rblau said:
clintholeman said:
I then slide the work piece under the rail, butting it against the wooden rail, support off-cut side as necessary and rip away.
I like these techniques using stops under the rails, and will give them a try, but I'm wondering about the part where you say "support the off-cut side as necessary..." For the typical MFT setup (granted, this can be changed) there isn't much room to the off-cut side of the rail so if you're cutting strips off a wide piece you would need that support. I actually do it a bit differently in that I use the off-cut piece as my 'keeper.' It's probably not as fast as Lou's or Clint's method, but it allows one to use the MFT to support the piece from which you're cutting the stips. To speed things up I use my comination square. I set it to 3/32" plus the width of the piece I need (I've found that 3/32" is a good approx to the kerf width and it's easy to add that amount), slide the piece under the rail a bit beyond the necessary width while pushing against the fence, butt the combo square against the edge of the piece and then slide it back until the ruler part of the combo square hits the rubber strip on the rail. I then check the distance further down the piece, away from the fence, to ensure that the width will be uniform. After cutting the stip of wood and removing the off-cut, I lift the rail, slide the piece over again, butt the combo square, etc and recut. A few pics would explain this in a jiffy--maybe I"ll try to do that later.
--Rob
OK, I finally got around to taking some pics as Dan suggested. A few comments about my approach:
-I think this thread has covered a few different types of ripping. This technique is geared towards taking the same amount off of one board rather than taking several different narrow boards and cutting them all to the same width. The idea is to have most of the board supported by the table and use the cutoffs as the keeper pieces. This requires taking into account the kerf width as described above.
-The pics show me crosscutting the board, but that's just the way I set it up for the pics.
Pic #1--the general setup. Step one is to butt the board up against the fence. I normally wouldn't have the saw resting on the rail during this setup phase--it just put it there to illustrate one little tip. It's useful to put a piece of wood of the same width back towards the other end of the rail to help support the rail. If ripping a long piece this obviously wouldn't be crucial, but with shorter pieces the rail can bow and cause you to cut deeper into the top and will also make a less accurate cut in the piece.
Pic #2--to make repeated 2" cuts: set the combination square to 2" PLUS 3/32" (the kerf width).
Pic #3--make sure the top of the edge of the board (closest to fence) is 'sticking out' the correct distance from the rubber strip on the rail by butting the square against it and ensuring that the edge of the rule is right up against the rubber strip. If off a bit I give a few gentle taps one way or the other with a rubber hammer.
Pic #4--make sure the other end of the piece is also protruding the correct amount. This is less of an issue if the piece is square and the fence and rail are square, but for rips where you don't have as much of the piece against the fence, it is very helpful if not necessary.
Then make the cut. Lift the rail, slide the piece over, rail down, re-index with the square, adjust as needed, and repeat. It actually works pretty well.
--Rob
