Hello fellow Lumber Jocks. I have a problem that I can't solve and am looking for advice and or experience with this problem.
First off let me say that I have a Delta contractors(36-979) saw with a 42" Biesemeyer fence that I bought new 4-5 years ago. I have done a little ripping and crosscutting with it but nothing serious. I haven't really set up my shop yet because of monetary considerations but now I am ready to move in that direction. One of the main reasons I bought this particular saw was because of the fence system. The fence itself is plywood with a laminate over the plywood. I also noticed a while back that on the TV show "Rough Cut" with Tommy Mac, that he had put a wooden face on his Biesemeyer fence and I was curious as to why he did this. I received my first issue of Woodcraft Magazine a few days ago and there is a small write up where somebody ask him about the fence's wooden face. He replied "The MDF face of my fence wasn't perfectly straight, so I added a strip of 1 1/4"-thick maple butcher block."
Last week I spent a day in the shop trying to make sure the blade on the saw was lined up perfectly with the miter gauge tracks and also the fence was perfectly parallel to the miter tracks. Well much to my surprise, the fence is off by at least 15 thousandths.
Yes I have gone through the procedure in the owners manual step by step twice before the light bulb came on.
If you put a vernier caliper on the fence it starts out straight but about 6 inches in, it starts to come closer to the miter track by 3-4 thousandths. Once you get past this hump the fence starts falling off in the opposite direction.i.e. moving away from the miter track to the tune of 8-12 thousandths. So there is no way to adjust the fence with that kind of problem.
I guess I want to know if anybody else has had this problem and if so how it was solved. Should I just bolt another piece of wood to the fence (like Tommy Mac) or should I order a new fence face from Biesemeyer, or should I try to make this fence straight.
Looking for suggestions or solutions.
Thank you all for your input.
First off let me say that I have a Delta contractors(36-979) saw with a 42" Biesemeyer fence that I bought new 4-5 years ago. I have done a little ripping and crosscutting with it but nothing serious. I haven't really set up my shop yet because of monetary considerations but now I am ready to move in that direction. One of the main reasons I bought this particular saw was because of the fence system. The fence itself is plywood with a laminate over the plywood. I also noticed a while back that on the TV show "Rough Cut" with Tommy Mac, that he had put a wooden face on his Biesemeyer fence and I was curious as to why he did this. I received my first issue of Woodcraft Magazine a few days ago and there is a small write up where somebody ask him about the fence's wooden face. He replied "The MDF face of my fence wasn't perfectly straight, so I added a strip of 1 1/4"-thick maple butcher block."
Last week I spent a day in the shop trying to make sure the blade on the saw was lined up perfectly with the miter gauge tracks and also the fence was perfectly parallel to the miter tracks. Well much to my surprise, the fence is off by at least 15 thousandths.
Yes I have gone through the procedure in the owners manual step by step twice before the light bulb came on.
If you put a vernier caliper on the fence it starts out straight but about 6 inches in, it starts to come closer to the miter track by 3-4 thousandths. Once you get past this hump the fence starts falling off in the opposite direction.i.e. moving away from the miter track to the tune of 8-12 thousandths. So there is no way to adjust the fence with that kind of problem.
I guess I want to know if anybody else has had this problem and if so how it was solved. Should I just bolt another piece of wood to the fence (like Tommy Mac) or should I order a new fence face from Biesemeyer, or should I try to make this fence straight.
Looking for suggestions or solutions.
Thank you all for your input.