Changing the way I worked

harry_

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Nov 22, 2009
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I have been working on making some upper cabinets (for a larger project) and needed to make the shelves adjustable. Unfortunately I do not own a LR32 set up yet, Maybe at the end of the month (you hearing me Bob Marino? ;) ). The upside is that the job does not not require a true 32mm spacing. Probably the worst part of all this is that my cell phone went dead so I don't have pictures for how I did this, but I thought I would attempt to share anyway.

My cab sides are roughly 48 inches long by 8 inches deep.

The procedure:

1. I made a fence that would fit into the left hand rail of my MFT3. This is for my initial reference. This fence was built out so that it would be flush to the MDF top of the MFT3.

2. a scrap of wood about 7 or 8 inches long with 2 dados cut in to straddle the top of my guide rail. I used a screw clamp in the top groove of the guide to hold it in place.

3. Next I set my 2 cabinet ends (face to face then opened like a book) on the MFT3 referencing their bottoms to my left fence and using a quick-clamp to snug them to the protractor fence of the MFT3.

4. I then set up my OF 1010 router with it's guide stop. I set my wood block as a stop for the first hole (the one furthest away from me standing in front of the MFT3).

5. I then placed a T-bolt and matching knob into the top groove of the guide rail, then slid in the Adjustable stop that came with the MFT3, then another T-bolt and matching knob.

6. Set the Adjustable stop for the location of the 2nd hole.

7. Set first T-bolt against the Adjustable stop and tightened it down.

8. Set the router to the 3rd hole. Move the Adjustable stop to where it needed to be, then set the other T-bolt and matching knob.

9. Set the router to the 4th hole and set the stop that came with my TS75.

Once I was sure I was right with everything, I drilled my first 4 holes giving me my top shelf location.

10. Next I took a piece of scrap approx. as long as my left fence and ripped it to 1/2 the distance between MFT holes.

11. I advanced my sides to the right to expose the first set of holes, inserted the dogs from the quick clamps and referenced the sides to them and locked them in place with the quick clamps as in step 3 above.

12. drilled the holes.

13. advance the boards again, insert the scrap from #10, locked it down & drilled.

14. rinse & repeat.

The worst part of this set up was having only one flip stop, and having to move it back & forth for holes 2 & 3. The beauty of it all was that it was in fact, repeatable.

This entire exercise is not an attempt to replace an LR32 set-up, but to get by without one. Being my first attempt at doing such a thing, I was very concerned about the holes lining up. This is why I chose to do both sides off the same reference at the same time.

 
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