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Compared hand filing to using a jig for dovetails and wow what a difference.
I spent 3 years fighting with loose joints and bruised knuckles trying to do them freehand on pine boards. Switched to a $15 store bought jig last weekend and got perfect fits on my first try has anyone else had that kind of night and day shift in their woodworking?
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young.kim21d ago
Hand filing never felt right to me either. Was it the angle you were holding the chisel at or the way you were transferring the marks from the tails to the pins that made the biggest difference once you had the jig? I'm curious if you stuck with your original layout method or changed that too, because that was always my hangup - getting the lines to line up perfectly across the board.
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jasonf1720d ago
Honestly I think some of yall overthink this. Its just wood and glue at the end of the day. If its close itll hold fine.
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Wait, did you find that the jig actually helped with your layout or was it more about the cutting action? Because I see a lot of people say the jig just makes the angle consistent but you still have to transfer marks right. For me the biggest mind shift was realizing I was holding my chisel at a slight tilt without knowing it, so every cut was just a tiny bit off. Then when I used the jig it forced my hand to be straight and suddenly everything clicked. It was like my eyes were lying to me about what straight even looked like. I still use a marking gauge for my baseline but I gave up on trying to eyeball the angles by hand. Did you change your marking knife or pencil when you switched to the jig or stick with the same tools?
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