My Makita comes with clamps on the fence that you can be used to clamp small
pieces to the table so you can get your hands out of the way. That said,
after I made a miter sled for my table saw, I rarely use the Makita for 45d
miters any longer.

Nice thing about the sled design I have is that even if each cut is not
precisely 45d, if you cut in the right sequence, you get the complementary
angle that insures a 90d corner.

The problem then becomes making sure that each side is precisely the same
length, which is solved by stops on the fence of the sled.

IIRC, there are plans for a basic TS miter sled in the latest issue of Wood
magazine on the racks as we speak. It is not as fancy as the one I made, and
it has no blade guard, but it is basically the same idea.

Might want to check it out.

--
www.e-woodshop.net
Last update: 9/21/03


"john moorhead" wrote in message
Folks -

I always end up painting myself into a corner on this one. I am building
a
number of small boxes with matching grain on mitered corners. How do I
cut
the miter safely. I have a 12" double tilting SCMS, but the box ends are
only about 5" long so my hand is too close to the blade for comfort. I
have
the saw tilted toward the "narrow" side rather than the 135 degree side to
combat earlier problems with tearout and material damage ( there are
rabbits
on both the top and bottom of the workpiece) Redwood splits and splinters
out very easily...

I could set up the table saw to crosscut the miter using the miter guage,
but I still have the same concerns.... I've done it, but it just didn't
*feel* safe, so I stopped.

To make the grain match perfectly on all four corners, I ripped 8/4 stock
in
half vertically, then the inside faces of the two pieces are turned to
face
outside, and then one side and one end are cut from each piece. If you
are
*VERY* careful with this set up and cut the miters as close to the final
size as possible then you can have continious grain on all four corners of
the box. If you have to trim the parts very much at all, the effect is
considerably reduced.

I guess I could double stick tape the workpieces to some longer
sacraficial
stock, but thought I'd ask y'all's 2c worth here. I didn't leave the
stock
long and then cut each box side off sequentially as I want the grain to
match and didn't think I could get each side *dead on* that way. If it
weren't a big deal, I think that would be the way to go.

Thanks in advance for your remarks....

John Moorhead
Lakeport, CA