Length Stop for a Miter Saw

[Cherryville Chuck]

I've been wanting a way to add a stop to my SCMS for a while and I finally figured it out today. Took about 2 hours of work to make it. I replaced the right side fence height extension with a home made one. The extensions on my Milwaukee fit into roughly half inch wide slots. So I milled piece of wood to that thickness so it would sit in the slot and then added the T track. The wing bolts that hold the OEM fence hold my wooden replacement in the same way. I may add a ruler or tape across the top later. I need to find some wing bolts for the stop too. How many saws this would work on I'm not sure but it might be the seed of an idea to figure out how to adapt it. The one photo shows the tongue I milled.

[DaninVan]

My old Bosch 10" SCMS doesn't have any horizontal slots, just a couple of screw holes. But at least now you have me thinking about it.
I had a nasty 'incident' about 6 weeks ago. i was taking 2" slices off the end of a 12" wide Eastern Maple 8/4 thick panel when the blade suddenly jammed, kicking the motor assembly back at me. Never happened before.
That's a 20+ lb chunk of metal traveling at 150fps for maybe 10" straight back at me. Nasty rotator cuff pain ever since.

[tomp]

Good ideas there, I'll have to keep them in mind when I make a similar fence for my little Sears 7-1/2" radial arm miter saw. I see that you have two attachment bolts thru the stop into the t-track - do you find that this keeps the stop vertical and prevents any movement if it's bumped a little too hard when placing the wood? And another question, not being nosy, but are you left-handed? - I'm right-handed and find that it's more natural for me to have the stop on the left side, holding the "keeper" part with my left hand and operating the saw with my right.

Not very good photos - I thought I'd taken more detailed ones when I was making the fence (but they may be mixed in with the project I was working on at the time) - but you can kind of see the long fence (I think, without going out and measuring it, that I can measure/cut around 48") going off to the left and sitting on top of a roller stand at the outer end. The fence on my 30+ year old Ryobi chop saw (miters only, no compound)only has holes in it so the fence is attached with through bolts.

IMG_4092.JPG

The long fence is bolted to the saw, and has a ledge attached to the bottom to support the outboard end of the piece. I didn't get fancy with the stop, just a block of plywood clamped to the fence - nice and solid, quick to adjust and low cost.

I use the fence to eliminate chip-out on the back of the part (probably should put a matching part on the other side of the saw but............) but also as a quick and easy way to set the block. The fence is attached with bolts through slots in the add-on fence to allow adjustment of the cut end with the blade so I can use it to align the cut line on the fence with the saw blade.

IMG_4093.JPG

Here you can see the slotted holes in the wooden fence (fence was new at this point so none of the slot was used up) - depending on what I'm doing, I either just spin the blade while positioning the fence, listening for a scrape noise as the teeth rub on the end face, or bump the fence a little to the right and take a skim cut on the end, giving an exact cut line on the fence. The position of the stop block is then set by measuring from the end of the fence as shown in the photo. You can also get a better view of the ledge under the fence which is used to support the outer end of the part being cut.

Note the stack of treated lumber on the lower left of this photo, stickered in an effort to dry them out a little; this was when I was making the tortoise planters a couple of years ago. I will dig out the photos of the fixture I made for this saw to cut multiple, different length, mitered parts for making these planters, but will put them in a separate post.

[Cherryville Chuck]

Tom that was the thought I had if the fence was fixed and not easily removable. I'm right handed but my preference is to feed from the left. I was cutting off short pieces of 5/8" ply with it and lifting the blade did catch the corners of the pieces but not enough to cause a problem. I'll have to make a hold down for it. Something curved where the butt end sits on the bench so I can leverage against it to apply pressure on the cut off. I need to do that anyway even if I'm not using the stop, it's just another job I haven't gotten around to. Maybe later today. Long pieces I use my sled on the TS and either clamp a stop to the sled or use the fence. The sled keeps the piece square to the blade so I've never had a piece bind using the fence that way. I cut the stop so that it sat on the table of the miter saw which helps keep it square and the screws can be tighten pretty tight. I'm using the proper clips for the T track. I have only used it once so far so time will tell if it moves during heavy use. I like how you zero your cuts out but with the Ttrack in mine that won't be an option.

I remember the tortoise planters now that you mention them. I bought a bunch of pwf grade lumber last summer for a renovation I had to do to my house and some of the boards were so green that water squirted out when I drove nails in them. I think they do that on purpose as green lumber doesn't soak up too much preservative which increases their cost.

Dan did you have the piece jammed against a stop? Can you use the screw holes to attach angle brackets or angle iron?

[Stick486]

when cutting small pieces, to avoid lost pieces, fly aways and jams use your shop vac to capture and pull them away from the blade...
this works on most all cutting tools...

[DaninVan]

"Dan did you have the piece jammed against a stop? Can you use the screw holes to attach angle brackets or angle iron?"
-Charles
Yes, but a fairly smallish block. i think it was maybe 1.5" x 1.5" x about 6"' long against the fence.
For sure the remaining stock was too short for the crosscut operation. i may also have inadvertently allowed the motor to rise up a tich out of the cut.

[Cherryville Chuck]

I found when I used the length stop I also needed a hold down which is something I had been planing on making anyway, it just became more urgent with adding the stop. I took part of a blank I bandsawed out of a curved cherry limb and bandsawed and spoke shaved and drum sanded into shape and cut a jaw on it to be able to put both down and forward pressure on a piece. I have to use it with a support stand I made for holding long pieces level with the saw table but that's no big deal.

[Jon]

I used double sided tape to add some MDF to the miter saw. Provides great zero clearance cuts. I subsequently cut the center section down for better clearance of sawdust. The slot across the top is a classic T slot to secure a stop block. Apology for the upside down photo. I tried reversing it but it failed on the load.
For securing small pieces I use the fork from FastCap. Works great and provides ample hand clearance

[Cherryville Chuck]

That hold down was the one I was roughly copying. I have yet to see one up here. I corrected the photo but it reversed the order they show up in.
The extra table would help with splintering. Sometimes I'll put a board or piece of ply against the fence and then my piece against it and cut through both and that just about eliminates splintering too.

[Jon]

Chuck, thanks for the photo corrections.

An additional advantage to having the extra backing is it provides an efficient way to initially align parts for a cut.

I bought that hold down several years ago when it first popped up. I have not seen one advertised since.

[Herb Stoops]

That wouldn't be too hard to make, me thinks.
HErb

[Cherryville Chuck]

There's a new project for you Herb. The curved limb I used worked well and it's fairly strong because I followed the grain instead of cutting across it. And there isn't a whole lot else I can think of using pieces like that for but bandsawing them into usable blanks is a little tricky and not something I would recommend to a novice.

[tomp]

IfFastCap 10 Million Dollar Arm is the one that you're talking about, it's shown as available on Amazon

[Jon]

@tomp
That is the one. Appreciate the reference.

[tomp]

Another option, although a little cumbersome, seems like a toggle clamp would do the same thing and would be a little quicker to load/unload.

Safely cut small pieces on your mitersaw.docx

[tomp]

I think this is the idea that I was thinking about, just rotate it by 90° (but you would need the auxiliary fence) - and would be pretty quick too.

TS Sled Small Part Hold-down.pdf

[Cherryville Chuck]

I like the sled and particularly the lever operated hold down Tom. But I wonder if it has enough operating range? That could be fixed by milling a vertical slot in the fence and cutting 2 or 3 notches for the bolt to fit into. That way just loosen a knob and move to a different slot to change thickness.

[CharleyL]

The source for Jon's safety hold down stick is FastCap. I have two of them, because they work great at the table saw and router table too.
https://www.fastcap.com/product/10-million-dollar-stick It's a pretty good deal at about $18 plus shipping. The name seems to indicate the total cost of medical attention, if it isn't used.

For a stop, I frequently just use a two screw clamp or a small C-clamp and a piece of wood. My favorite piece of wood has a \ cut on the end so that there is only a short surface, above the saw table to bump the work piece against (if stop block is to be used on the right). This slope keeps any sawdust on the saw table from creating a dimension error if any is left after a cut by keeping the bump point of the stop above any remaining sawdust from previous cuts.

Charley