little more comfortable and pleasing to the eye. In use, I guess you could argue that a rounded bar allows you to tilt the head a little more and still make a line, but I don't think it significantly improves the function of the gage.

Jim

My favorite western gauges have round bars.

Pam Niedermayer - Austin, TX

>

Re: Marking gauge question

ThomD

>The marking gage that has given me the best service over twenty years is the Japanese style with the screw tightener and a blade. I have lots of MGs, and that is the one that I never put away. I have even fancy Bridge city gages, and they never see use, cause they were a concept not a shop proven design, the large fence is key to me. Lee Valley droped these from their cataloge a while back, but they are back. Though expensive, they are easy to make. FWW had a plan a few years back. You can grind a blade out of any piece of 01 or even some HSS hacksaw. Japan Woodworker sells the blade also for far less than the gage costs, and their blades are laminated hard stuff. I love Japanese tools, all tools really, but my preference here is just practicality.

The rounded arm is more comfortable, and it stops the piece rocking out of position, as it can with square stock. It makes the mortice easy to saw out if you don't have a morticing machine, cause you just drill the hole for the rounded side, then keyhole out the rest. Or drill a series of holes, and then just square the back of the one with the wedge or key mechanism.

Rounding the beam is just a mater of runing it over a roundover with a bearing, making the second cut with the beam vertical. Of you have the right plane, all the better.

I hate round arm western gages (LV ones anyway), which seem rust prone, cold, and the round blades are always unscrewing. All things that can be dealt with, but who has the time to wait for that.

I agree Thom...

Scott Burr in Ben Lomond,CA

>My LV gauge causes me nothing but headaches. I just love it when the thumb screw loosens up while trying to mark a line for a DT etc...

Thanks everyone, much appreciated!

Frank D. in Montreal

>

Re: Marking gauge question

Paul in NJ

>Frank,

Rubbing the bar against the stock you are marking helps steady the operation and the rounded cross-section helps you take a controlled bite. Rotate your gauge slightly to take a smaller bite. My ideal marking gauge would have an eliptical or rounded triangular cross-section to the bar to allow better visibility of the cutter.

Paul Dzioba

Re: Marking gauge question

Frank D. in Montreal

>Thanks Paul,

Someone told me the same on another forum, and I must say I'm kind of embarassed not to have noticed it myself. I'd been thinking about this for a few months and didn't notice that the answer was right in front of me. I changed my design and will be making the posts with curved sides. The mortise will be tricky but I think I'll do it with an in-cannel gouge and then a half-width beam with some sandpaper glued to it to smooth the mortise wall out.

Frank

Re: Marking gauge question

Adam Cherubini

>Paul'sright on, but I never see gauges whose arms are rounded on the bottom. I've seen some 18th c stuff and the round surface is always on the top.

I think the french gauge is the best. Mine has a square arm just like Seaton's. Underhill uses one too. I'd look long and hard at the gages in the Seaton chest before redesigning another wheel.

And no its not about purism...as if we have to slavishly do whatever was done before. This is a good gauge that's easy to make and works well!

Adam

Pennsbury tomorrow! Anybody coming?

Re: Marking gauge question

Jim in Burlington On

>I read a very good article about making or altering a making gage to make it more useable by David Charlesworth. He suggested having a gage with the screw so it tightened onto one of the corner instead of the middle of the beam so pressingit into a corner and it will not rock.

Re: Marking gauge question

Frank D. in Montreal

>Cool Jim,

I talked to David Charlesworth on another forum about the gauge. He seemed to think that a square beam would work OK. I told him that I knew he like to modify cheap gauges, but around here the El Cheapos are just too cheap, and the next step up is rosewood. I've always wanted to make my own anyways. I'll be using Jeff Gorman's method of a wedged dowel to lock the beam, at least on the small gauge. The panel gauge is too big to drill, so I'll probably go with a wedge for that one (if I start fiddling with hardware knowing me it'll take me another year to make, 6 months just to choose the screw...).

Re: Marking gauge question

Charles

>Frank, I'm curious about where your buy the stock for the pins.

Re: Marking gauge question

Frank D. in Montreal

>Hi Charles,

I do a little metalwork once in a while, so I have A2 and O1 bar stock but I'll probably just saw a piece off an old shovel and use that (there are tons of possibilities: sawsall or hacksaw blades, old razors, planer bldes, old plane blades...). Shovel steel is usually good steel, and pins don't see as much abuse as a plane or chisel blade.

Pin Stock

Jim in Burlington On

>You can buy small drill bits they work the best IMO.

Hey Jim

Frank D. in Montreal

>Thanks for the tip I'll give it a try. Would that be regular HSS bits, or do high-carbon bits work better? I guess it won't make a huge difference but I might as well go with the best.

HSS

Jim in Burlington On

>Seem to work the best for me. I tried several things including push pins that were hardened high carbon steel and they were harder to cut and snapped on me a few times. You can use the same drill to make the holes in the brass holders for the pins.

Re: Marking gauge question

ThomD

>Well of course a square gage beam will work fine, the english style gages I have are all square, but overall I don't much like them. You end up with the delicate question of exactly how tight to make them, and then it ends up easier to make one side rounded so that it centers, rather than ending up with something that is either loose, or sticks. I mean it all works, my fingers with a pencil work more often than not too.

Re: Marking gauge question

Frank D. in Montreal

>Thom,

You're not the first to mention the finger-and-pencil method. It seems popular! And I thought it was only used to make houses. I will be rounding off the beam on my standard marking gauge, unless I use up all my wood trying to get the mortise right. Thanks for your previous post BTW, it was most helpful.

Re: Marking gauge question

paul womack

>Might I suggest at least reviewing the sheer genius of this idea:

In the Stanley #5061 (IIRC) marking gauge, both the stem and mortise are more or less square. But the stem is a good deal smaller than the mortise.

The genius comes from the orientation of the pressure screw, which pushes onto a (flattened) corner of the stem, via a protective 'shoe'.

The makes the fit a 'V' or taper fit, and the design is thus nicely immune to fit problems due to wood movement.

In all other designs (AFAIK) the stem must be a precision fit in the mortise, in the direction perpendicular to the screw force.

Here's the patent:

http://www.datamp.org/displayPatent.php?number=160541&type=D

BugBear

Curing a wobbly stem

David Charlesworth

>I used the 5061 gauge, and modified the pin, for as long as it was available. Unfortunately due to low spec manufacture these never looked sexy enough and were discontinued in UK.

The diagonal pressure screw was in my opinion the only advance in gauge design for hundreds of years.

I wish some enlightened manufacturer would revisit this design.

The flashy ebony and brass gauges which seem to be so popular will all suffer from play or tightness in one dimension, sooner or later.

A trick I learned from Colen Clenton is to make the flat surface of a square stick, opposite the screw, slope slightly out of square. When the screw is tightened the stem twists slightly in the sloppy square hole. When twisted sufficiently the corners lock against the sides and the wobble ceases.

Brilliant....

David Charlesworth

Re: Curing a wobbly stem

Frank D. in Montreal

>I think Jeff Gorman's design (don't know if it's his but it's the one he proposes on his site) would fix this problem also, because the wedged dowel puhes the beam against the mortise at an angle (the angle cut into the dowel pushes diagonally on one corner of the beam).

Re: Curing a wobbly stem

paul womack

>I used the 5061 gauge, and modified the pin, for as long as it was available. Unfortunately due to low spec manufacture these never looked sexy enough and were discontinued in UK.

They still appear at car boot sales. Quite cheaply too. :-)

The diagonal pressure screw was in my opinion the only advance in gauge design for hundreds of years.

I think Ralph Brendler might disagree!

Ralph's tremendous patent gauge site

BugBear (who also likes Mr Clenton's idea)