Router Extension Ready

This is beyond amazing. I used my Powermatic 66.

After I got the splitter installed, I realized I had no choice but to go ahead with the router insert plan. I took apart my old computer desk and made sure there was no metal left in it. I made myself a featherboard. I realized I had no way to anchor the featherboard. I put the featherboard away. Then I sawed up the desktop.

Believe it or not, it is possible to cut a sheet of particle board five feet long and two and a half feet long, on a table saw with rails but no extension. The long cuts are easier, because you have less board hanging out over the empty space where the extension should be, but even the short cut is doable.

I remembered some of the stuff from Kelly Mehler’s video. Stand at the left rear corner of the sheet. Hmm…maybe that’s all I remembered. I tried his trick of using sawhorses as an outfeed table, but it was a colossal failure. I believe the problem is that the sawhorse brackets I bought are total garbage. The sawhorses refuse to stay open, and when you pry the legs apart, the brackets bend and give way. Useless. I should complain to Home Depot. I thought these things were a better deal than the premade plastic sawhorses, but I was severely wrong. I am going to buy some of those things even if they cost thirty bucks each. You really have to picture me, walking around the saw while the sawhorse folds up, trying to keep the desktop against the fence while preventing it from falling on the floor.

I did a practice short cut, which was perfect. Then I moved the fence and did the real cut, which was less than perfect. Doesn’t matter. I screwed up pretty badly, and the error is still probably less than a sixteenth. Who cares?

That Biesemeyer fence is really something. Old and beat-up as it is, it still seems to lock up completely squarely.

I have to mount some two-by-threes under the desktop so I’ll be able to attach it to the rails. After that, I’ll be sitting pretty. I’ll pop the router in and add some sort of adjustable support leg. Bang. Done. That will put me in a position to use the saw and router to make a real cabinet and extension. I didn’t realize how long the extension was; I should be able to create a very serviceable woodworking bench from it. It’s not the ideal workbench, but given my space problems, it will be a lifesaver.

The saw isn’t loud at all. I don’t know why I bother wearing ear protection. But the dust! It shoots straight up under my protective glasses. I guess I need goggles.

I tried a different blade. I’m not sure which one to use. It turns out I have more blades than I thought. Something like two dozen. I decided to try one that looked more “woody” than the others.

The splitter is wonderful. Kelly Mehler says to put them to the right of the blade, so they moosh the wood against the fence, and boy, is he right. It makes it a lot harder to slop the wood to the left. The flexibility of the splitter assures that the wood will fit between the fence and splitter, so that’s not an issue.

This is beautiful. This is a little piece of what I was hoping for when I bought tools. I had a whole bunch of problems today, and tools solved them. Tools really work, if you buy enough of them and make an effort to learn how to use them.

Think of all the stuff I had to do to get this thing running. Take it apart. Load it by myself. Unload it by myself. Put it together. Change the plug. Align everything. Lubricate the trunnion. Build a mobile base. Alter the dust collection connection. Fabricate a splitter. And here I am, sawing stuff up with very good precision.

I hope I continue to have success. It helps to pray every single time you do anything even slightly difficult.