Dovetail marking guage

feeling dense

Bill Tindall, E.TN

>I am intrigued by the design but don't see how it works.

PS

Bill Tindall, E.TN

>I am confident if you sent me one I could figure it out while laying out my next drawers.

Re: Dovetail marking guage

paul womack

>Here's the fancy version :-)

BugBear

Re: Dovetail marking guage

Dan Donaldson

>Nice. Do you have any construction details? How does the adjustment work? That looks like somwthing that I might want to copy ;-)

The Emperor's new marking gauge?

Bill Houghton, Sebastopol, CA

>Did you forget to attach the pic, Bugbear, or is my computer messing with me?

Re: feeling dense

John Pappas

>Bill, I am not sure about what puzzles you here. The brass blade can be moved to a position that gives you the pin width you want to use. If you cut pins first you simply mark the pins on the end of a board. If you are a tails first person, then you have to think a bit differently. Rather than thinking of laying out the tails, think about using the guage to mark the pins, but on the face of the board. Let me know if I need to take some pictures.

John

Re: Dovetail marking guage

John Pappas

>Dan, The body is simply a sandwich of two pieces of thin wood and a piece of thin veneer. Before glueing it together, I cut a channel and pressed a threaded bolt (sans head) into it. I used a short piece of steel banding to make what serves as a washer between the knob and the brass blace. Pretty basic, I would say.

that's a beauty

John Pappas

>

Re: The Emperor's new marking gauge?

Neal in San Jose

>Works for me. Must be your computer.

Re: Dovetail marking guage

Wiley Horne--So. Calif.

>Paul,

Is that one commercially available? If so, where?

Thanks, Wiley

Yep, It's messing with you Bill.

Scott Burr in Ben Lomond CA

>

Nice Gauge.

Scott Burr in Ben Lomond CA

>I like how simple it is. Pretty too!

You just cain't trust these compooter thingies

Bill Houghton, Sebastopol, CA

>NOW it appears, in all its lovely glory. Thanks for letting us see it, BB.

strange

Bill Tindall, E.TN

>first time I opened it I didn't see the image either. Then I tried later and there it was. Neat device!

Re: Wiley - the other marker

barryvabeach

>Wiley, I don't know where Bugbear's marking gauge came from, but I saw it a long time ago and made one out of clear plastic and it is great. As you may have guessed, you can use it with the broadest side of the triangle up and set the bar for the size of the tails you want to mark and you can mark both sides of one tail. Alternatively with the point of the triangle up, you slide the bar up or down so that at the scribe line it is the size of one of your dovetail chisels and then you are marking one side of each of two adjacent dovetails. The nice thing about the clear plastic is that you can see all the marks you have made so it is fairly quick to layout pretty evenly spaced dovetails without actually measuring anything. Barry

don't understand how it adjusts

Bill Tindall, E.TN

>

Re: don't understand how it adjusts

John Pappas

>Bill, looking at picture of guage. Loosen knob on right so the blade is free to move up or down. Move brass blade up to get the profile of a narrow pin. Can get to a pin that comes to a point. Position blade and mark both sides of a pin. To get a wide pin, move the blade down to the desired pin size. The angle here is cut for dovetails in hardwood. I could have another blade where the angle is set for softwoods. Hope this helps.

John

Re: Wiley - the other marker

Wiley Horne--So. Calif.

>Barry,

The clear one is a great idea, as is John Pappas' gauge! How did you go about making it? Actually, I have one of these gauges in brass and rosewood--a fellow in Berea, KY used to make them and I bought mine about 10 years ago from Japan Woodworker. They don't offer them anymore.

But. Mine is 1:8. And the one Paul showed is 1:7. I've got a sneaking hunch I've seen Paul's example in a magazine, and it was not commercially available--but am hoping I'm wrong.

So how did you make yours?

Wiley

Re: Dovetail marking guage

paul womack

>Heh. It's a long-ish story. A while ago I did a favour for Ian Dalziel.

http://www.iandalziel.co.uk/

The favour was simply some technical information, which (as I'm sure you all know) I'm not exactly backward in handing out :-)

Nevertheless, he decided he needed to repay me. He offered me an infill smoother, which I declined as being hellishly disproportionate.

We eventially compromised. I had seen a dovetail marker design in Robert Wearing's "Making Woodwork Aids and Devices", which I liked, so I discussd the design with Ian. Robert Wearing's version was aluminium and plastic. Ian's final version...

...isn't. Just to complete the gloat, he sent me two, one at 1:5 and the other (shown) at 1:7

BugBear (duly grateful to a fine engineer)

Re: Wiley - the clear marker

barryvabeach

>Wiley, while mine looks like crap in comparison, the only goal is to draw reasonably accurate lines, given my limited sawing skills, the lines don't need to be that precise. I had a scrap of plastic leftover ( WARNING NO HAND TOOL USE AHEAD) and I cut it to a rectangle on the TS, then used a router table to mill the two slots parallel to the sides ( so you can use the sides to mark the tops of the tails) then drew a triangle in the middle and used a dremel to rough out the shape ( RETURN TO HAND TOOL PROGRAMMING ) and then used a triangular file to get the triangle reasonably straight. Used a cutoff of cocobolo ( which must be square and of consistent thickness if you want to mark the tops of the tails ) for the bar. I put a notch in the bar thinking I would make evenly spaced marks at the top of the board, then center the bar on those marks to layout the tails, but I haven't done that much.

Re: Wiley - the clear marker

Wiley Horne--So. Calif.

>Barry,

Gee, that's a very neat job. I see what you mean, that the plastic will let you kinda fair in the whole pattern quickly by eye.

Really nice work, and thanks!

Wiley

That is a stunning

Wiley Horne--So. Calif.

>'thank you' from Ian Dalziel, let alone he made two of them for you. We need a new superlative for commenting on the quality of the piece, it's that good.

Thanks for sharing!

Wiley