# question regarding Porter Cable 4216 dovetail jig



## Chris36 (Sep 2, 2012)

I recently purchased this unit. My joints are nice and tight. The problem I am having is the offset guide does not appear to be accurate. Meaning , even though the dovetail joints line up, the block of wood is off by 1/8" side to side. I have tried manually moving it on the pin side and it always seems to be off.Is there a way to adjust the offset guides spacing? I make sure that the tail and pin are tight against it. Please help if you know an answer or if you know what I could be doing wrong.

-Chris


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## huff (May 28, 2009)

Chris, Is this a new jig and did you get the owner's manual with it? Depending on the size dovetail bit you're using will determine what is recommended for the offset. Also, are you doing half-blind dovetails or thru-dovetails. If you're doing half-blind dovetails like for a drawer box, etc. You will be indexing two of your cuts from the left side of the machine and two of your cuts from the right side. Are you having the same problem when indexing from either side of the jig? Hope I didn't confuse you too much. I'm referring to half-blind dovetails, which is what I primarly do for drawers in Cabinets, etc. Porter Cable make a video on using their jigs and I'm sure you could find one on line if one didn't come with yours.


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## Chris36 (Sep 2, 2012)

Thanks John,

I will check it out tomorrow. I have only been running from the left. I think maybe the jig was not tight enough and the plank moved slightly while routing. I am also running half-blind dovetails for drawers. I just purchased the 4216. It seems fairly easy to use. I will let you know what happens .

-Chris


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## huff (May 28, 2009)

Chris, Here's a tip I learned when using my jig; When I lay out my sides, front and back for my drawers, I size all my pieces to the exact size, daddo for the bottom and make sure I sand the inside of my drawer pieces at that time. (I found that if you sand after you dovetail, but before you assemble, it can change the tightness of the joints if you have to sand much to get rid of tooling marks). Here's my tip: take your pieces and set the sides and front and back on edge as if you were putting the drawer box together…........but think inside out and upside down. I hope you can picture this, but since you have the sides, F&B daddoed, put the front of box in front of you on it's edge with the daddo towards the top and facing towards you (facing out), Do the sides the same with the daddo facing to the outside and towards the top and the back the same way. Take a pencil and start at the front left corner and mark the bottom edge of the front and the left side with an "A" , go to the back left corner and mark the left side and back left corner with a "B", go to the back right corner and mark the back right corner and right side with a "C" and come back to the right front and mark the right front and right side with a "D" 
You'll better understand this when you can do this with your pieces in front of you and you will see now you have all four corner marked with a reference letter.
Now you can start your first dovetail. Start with your letter "A" corner; your front will go on the top of your jig on the left side with the daddo facing up and towards the stop block. Your side will be placed in the front with the daddo facing out and towards the stop block. Make sure everything is snug against the stop blocks on the left and flush. Now you're ready to dovetail. Once you're done dovetailing that corner, remove and flip around and check your fit. Replace your pieces to your bench and now you can do corner marked "B".........This will be indexed on the right side of your jig doing the same as with corner "A". Daddo facing up and out and towards the stop blocks on the right side.
Corner "C" will be indexed back to the left side of your jig and Corner "D" will be indexed to the right side. I found this works well for me, because when I get ready to assemble my drawer box, I can still use my indexing letters to make sure I keep everthing matched the way it was dovetailed. 
I know this is confusing and hope I didn't mess you up with this info. PM me if you have any questions and I'll see if I can answer any questions you have. I've used my jig for years and the only drawer I've ever done for any of my projects is dovetailed. Feel free to check me out at my web-site @ www.thehuffordfurnituregroup.com. 
Good luck and let me know how you make out.


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## huff (May 28, 2009)

I forgot to mention one thing; I used to have a problem with the fronts or backs moving a little while dovetailing and that really screws thing up. I took some adhesive backed sandpaper and put on the surface of my jig where the wood lays and that's all it took to keep things from moving when I clamped the pieces. Hope this will help too.


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## toddbeaulieu (Mar 5, 2010)

John, thank you for posting these tips. The sandpaper trick is a great bonus. I had a test piece slip this morning. Would hate for that to happen on the real project.


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