Osborne EB3 mitre gauge calibration

[Con Owen]

Hi
Just purchased an Osborne EB3 as could not resist the sale price. It appears to be very well made. As I have only calibrated the very basic mitre fence that came with the Fox Table saw (I think I did this OK). I am a little more nervous in the case of the EB3 as I don't want to mess anything up, whilst the instructions do appear to be straightforward enough would I be correct in just placing my engineers square against the sliding bar and the back of the fence then adjust after loosening the eccentric screw inside the outer brace?
Also just discovered that the last 200mm of the mitre gauge slot of the saw is approx 1/2mm deeper than the rest of the track, this does not appear to affect the EB3 in any way, it runs very smoothly. The track itself is overall approx 1/2mm deeper than the sliding bar of the EB3, this causes the nut at the end of the sliding bar to foul the top of the table. My intention is to purchase the slick low friction material from Axminster as this is .5mm thick and stick it to the track, or would it be better to stick it to the bottom of the sliding bar? Am concerned about the wearability of this material. Has anyone used it? Or is there a better option?
Cheers
Con

 

[NeilO]

Wish I could help , Con ..
but mine hasn`t arrived yet , still David Osborne did say 4-10 days, guess I`m just being impatient. :roll: ..

 

[Inspector]

I've had one for a few years and I think I used a square to adjust if it even needed it then. Hasn't changed since I put it on the saw.

I went down to the shop and looked to see what "nut" you were talking about and discovered that my bar sits .25 to.5 mm proud of the saw except for the far end where it's flush. Slot isn't quite deep enough. It's never been a problem so I'm not going to worry about it.

I wouldn't bother with the plastic tape unless the dip in the front end of the bar causes the fence to be tipped forward of perpendicular too much. And I'll add that for most cuts unless it is off perpendicular a lot it won't affect your work, except maybe for tall miter cuts.

The washer at the end of the bar that rides in the T slot is held with a countersunk screw and it doesn't foul. The other end of the bar where the post is, has a cap screw and is slightly proud of the bar, but my miter slot has a deeper groove in the center that accommodates it. If that's the "nut" you referred to, take a file to it and take off the .5 mm or so of offending metal.

 

[paulm]

Not sure I can remember correctly how to go about it, but Scrit posted a while back on a method of adjusting / checking for square using a square of ply or similar, involving cutting a little off of one side using the mitre gauge as a guide then rotating to the next side and cutting again and so on until all sides had been cut, then after the fourth side has been cut rotate again and cut a thin strip off of the fifth side.

Measure the width of the thin strip at both ends and the difference, if any, is a multiple of the amount by which the guide is out and needs adjusting.

Means you can detect and make much finer adjustments as any problem compounds itself with each additional cut.

The size of the initial piece of material isn't critical but again the larger it is the more any difference will show itself.

Think that's the way to go about it but if I've missed anything I'm sure someone will be along to elaborate !

It's a great piece of kit when you have it set up properly and saves a whole lot of time and fiddling around, particularly using the length stop. Make sure you stick the abrasive on as it makes a difference to accuracy by stopping any slight movement in the pieces as you cut them.

Cheers, Paul

 

[Anonymous]

Con

Absolutely spot on!

There is only one adustment on the Osborne and after a couple of trial cuts, I got mine bang on and it has stayed that way.

Superb piece of kit that is STUPENDOUSLY accurate

 

[Con Owen]

Hi NeilO
IIRC mine was just about 1 day over the two weeks. It had been shipped on the date David said, it was just being held up by the PO who had to advise me of the VAT and their handling charge, which took 2 days as they do it by post. So you should have it soon.
Hi Inspector
The nut I was talking about is the adjusting one so I would not file that, it is about 1/2mm below table level height so the bottom of it catches just has it reaches the mitre slot, so the idea of putting on the slick low friction tape which is .5mm thick was to bring the bottom up to table level, I now see in the instructions that there is a tape provided in the kit, it must have got in between the measure and the abrasive tape, I will check tomorrow to see if it is there, this if .5mm thick would overcome the problem.
Hi Chisel
I have already printed off the method advised by Scrit which seems very good. What I was concerned about being not too familiar (a polite way of saying it) with calibrating I did not want to mess up anything.
Cheers and thanks for everyones help
Con

 

[Con Owen]

Hi Tony
Thanks for confirming the calibration procedure. I was just a little bit worried if I had understood the manual correctly.
Cheers
Con