Popular Woodworking 2001-08 № 123, страница 6

Letters

MAKING A PERFECT CUT IS AS EASY AS LINING YOUR MARK UP TO THE LASER TRAC!

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THE GOOD LIFE ATA GREAT PRICE GUARANTEED™

A Fast Way to Make Octagons on the Table Saw

You Don't Need a Planer to Make Eight-sided Objects

While scanning through the April 2001 issue, I came across the "Planer Tricks" section of Steve Shanesy's article "Using Your Planer Through Thick and Thin." He offered a jig to plane octagons for turning. I have a handy trick along those lines that is probably much quicker (one pass per corner) but uses a table saw (obviously not in the scope of the article).

Set the table saw blade to 45°, raise it up to give a good surface along the blade, then lay a flat side of your square stock on the blade. Slide the fence up to the resulting corner, and lock it there. Remove the stock from blade, lower the blade to a safe height that just cuts through the stock, fire up the saw and rip off the four corners. This produces very nice octagons for turning (although they might not be perfectly regular, they will be close enough to chuck up on a lathe). Keep up the great work on a great magazine.

Doug Sager Denver, Colorado

Other Places You Can Find Help With Compound Miters

I just read the letter from George F. Mc-Cullough in the April 2001 issue of Popular Woodworking about cutting compound miters. Recently, I also looked into calculating the angles required to cut various compound miters. After searching the internet for some solutions, I came across a website (www.turnedwood.com) called "Kevin's Woodturnings." Kevin Neelley is an extremely helpful and talented gentleman. His works represented on his website are incredible and inspiring. Kevin also has a software program available that will calculate exactly what blade angle and miter angle are required to make practically any number-sided figure. He uses his program for calculating the compound angles required in segmented bowl turning. It can easily be used for other applications. Kevin also made me aware of other websites

which would help to determine compound miters. These sites are Better Woodworking (www.betterwoodworking.com/com-pound_miter.htm) and Badger Pond (www.wwforum.com/faqs_articles/miter_for mula.html). Badger Pond explains the mathematics behind calculating these angles, and Better Woodworking's website includes an informative chart with all of the blade tilts and miter gauge angles listed. I might add, Kevin and Badger Pond's sites both include illustrations which help to explain the slope.

Thanks to Kevin for his help and insight. If it weren't for him I would probably still be looking for this information.

Brook Snyder Lakeland, Florida

Editor's note: You also can download Nick Engler's compound miter calculator for the Excel spreadsheet from our website at: www.popwood.com/features/mag.html.

Why Do Horsepower and Amps Never Seem to Add up?

I am a marine engineer by trade and at the risk of sounding stupid, perhaps you could explain to me the difference that occurs between horsepower and amps in machines sold in the United States and rated for that market. In Europe when you buy a machine, regardless of its type, it is rated in

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Letters • Popular Woodworking • 1507 Dana Ave., Cincinnati, OH 45207

8 Popular Woodworking August 2001