Interesting Domino Application/Modification

Rick Christopherson

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Shane, the following content is sketchy, so feel free to move it to another forum. To me, it seemed like it fit here best, but I could be wrong about that.

This weekend I was working on a project of making a pair of granite side tables with my 10-year old son. I'm making one for me, and he is making one for his mom (Christmas). The tops are 1-1/8" solid granite, framed with cherry to conceal the unpolished granite edges. The inside profile of the frame is complex because it has to wrap the top corner of the granite plus have a rabbet for a substrate below the granite. Here is a picture of the frame profile. The small lip conceals the unpolished granite corner, and the rabbet supports the plywood substrate that connects the base with the top.

Profile.jpg


Even though Domino is not designed for it, whenever I make mortises, I always try to register the position from the finished faces. In this case, I don't have any choice, because the inside surface is not flat. So I needed to rig up my Domino to register from the outside "point" of the mitered frame instead of the normal inside corner.

To do this, I took one of my older Domino Support Brackets (495666) and bolted it to the underside of the Domino fence, using the triangular alignment holes for mounting. I came up with this idea 5 years ago, but didn't implement it until recently. It gives accurate positioning from the "point" (outside corner) of a mitered frame.

To do this, I removed the two thumbscrews from the support bracket and drilled a couple new holes through it that align with the triangular alignment holes in the Domino Fence. Note, I did not modify my Domino to do this! Only the Support Bracket. In effect, this creates a new fence that is 90-degrees to the standard Domino fence.

SupportBracket.jpg


The drawback is that in this configuration, the Domino sight gauge is too far away from the workpiece to be usable. Also, the lines on the base of my Domino are not accurate. Only the sight gauge is perfectly centered about the mortise position at the level of accuracy I demand of my joints.

I couldn't use pencil lines with the sight gauge, so I needed an external reference edge. Then I realized that the SCG-10 is perfect for this. It will register the sideways position of the tenon from the finished edge of my frame. Moreover, these tenons are not centered on the workpiece. They are offset, closer to the top edge due to the rabbet for the substrate.

Because my son's piece of granite was different from mine, the frames are slightly different too. Notice how the tenons are equal distance from the "points" but not the "blunts" of the miter. Also notice how they are centered about the space for the granite, not across the whole width of the frame.

Mortises.jpg


Here is the final result of the mortising operation. The Support Bracket is registered off the outside face of the frame, and the SCG-10 stop arm is registered off the top edge of the frame. Everything is locked in so tight that the tenon alignment was perfect. The mitered corners were so close to perfect that it took only a couple passes with the ROS sander to flush all of the edges.

MiterPlunge.jpg


The tables aren't finished yet, but if you are curious, here is my table with the granite in place, and my son's base-legs without his granite (he was still sanding the decorative flutes). They are both now ready for lacquer and final assembly. Hopefully I can get that done in the next couple of days.

HalfFinished.jpg
 
I suppose as long as I have this thread open, I should show some of the other things we did while making these tables. As a matter of fact, I should probably explain the whole back-story for them too.

Without going into the reason, I have literally TONS of granite pieces in my garage. I got it for free and planned on doing projects just like this one with each of the pieces. The picture below shows some of the granite I have stacked up in the garage.

WallOf%20Granite.jpg


I haven't been very active in my workshop for a long time, but a couple weeks ago I decided to take advantage of some of this granite and make a front hall table for myself. I found a piece and created a design around it. The next day, I got a call from my son wanting to "make" something for his mom for Christmas. So I figured we could kill two birds with one stone and make similar tables together.

I created the design in SolidWorks and configured one version for his chosen piece of granite and one for my chosen piece. I printed a template for the legs and we bandsawed the rough form and then template routed them with the OF1400 with a top-bearing pattern bit.

After some edge sanding, we put a 2mm (Festool) roundover profile around the edges of the legs. This picture is of Tanner routing the profile of his table legs using the MFK 700 router. (Yes, you may notice the ASA5000 boomarm over Tanner's head. I love that thing, and it is the best Festool product I ever extorted out of poor Christian Oltzscher.  [tongue] It sweeps across my entire shop.)

LegRouting.jpg


The legs and center shelf/stretcher were assembled and then we moved on to the top frame and granite.

I spent more time "thinking" about how to assemble the granite and cherry frame than we spent doing the actual assembly. I planned out how to deal with the granite probably being out-of-square, how to deal with the granite be of non-precise thickness, and how to make these two dissimilar materials fit together permanently and with precision. That's why the frame was built the way it was built.

I used construction adhesive between the granite and the cherry, but regular wood glue and Dominos to assemble the cherry frame. I know how much squeeze out is preferred with wood glue, but the construction adhesive was sheer guess due to the large gap. During clamping, the granite needed to be supported from below so that the cherry frame and clamps would settle down to the surface by their own weight. I screwed this up the first time on MY frame, but at least learned my lessons by the time we did Tanner's frame.
MyTop.jpg


After the frames were dry we needed to route the flutes along the edges. To make the single round bead, I needed to use my sharp-point flute bit spaced 3/8" apart. (Picture a roundover bit without a bearing and a sharp point at the center). Tanner used the MFK 700 with the fence to control the spacing of these passes. Important: Read one of my manuals on this topic. If you move the router in the wrong direction, it will pull away from the fence! I know this fact VERY WELL, but it still slipped my mind. Thankfully I screwed-up on my test piece and pulled the router in the wrong direction when it didn't matter. (The router bit drifted away from the fence).

In the picture below, notice that Tanner is pulling the router toward him. If he had pushed the router in the opposite direction, it would have caused the router bit to pull the router away from the fence (registration edge) and the line would be crooked.

FluteRouting.jpg


Of course the worst part of any project is the sanding. We use pneumatic ROS sanders for the grunt work, but the fine sanding of the flutes must be done by hand. Tanner was introduced to the pains of hand sanding. This is his top, which you can see is more square than my rectangular top.

FluteSanding.jpg


 
Impressive!
I hope your son was just posing for the photos...he needs some Eye protection if not. [eek]
 
I am more than just a little offended that you would imply I would endanger my son's safety needlessly. Please explain how a router bit in the fully enclosed base of the MFK700 poses any immediate danger. I know it makes you feel important to point out perceived safety violations in pictures, but there is a whole Tommy Silva thread for that. Knowing when safety is a concern is just as important as knowing how to protect yourself from it. If the operation was dangerous enough to warrant safety glasses, he wouldn't have been performing it in the first place. I don't make my son wear a bicycle helmet either, but he does wear full protection on the dirt bike.
 
MarkF said:
Impressive!
I hope your son was just posing for the photos...he needs some Eye protection if not. [eek]

You can clearly see the machine's switch is in the off position...
 
Great idea Rick.

Related: When I bought my first biscuit jointer, I researched what was available and got the DeWalt.

A month later, Porter Cable came out with theirs with a killer feature that immediately made them the best and prompted me to buy
the PC as well. The feature was a fence that tilted in same way you've modified that one to do.

So the biscuit jointers have seen the need for this, maybe Festool can offer something like this in the future.
 
Festoolfootstool said:
MarkF said:
Impressive!
I hope your son was just posing for the photos...he needs some Eye protection if not. [eek]

You can clearly see the machine's switch is in the off position...

but can you see if the sandpaper is turned off or not?
 
As for not wearing a bike helmet, my daughter is a physical therapist who works with young people. She and her co-workers have a saying: Wear a helmet or end up wearing a diaper. Just saying. Great project with your son though.
 
Looks like you have a great relationship with your son, Rick.  It reminds me of the times my son and I get to work together.  He's now 30, but still comes to dad's shop to work with the Festools and we ride motorcycles together.  Once a year Ryan and I will take off for a week riding in the mountains of Colorado.  Great times!!

Rick, could you give us a little tour of your shop area?  Of specific interest to me is the ASA5000 and what you store in all those little sortainer drawers and how you remember what's in each drawer.

Thanks!!
 
Bill, I got the ASA5000 this spring. Here is a thread on the FOG that discusses it a little bit: http://festoolownersgroup.com/fun-games-diversions/something-wicked-this-way-comes/?all. Halfway down the thread is a link to the parallel discussion about it on the TalkFestool forum.

It's not available in North America, nor is there a lot of demand for it, even though it is super cool. It took a lot of engineering to safely mount that to my basement wall. The basement wall is 12 inch reinforced concrete that supports the spancrete garage floor above half of my shop. Any other type of wall wouldn't survive the torsional forces.

On the end of the boom arm I have compressed air, vacuum, 2 outlets of unswitched power, and 2 outlets of CT22 switched power. I also have the vac hose with integrated plug-it cord on the end too. The articulated arm has a 16 foot radius so it reaches most areas of interest in my shop. It will even reach about 10 feet into the machine room under the garage. The really cool thing is that I no longer have to reposition the vac for long rips with the TS55.

As for the sortainers, I am still in the middle of organizing them (one of them is upstairs here in my office for holding parts to build my MGS and SCG Guides for the Domino.) I am organizing them with cabinet wood screws to the left, and progressing through machine screws then general hardware toward the right.

The Sortainers come with paper labels and plastic sheaths, but I am printing labels on the computer so they are easier to read at a glance. The high-volume screws occupy whole drawers, but the sortainers also have dividers for segregating lower volumes. Most of my wood screws are in bulk and take up whole drawers.

I am still very slowly reorganizing my workshop after laying down the new floor a couple years ago. The first step in finally getting myself interested in the workshop again was to set up what I have nicknamed my "Wall of Shame" last year. This is my Festool display area, which also makes a great backdrop for photos and videos. 

NewWallOfShame2.jpg


After 4-1/2 years, I am finally mounting my Kapex into the cutoff station in the machine room. The original station was 29 feet long and permanently fixed in place. I tore this all apart except for the last 12 feet of the Radial Arm saw surface. The Kapex is mounted on a separate platform and I will rebuild an extension for it to the left. This time, these two sections will be movable to make it easier to access the dust collector that is behind them in a nook in the wall. All of the surfaces are steel-blue colored laminate.

Another new change to the shop as a result of the new floor is that many of the machines are now on machine movers from Vega. These are the type where the whole frame rests on the floor when not being moved, and the wheels don't touch the floor unless you tilt the frame with a separate tiller wheel. They even made me a custom one for my 7-foot Oliver lathe. This allows me to keep the machines tight to the wall for most operations, but pull them out when it becomes necessary.
 
I possess the original attachment you have marketed under the Domino with steel plate fingers but have never seen the version you use - e.g. the green aluminum fingers and apparently some form of drive belt adjustment. Additional information on the 'green machine' would be appreciated.

TIA
 
Chris Rosenberger said:
He is using sandpaper without protecting his fingers.

Wha?

That one's new to me...

I've never done anything to protect my fingers from sandpaper (at least not when hand-sanding)...

Is that generally considered a "normal" practice?
 
Peter Halle said:
I am sure that Rick will be back to answer questions, but in the interim here is a link to his website about the guides:  http://www.dominoguide.com/

Peter

Thank you Peter - while you're here, please tell me what the 90 degree holding device is that Tanner is using to secure the workpiece for beading the edge.
 
Woodwreck, the Self-Centering Guide (SCG-10) was released about 3 months ago, and is intended to be a complement to the functionality of the previous model. The MGS-Series of guide is intended for when you have specific mortising distances that you repeatedly use, and when you need more than one distance at a time. It allows you to use multiple settings without changing those settings between operations.

The SCG guide is intended for rapidly changing the mortising distance without tools and without measuring. The plastic-coated steel cable you see is the coupling cable between stop assemblies. As one stop is moved, the other stop automatically moves in the opposite direction to always remain centered about the mortise position of the Domino joiner.

MainSCG-lo.jpg


The concept for the SCG guide was developed at the same time as the MGS guide, but it took a lot more engineering to achieve the required level of precision at a cost effective rate. All of the primary components are precision milled from aircraft grade billet aluminum and anodized green for durability and aesthetics. The movable stop arms ride in a 2-piece dovetail saddle that allows them to easily slide for positioning, and clamp down firmly at the desired position. The geometry of the sliding dovetail provides a 2-way clamping action to clamp down on the stop arms, but to also pull them in tight to the dovetail face.

The stop arm assemblies are high-tolerance and milled to a precision in the 4-digit range. This is crucial to repeatability in stop arm usage because the clearance between the arm and yoke is held very tight. The pivot pin for the stop arm is stainless steel and pressed through the arm into both halves of the yoke. This also contributes to the repeatability precision. The detent positions of the stop arms (Up & Down) are controlled by micro ball plungers with stainless steel balls.

The baseplate is similar to the tried and true baseplate of the MGS guides with a durable powder coat finish. It uses the same centering plates for accurately re-installing on your Domino without re-calibration. The SCG guide does require a one-time calibration to center it on your Domino the first time you use it, but the centering plates ensure the same positioning each time you install it to your machine. The guide mounts to the Domino base using the existing threaded accessory holes, so you do not need to modify your Domino in any way to use it.

One of the most common questions I receive is whether the guides will work with the old pin-style Domino versus the new paddle-style Domino. The answer is, yes, it works with both models.

I take extreme pride in the fact that you will not find a negative review of either of my guides anywhere on the internet by someone that owns one. In the 2 years that I have been selling guides, I have never had one returned for warranty because I inspect every one of them as they are fabricated. (I did have one pulley defective recently, but that is now part of my inspection process to ensure it is never repeated.) I have never had a customer return a guide due to dissatisfaction, but I did have one guide returned unused due to (I suspect) financial hardship. I take customer satisfaction just as seriously as Festool does.

The guides are available direct from me on my website (http://www.dominoguide.com/) or from several Festool dealers. I am pleased to announce that as of a few weeks ago, Rockler Woodworking is now a stocking distributor of my SCG-10 guides. They are available on-line right now, and will be listed in the next printed catalog. If their demand remains as high as it has been in the first few weeks, they will probably show up on the store shelves too. (Initial sales were high enough that Rockler went into backorder within 2 weeks, but I just delivered a large shipment to them yesterday.)

The popularity of the SCG-10 guide has surprised even me, but there are quite a few people taking advantage of the Combination kit on my website for both models at a reduced price. (I need to create an MGS-30 combo kit, but haven't gotten around to it yet. Look for that soon, or shoot me an email if interested.)
 
woodwreck said:
Thank you Peter - while you're here, please tell me what the 90 degree holding device is that Tanner is using to secure the workpiece for beading the edge.

What you are seeing in the picture is the Festool VacSys. Unfortunately, it is not available in North America due to a (in my opinion, silly) UL restriction. I can't discuss that aspect without permission, so we'll leave it at that.

It's a great product and I would love to see it become available here. Surprisingly, I get quite a few people asking about it because I also showed it in my MGS guide's video, that was made before I knew VacSys would not be available here.

I didn't really need VacSys for that operation, but I used it out of caution, because if the granite piece fell over and broke, we would have had to start over from scratch, as no 2 pieces of granite I have are the same size.

VacSys consists of a vacuum pump in a systainer and the articulated vacuum body. There are 3 different vacuum heads that can be placed on the articulated body. When used on a non-MFT table, the vacuum body incorporates a self-clamping vacuum to hold the VacSys to the table. A foot peddle releases vacuum pressure to change the workpiece. The articulated head will rotate 360 degrees and tilt 90 degrees.
 
fdengel said:
Chris Rosenberger said:
He is using sandpaper without protecting his fingers.

Wha?

That one's new to me...

I've never done anything to protect my fingers from sandpaper (at least not when hand-sanding)...

Is that generally considered a "normal" practice?

No, it is not normal practice. It was sarcasm.  [big grin] Don't worry. Even I didn't know Chris was being sarcastic at first until I got half way through his posting, and then I busted a gut laughing.  [big grin]
 
Rick Christopherson said:
Woodwreck, the Self-Centering Guide (SCG-10) was released about 3 months ago, and is intended to be a complement to the functionality of the previous model. The MGS-Series of guide ....

The concept for the SCG guide was developed at the same time as the MGS guide, ......

The popularity of the SCG-10 guide has surprised even me, but there are quite a few people taking advantage of the Combination kit on my website for both models at a reduced price. (I need to create an MGS-30 combo kit, but haven't gotten around to it yet. Look for that soon, or shoot me an email if interested.)

Thank you for the exceptional detail but unless I missed it, you do not clarify if the original MGS can be retrofitted or by whatever term, to accept the new SCG green mechanism, It appears they are two standalone products?
 
woodwreck said:
Thank you for the exceptional detail but unless I missed it, you do not clarify if the original MGS can be retrofitted or by whatever term, to accept the new SCG green mechanism, It appears they are two standalone products?

No. They are two separate products with slightly different baseplates. They both mount the same and use the same centering plates, but the design of the baseplate is unique for each.
 
Rick Christopherson said:
I am pleased to announce that as of a few weeks ago, Rockler Woodworking is now a stocking distributor of my SCG-10 guides. They are available on-line right now, and will be listed in the next printed catalog. If their demand remains as high as it has been in the first few weeks, they will probably show up on the store shelves too.

Rick,

Congratulations on getting into the Rockler lineup, these days I think that is the gold-standard of reaching the woodworking target audience. That is a major testament to the product and your exceptional design and execution.

If it is not too nosey a question, is there anything you care to share about what it took to get them interested in carrying the product, not pricing but how you went about it?

Thanks,

RMW
 
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