sidecut jig

[KevyWevy]

I thought I'd share what I've been working on in my spare time the past few weeks.

Its a sidecut jig roughly based on 333's jig.



it will be nice to just set it up once for a pair, cut the core and the base without having to change it. i plan on buying an offset router bit that is the difference between the base (minus the edges) and the core widths.

I found a piece of PVC that was close to fitting the my shop vac hose. put silicone on it to get a better seal.


Holes down the center for the vacuum to hopefully hold the core or base material while using the router. i'd like a little more suction, so i'll try adding more holes.


i used MDF for the entire thing. i was hoping that the MDF for the sides would have a consistent flex patern. its not perfect, but it works.


I used 5 brackets on each side for adjustment


The brackets are for closet doors. found at home depot or loews for less than $3 each.




so, what do you guys think? any suggestions?

the minimum widths are 100mm 74mm 100mm
i don't know the max widths off the top of my head, but it will go big enough for fat powder skis.

[powderho]

Nice work KW! I think jigs like this will become very popular with the home builder. The first one I built (lame without pictures I know) was pretty similar to 333's as well. Instead of using plates and toggles clamps, I just used threaded rod with nuts that sandwiched the rails and center support. Very cheap and effective. I paid less than $30 for the entire jig. One major downfall was that it was a bitch to adjust. Loosen one nut, tighten the other side, repeat 1000 times. It would help to have block spacers like 333, but I wouldn't trust those for very long. The other major downfall of my design (and 333's) is that both sides have to be adjusted exactly the same from the center line of the center support. This gets tricky to measure accurately when your center support isn't the same width throughout. It's easy to get non-symmetrical bases with this design.

Which brings me to my new design. I'm eliminating half the jig. I don't think it's necessary. I think it was Davide's idea that I ripped off. He used a single rail adjusted to the shape of half the sidecut and cut it out with a razor blade. Cut out one side, flip the material over, and cut out the other side. Hopefully resulting in two identical sidecuts. Obviously you have to be very careful when locating the material when you flip it over. That's the main reason I'm going to continue using the locating pins like 333, instead of the vacuum table.

Oh ya, be careful when you're routing out the material. An offset router bit is a great idea. I was using a flush-trim router bit before. I think it was because my rails weren't perfectly vertical, but my router bit destroyed the rails. Pretty much making my jig useless.

Let us no how it works.

[KevyWevy]

so you have holes in your base material? do they just get filled with epoxy?
that's one thing i wanted to avoid (hence the vacuum)

i figure if after drilling a few more holes, the vacuum still isn't enough I can just use some clamps on the end to hold down the core or ptex.

[powderho]

Yup, drilled holes right through the base material. I used 1/8" pins to locate everything. I really didn't want to, but I figured it's really not that big of a deal. I think drilling the holes through the cores is a bigger deal than through the bases....you just don't see it. I fill the holes in with a P-tex stick before layup. I'm afraid of epoxy getting pushed through the holes during pressing. It would be pretty easy to properly fix the base material after the fact. It's not real hi-priority though. Skiing Snowbird on a year like this will do worse on a daily basis.

[powderho]

Here are some shots of my first jig. I should have put the threaded rods through the center of the rails. This would have made them more vertical and not get all mangled by the router.

[OAC]

Cool! I'm on my way to create the same type of jig. I've always wondered about if I dare to drill holes thru the base. Now I will!
One doesn't ski that much on the mid part of the base anyway...if your not a downhill racer.
Just pray for that the plugs not loosen and go down thru the base...

[twizzstyle]

Nice work kevin, looks good. I still think some kind of rubber sheet on the entire top surface would work great in holding whatever material you're cutting in place, as well as making a better seal for suction.

[doughboyshredder]

Nice work. Jigs are the way to go for anything that you can use them on. I built a jig for routing out bases and cores, but it uses templates. To hold the material down I have a piece of mdf that is similar in shape but a little narrower than the templates which I place above the base or core material, and a little longer than what needs to be routed. I then clamp that piece of mdf down, so that it is sandwiching whatever you are cutting out. This gives you a smooth surface to run your router on, and holds the material down pretty good.

No offense to you guys that are doing it, but drilling through your base for alignment pins is lame. The highest quality should be the goal imo, and you're not going to get that drilling holes through your base.

[OAC]

Pics?

[nate]

Here's the one I made this fall. Works great. The only real problem is it's not adjustable to more than 135mm or so. Plus all in all it's kinda ghetto in a lot of ways. But it does it's job and I was really pleased with how it turned out, especially for the price.

[OAC]

I'm always impressed with all the solutions in this forum! But I'm still frustrated/confused over how I can use the router over a flat uninterupted surface without any clamps or other things in the way that keeps the core/base down.
I don't want to move over to the cnc world....yet.

I have a cnc'ed template that I use to route out all the material, however with good result, but as I wrote, needs to be hold down with clamps...

[twizzstyle]

Re-read kevin's first post and look at the pictures. It uses vacuum to hold the work piece in place, so its a completely flat surface that the router can move around on. No clamps

[OAC]

Ohh...sorry! Missed it! Scrolled to fast and read it wrong!
It seems to be a feasible solution...I'm on my way to the workshop!

[nate]

I used doublesided tape. It did the job.