Why can't I make square joints with my Domino?

[Corwin]

One additional consideration is how you are making your mortice into the end grain in your first picture.  Here you may want to stack your piece on top of some scrap to raise your piece up off of your table such that you are assured that the Domino is referencing off the top of your piece rather than possibly referencing off of your table...

 

[williaty]

One additional consideration is how you are making your mortice into the end grain in your first picture.  Here you may want to stack your piece on top of some scrap to raise your piece up off of your table such that you are assured that the Domino is referencing off the top of your piece rather than possibly referencing off of your table...

Yeah, that was just for the picture. When I actually do it, I hang the work off the edge of the table using a Qwas Speed Dog. However, I can't make the tool float in mid air while I take the picture. Just like I don't actually prop the tool up on the work at a 45* angle to make the other cut.

 

[TomGadwa1]

A really foolproof way to do this is to reference off the BOTTOM of the Domino. Why you may ask? Because the distance to the cutter CAN NOT change!!! Place the board with the end grain onto a known flat surface. Mark your mortices and plunge. Now transfer your marks to the center or end or where ever you need to of the face board. Now draw a reference line on the face board. What really makes this technique work wonderfully is you now take a straight piece of angle aluminum, I use two inch, and CLAMP it down firmly with the one side against the face and the other side vertically set. Now with the fence on the Domino in the up position place the BOTTOM of the Domino against the fence. Now plunge your mortises. Since the Domino was referenced off of the fence via the bottom as was the end grain of the other board you will find VERY accurate results as aluminum angle stock is extremely accurate guaranteeing a 90 degree plunge. Using the table and the bottom of the Domino on the end grain will also guarantee another 90 degree plunge. I say this is a foolproof way to do this from much experience at being a fool? To recap the distance from the BOTTOM of the domino to the cutter will not change. The distance from the fence to the cutter can change even during a plunge!!

 

[agehall]

The drawback of referencing off the bottom, imho, is that you miss out on the feature that you don't have to care which side of the wood you reference off. I think that is a very nice idea to be able to set the fence to half the wood thickness and then not worry about referencing off the right side.

Otoh, referencing off the bottom can make things easier, as long as you remember to make pencil marks to indicate from where you should reference on each board.

 

[TomGadwa1]

When I build cabinets if I am using Big box store plywood for instance I definitely have a preferred side. Thus I choose that side for the top. Now I do not have to worry about whether the mortise winds up in the middle, as a matter of fact it actually makes assembly easier because the offset helps in orientation of the pieces that are to be assembled. The majority of the time when I use the Domino I DO use the fence to reference off of, BUT then I know that I have to be careful to make certain that the fence is "floating" such that the worktable does not displace my reference, that I apply firm pressure on the fence handle to the workpiece and that I do not skew the Domino which will cause a less than accurate plunge. Of course with practice this becomes more or less automatic. But for things such as toe kicks and bottom shelves that are up off the floor the BOTTOM Domino reference technique really works very well. If I could afford cabinet quality plywood I would definitely center the mortises. 

 

[Jonhilgen]

One word: Domiplate.

 

[waynelang2001]

One word: Domiplate.

Another " One word ".......Instamorph, Dont ask me how it would fix the problem. All I know is someone will figure it out  [dead horse]

 

[Kevin Stricker]

You are also most likely not getting the plastic support plate referenced off the base of the Domino.  Place the domino nose down on a flat surface with the fence up and hold it down with one hand while you are tightening the support plate and you will get better results. You will also get better results if you stack several pieces of wood like Ken suggested and use your hand on the knob to also clamp the domino to the boards.  If you have a MFT you can also use the side extrusion in a similar fashion, just line the board up flush with the extrusion before clamping.  Now when you mortice use your thumb of your "clamping hand" on the knob of the Domino and your fingers wrapped under the table to keep things clamped tight.  Just use your thumb and forefinger around the plug-it to plunge. 

 

[jmbfestool]

Kens idea is sound!    And the domino plates mentioned will also help for certain thickness materials. 

Another solution which you can easily do!  Is make up your support which you can make dead square out of plywood or something like that instead of using festools crappy plastic accessory.   

To set it up every time simply place the domino like ken has in his picture for doing a centre line on a flat surface attach your self made jig like you would do with the festool plastic accessory  push it down so it's against the flat surface tighten it up so it won't move!  Now your jig will be flush with the face of your domino and if you made it square it will keep you domino square to the face of stock.

 

[williaty]

Aligning the plastic bit by setting the Domino on its face is how I've been doing it. The plastic bit is just plain out of square. My plan at this point is to build a box for Dominoing with one edge perfectly 90*. I can rest the work on the top of the box and register the Domino fence against the side of the box. This will give me a quick and easy way to do this repeatedly if I need to do multiples and I think it'll also allow the SCG-10 to stay on the Domino to be used as a lateral alignment reference.