Recommendations for a dovetail jig

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Rob_H

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Had the CJ600 from Trend for a while now but I cannot get on with it - I know it's me rather than the jig but I've had misaligned DTs so many times I have completely run out of patience. Short of the 'Rat (new baby prevents that kind of extravagance for the workshop apparently),
what recommendations does anyone have for a £150 - £200 budget for silly person proof DTs? Short of that I may have to learn how to make them by hand!!
 
Rob, I swear by the Rutlands one! It is just an aluminium template that you mount yourself on some MDF and will only cut through dovetails of equal spacing but it is great. Easy to set up easy to use and produces great dovetails quickly.
http://www.rutlands.co.uk/cgi-bin/psProdDet.cgi/DKD51 Just make sure you put a small spring on the router shank to keep the bearing from moving as some of the guys on here have had problems with that. I have not been one of them I may add. :wink:
 
I was gonna say that!!! Except I was gonna say a fella I know has one and says its great. I am gonna get one too, as soon as I get round to it. Everyone I know who has used one says it's great.

Thats the one I will be buying, it's just gone up in price though. Shame, typical supplier finding a popular product and hiking the price up disproportionately, capitalising on the fact that it's getting good reviews.

HTH

Neil
 
Hi Rob. Just MO you want to spend 150 - 200 on a jig that just does dovetails and IMO think they look horrible. I bought a rat new some 8 years ago and yes it was expensive, but it's a jig that can be used for more than just dovetail joints. I haven't even used it to full potential so for the money it is actually not as expensive as just one jig for dovetails. Have you tried e-bay or even the woodrat forum for a second hand one. Just a thought. All the best.
 
Rob

Unless you have lots to cut, I find cutting them by hand is just as quick and a lot more satisfactory.
 
Follow the tutorial in my tag line

You could cut the pins using a bandsaw to save time and increase the chances of them being perpendicular cuts, somethign that is quite important.

Jigs don't save time when compared to bandsaw-chisel for pins and handsaw-chisel for tails unless you are cutting loads.

For instance, I cut DTs on 3 large drawers using bandsaw followed by handsaw for tails in around 3 hours last week.

Enjoy :wink:
 
I do agree with Malcolm's comments, although I've not owned or used a WoodRat myself. There is simply so much more that you would be able to do and it's the only way (as far as I'm aware) that you can replicate truly 'hand-cut' dovetails by machine. With the right cutters, it'll even do those tiny pins and tails for drawer-making - I'm starting to wish I'd bought one with a job I have coming up... :wink:
 
I used to use a Leigh, but sold it eventually. It was an accurate and reliable jig, but I preferred to cut by hand rather than have that "machine cut" look.

I now use a Wood Rat, or for a quick, one-off job use handtools. The Woodrat delivers an authentic looking result, but it does need quite a lot of "fettling" and you shouldn't think of it as a tool that'll deliver great results straight from the box.

There is one other dovetail jig that I sometimes use for boxes and small stuff, the Gifkins dovetail jig. It's a fairly unique bit of kit as you use it with a router bench, but if you have a router bench permanently set up in your workshop it's probably the quickest and most convenient solution. The results are great, for wood up to 10mm thick you can use very pretty dovetail cutters with a 6.5 degree angle and you can introduce some spacing variability to the layout.

There are however some notable restrictions with the Gifkins jig, the pretty 6.5 degree dovetail cutters will only cut up to 10mm thick material, thicker than that and your back to 8.0 degrees and a more "machine cut" look. The widest board it'll take is about 300mm. And it'll only produce through dovetails, so unless you want to attach a false front it's not much use for drawers and is more of specialist box-making jig for producing dovetails and comb joints.
 
Well I Have the gifkins jig and believe me its totally fool proof and amazingly quick- I love it :)

I had the woodrat and sold it - too fiddly - easy to make mistakes but worst of all I could not get it to grip the work properly - blimmin thing kept slipping -
Its a great idea but it needs work IMHO

Mike
 
mikepooley":xf1wde8c said:
I had the woodrat and sold it -worst of all I could not get it to grip the work properly - blimmin thing kept slipping -
Its a great idea but it needs work IMHO

Mike, I think it's now had the work, the new design wooden cheeks hold the work securely (I have zero slippage problems with them), but for even more security you can glue on a layer of sandpaper.
 
ah! well actually i tried sandpaper on the old metal ones but that didnt work,
But Im glad to hear you have had no probs with the new one.

I did look at the american device very much like the woodrat, cant remember the name - it looks good but a tad expensive. :shock:
 
I've listened to everyone's advice and I would really like to go down the hand cut route. I've been putting this off as being too time consuming but I've just finished a part time degree - and 10,000 word dissertation, so I've got some time back. I need a DT saw and a coping saw - how much should I spend and any recommendations? Do I need a special chisel? NAy help would be appreciated.
 
Rob_H":2f9w8wbe said:
I've listened to everyone's advice and I would really like to go down the hand cut route. I've been putting this off as being too time consuming but I've just finished a part time degree - and 10,000 word dissertation, so I've got some time back. I need a DT saw and a coping saw - how much should I spend and any recommendations? Do I need a special chisel? NAy help would be appreciated.

Rob, there is one chisel that will really help with dovetails (two actually, because they're handed) and that's a skew chisel.

I had a pair for years that I'd simply reground from some old but cheap cast chisels, they were a mismatched pair of ugly ducklings, but they worked superbly for getting deep into the joint and ensuring a really clean cut.

Recently I replaced them with a jaw-droppingly expensive pair of Blue Spruce skew chisels...and I can honestly report that although very pretty, they're not superior in any functional respect to my old pair!
 
I still keep looking at the Trend through dovetail jig with the moveable pins.....
but I don't think anyone on the site has one to inform me if it's worth the money.....????????????


Mike
 
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