58 - Miter Saw Station, страница 28

T-TRACK

TOILET BOLTS

FINGER

STAR KNOB

A tall fence, built-in hold-downs, and a see-through guard put you in control of the cut.

The nice thing about using a molding head to make moldings is that you don't have to buy another expensive piece of equipment — the molding head attaches directly to the table saw you already own. But in order to cut moldings safely and effectively, you need to have an auxiliary fence like the one shown in the photo above.

This fence does two things. It allows you to "bury" the molding head in the rip fence so you can use

just a portion of the cutter profile. And it also serves as a hold-down for the work-piece, helping to prevent kickback. But the beautiful thing about this fence is that it's not just for molding heads. It can also be used for cutting rabbets with a dado head. It's one versatile fence.

The fence consists of two basic assemblies. A long face provides support for the workpiece and a couple of hold-downs slide in tracks

EXPLODED VIEW

HOLD-DOWN BLOCK

-—-(B)

FENDER WASHER

FACE

GUARD

TOP VIEW

GUARD

in the fence. The whole thing can be built in just a couple of hours.

Face - To make the fence, start by cutting a piece of plywood to size for the face (A). The length of this piece should approximately match the length of your rip fence. Next, I trimmed off the front and back corners of the face so there wouldn't be any sharp corners.

An arc is made along the bottom of the face to provide clearance for the molding head and its cutters. To determine the location of this cutout, clamp the face to the rip fence on your table saw. Then with the saw turned off and unplugged for safety, raise the molding head into position and slide the fence over against it. Now you can mark out the location of the cutout on the face. (I used a sabre saw to do this.) T-Tracks - Once you've finished cutting the arc, the next step is to mount a couple of aluminum T-tracks in the face for the hold-downs' (see page 31 for T-track sources). The T-tracks fit into dadoes that are

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ShopNotes

No. 58