Clever DIY Jigs To Expand What Your Tools Can Do

Most woodworking power tools are designed with a degree of versatility in mind. Tool manufacturers have come up with all kinds of clever ways to expand the various capabilities of their products so that you can use each of them for a wide range of different applications, meeting the needs of whatever project you choose to take on. But even with all of these innovations, there are times when you'll need additional accessories to do a job properly. Store-bought accessories can help here, but they often come with big price tags. However, there's a way you can make some on your own.

Jigs are homemade wooden devices that can expand the functionality of the tools you already own. They're often used to gain a level of precision you might not be able to achieve by using your tools freehand, and they can also help make it easier to achieve complex cuts quickly.

Some jigs are simple enough to throw together in a few minutes, while others require special tools and more than a little geometry to make them properly. Despite that, most jigs can be made from scrap wood that you likely already have lying around your shop. This means that making your own jigs is usually a much cheaper alternative to buying the expensive woodworking accessories sold by major brands.

One of the simplest and most useful jigs that you can make is a straight guide for your circular saw. You can practice cutting a straight line without a guide, which is tricky and offers the least assurance of accuracy, or you can clamp a store-bought straight edge guide, like the ones made by Kreg, to the piece. Alternatively, you can make a simple circular saw guide jig out of a couple of lengths of plywood.

To make this jig, you just need to cut two boards out of plywood. They should both be the same length, though one will be wider than the other. You also need to ensure that the narrower of the two boards is wide enough to accommodate the distance from the inner edge of the guard plate to the edge of the circular saw's body (particularly if it has a protruding motor), with enough room left over to secure clamps.

The wider piece will need to be the width of the first board, plus the distance from the inner edge of the guard plate to the edge of the saw blade, plus an inch or so of excess. Glue the two boards together with the narrower board on top and all the way to one side, then use the circular saw with the guard along the edge of the narrower board to cut the excess length from the wider board. You now have a perfectly straight guide that can be clamped to any piece you wish to cut and has an edge that you can line up with the exact cut placement of your circular saw.

Most table saws come with a small miter gauge that allows you to make mitered and compound cuts, but these aren't always the most accurate solution, as they often have a bit of wobble. A miter sled can help you create a more secure and stable sliding surface. Some, such as the one designed by Kings Fine Woodworking, are able to produce all kinds of angles and cuts. These can be complex to build and require a lot of tools to make, however. Most people might be better off starting with a simple cross-cut sled that can help you get clean and easy 90-degree cuts every time.

You start by cutting a rectangular base out of plywood. The exact dimension of this base will depend on the size of your table saw, but you want most of the sled to be able to rest comfortably on the front of the table before the edge touches the blade. You'll then want to cut tracks that fit in your table saw's miter slides. These are often made from a hardwood, like maple, so that they don't warp or bend. They should be attached to the board as they rest in the slide to ensure a perfect fit.

Finally, you need to make front and back fences by gluing multiple strips of plywood together that are tall enough to stand well above the maximum height of the saw blade. This will provide a stop for the pieces you're cutting and keep the two halves of the base together once you run the saw through the sled. Note that both fences, and the base's attachment to the tracks, must be 100% square with each other.

Random orbital sanders are a type of orbital sander that combines orbital and back-and-forth motions to sand without creating marks or rings. They're useful for a wide variety of projects, but it can be a struggle to use them on smaller pieces, as it's difficult to secure them in such a way that the sander can apply adequate pressure. Fortunately, one simple jig allows you to use your random orbital sander like a benchtop disk sander, eliminating this problem.

Making one of these is pretty easy, and you can do it with scrap plywood. You just need to create a simple four-sided box, with a slot for the sander cut out from one side. The box should be as wide as the sander itself and at least as deep as the height of the palm grip (and battery if you use a cordless model). To make the slot, measure the width of the narrow groove between the sanding base and the palm grip of your random orbital sander. Trace an oblong shape that is rounded on one side in this width from the center of the box on one of its outer faces, terminating on the bottom edge. Then use a band saw or jigsaw to cut out the slot. Once that's done, simply glue and screw these four walls together.

The back end of the sander should fit into the slot, leaving the sanding face exposed and allowing you to move small wood pieces along the sander, just like you would with an expensive benchtop sander. The open top and bottom allow you to access power and speed controls on one side while providing enough space for a dust collection hose on the other.

There are times when eyeballing the angle of a hand drill to get a straight hole just isn't going to cut it, such as when you're drilling holes for connecting dowels. The tool of choice for these situations is usually a drill press, but they can be expensive — and there are also times when a project is too large to fit on one. A simple drill guide jig can help you get the desired result, and they're fairly easy to make.

The basic principle involves creating a perfectly square right angle and resting the drill bit in the corner, which helps line up the bit and keeps it straight as it plunges into the wood. This is easy enough to do with a couple of small pieces of straight scrap and some clamps, but you can also build adjustable jigs that offer more functionality.

Casual DIY designed a version that uses three small plywood rectangles of the same size. He started by stacking them and taping them together. He then cut a 90-degree triangle at the bottom to create the necessary right angle for the guide, cut a slot through all three of them for a locking nut, and cut channels on the other side to install slides to keep them straight. This resulted in a guide that didn't just keep a drill bit straight, but could also be adjusted to multiple heights and accommodate large-headed forstner bits that typically wouldn't fit in a fixed design.

A dado is a smooth and even channel that you cut across the face of a wooden board that's designed to fit the exact width of a different board at a 90-degree angle. These are often used in the construction of cabinets and bookshelves, and there are a couple of ways to make them. Using a set of dado blades on a table saw is the most common method, but you can save some money by cutting dados with your router and a dado jig. This is also a better solution when working with larger pieces that won't easily fit on a table saw.

To make one of these, you need two lengths of plywood that are longer than your workpiece is wide. These will serve as the rails on either side of the router. You'll also need two smaller pieces that you will screw to the rails to keep them in place. Clamp one of the rails to the board that you're going to be cutting the dado into. Make sure that it's perfectly square, then scew the smaller attachment pieces to the underside on either end, keeping them flush to the edges of the workpiece.

Place spacer blocks next to the block that are the width of the board you'll be inserting into the dado, and attach the other rail to the attachment pieces on the other side of the spacer. Remove the spacers, and you'll have a jig that will allow your router to cut the dado with the bearing rolling along the guide rails. These are usually custom-made for each project as they need to fit the workpiece, but they're very useful when you need to make a lot of dados.