Thank you so much for making these videos. I’ve wanted to know how to make dovetails… for as long as I could remember. I own routers… new for over 10 years easily. This task/tool looks so intimidating that I’ve never tried. Forcing myself to learn. I came across your videos to gain confidence and understanding. Thank you for giving me the drive and know how to try. Your instructional videos are superb! One tip I can share w you that I saw from another video was to use a piece of wood the same thickness and lay it in front of your cut. Scribe a pencil mark on it. Now you can Lay your router as if you were to make the cuts and verify the depth that could potentially be more accurate
Thank you so much for such a kind comment, that makes my day! I had this jig for quite a before working up the courage to give it a try as it was quite intimidating. Once I broke through that part, I wanted to share my experience with it, in hopes of encouraging others - hence the longer videos. That's a great idea to scribe the mark based on the workpiece! I've been trying to do that sort of reference measurement (rather than numerical measurement) in most of my woodworking, but haven't done it with dovetails. Great tip!
Great review. I previously watched a review on the Rockler jig and your Porter Cable looks like it is made sooo much more durable. I'll be going with the PC for sure. thanks!
@@denisj4c0bs72 I used Baltic birch which is actually 15/32" or so. The jig calls for minimum 1/2" thick material, so my joints took alot of finesse to keep the tails from blowing out the grain. And they ended up being very tight! Next time I will use something that is actually 1/2-9/16" thick. My advice would be to caliper the material before you purchase it.
Just got my jig in after not using one for a long time and I had only done the through dovetails. This was a great refresher and my test box came out decent.
Wow, great video. I have not tried Dovetail joints and honestly, I haven't watched a video before about it. Looks great, may have to try that in the future.
Happy it helped! The instructions were definitely a little frustrating (and should have been in colour), which is the main reason why I made these videos.
Great video and thanks for making it. By the way, that plastic chunk on your router's cord is just an anti theft tag container. Just smash it and remove it if it annoys you.
If you have to hammer your dovetails together, they are too tight. you need to slightly adjust your router bit. This is why you always test you setup on scrap wood first.
if its too tight do you raise the router bit or lower it? In a different video they said you slightly push the template forward like 1/16 of an inch,, your thoughts Magaman?
WOW! That's fantastic work there. Thanks for sharing. I'm waiting for the new model of a Bosch router, as I saw a few reviews that didn't seem to recommend the current one. I wonder what your thoughts on the plunger are, in general. Cheers!
Thanks for watching and leaving a comment! The jig is very impressive and built well, just a bit intimidating to use at first. I was very happy with my Bosch 1617 and it was ideal for this jig as the accessories available for Bosch routers is quite impressive. I haven't heard anything about Bosch updating their larger routers (I'd love to try one when new ones come out) and I recently changed out my router setup to a single Festool OF 1010 router. It's a bit between the Bosch 1617 and cordless DeWalt that I had and better fits my requirements for cabinetmaking...albeit at a cost.
Just a FYI if you ever take the face plate off your router you need to recenter the face plate because if you rotate the router the joints will not match found that out the hard way
Ah yes, great point Kenneth! The first time I ran into that I wonder why the router bit wasn't perfectly fitting into the bushing. Glad I figured it out before jamming it in and turning the router on.
when you check the router bit depth you assume the the rubber stop on the the threaded bolt is the proper depth. What if it has been changed? Is there an alternate method to make sure the bit is the right depth?
Great Video! My mini 7 degree 9/32 router bit which came with the Porter Cable jig needs replacing. Do you know where we can find a router bit to replace?
It would seem that half-blinds are the way to go, not sure why anybody would do a through dovetail with all the extra work of flipping the jib and changing the router bit.
Oh yeah, totally agree - It's often my go-to type, especially since 90%+ of my dovetail work is for inset drawers (ideal for half-blind). I do the occasional through dovetails for boxes, but it really is a pain changing the bits and setting the depth (2 routers would make this a bit easier).
If I recall correctly, moving from right to left as I do in the video is a climb cut. I could be wrong, but that was my intention and is what’s in the manual as well.
Nice work, I tried what you did but my wood piece was tearing apart. I was wondering if you could tell me the speed of your router and other tips to achieve your quality of work
Tear out can be a big issue, so I always make sure that I have a backer board behind the primary work piece (for through dovetails). Funny enough, I haven't thought much about speed when using this jig - checking my router, it looks like it would've been on speed 3, which is ~16,000 RPM on this router. The type of wood is always a factor as well. In my videos I'm using oak, which stands up really well to this task - I also use it with maple, cherry, and walnut (walnut can sometimes chip) with clean results. I tried it with poplar and pine with really poor results. Hope all of this helps!
Great video, I often come back to it for inspiration! After owning this jig for approximately 8 to 10 years lol, I finally tore the Band-Aid off. Not as intimidating as I thought especially with some good research videos. My question is on your boards that you just cut.. how do you adjust so the cuts are flush? Meaning if they were a little proud or a little shallow... Is that all with the depth of the router or adjusting the template plate? Thank you
The bit height adjusts the tightness of the joint. If the pin or tails board is proud or shy then adjust the template. There are instructions for those adjustments with pics on page 18 of my manual, not sure if your manual is the same.
I don't recall exactly what I had it set, but with the work pieces being 3/4" white oak and the bit being relatively small in cutter diameter, I likely would have been running close to max on my router, which is 25,000RPM.
I have a question that I have been trying to find an answer to... does this jig "not work" with a 1/4 inch collet router or does it need multiple passes with a 1/4 inch collet... again bit width, I get, should be 1/2 inch, my concern is the collet.. maybe my question is stupid... not sure.. appreciate the help. Thanks
Very fair question! The main issue is that you need to be able to install the guide bushings in the router to use the jig. If you have a 1/4” collet router than can accept guide bushings, then I don’t see any reason why you wouldn’t make the miniature dovetails that this jig can make. To make full size dovetails (like in this video), I’m not sure how that would work with the included guide bushings, but I’m sure there’s some math that could be done to figure out what you need.
I would like to ask you if the Porter Cable jig works with any dovetail bit (diameter and angle) for a blind dovetail joint? Or does it have to be the 17/32 in x 7 degree to work? I don't have access to a router with a 1/2 diameter collet, so I am using a 1/4 inch diameter collet dovetail bit that says it is "1/2 inch" and unknown angle. I am struggling to make the cut fit (too loose now) and am slowly making the cut deeper and hope this solves the problem. But it occurred to me that possibly the diameter (and possibly the angle) is vital. I could try and find a 1/4 inch equivalent diameter and angle. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
While it may work, I wouldn’t recommend going that route. If you do, you’ll need to make sure you use appropriate guide bushings and on my experience it can sometimes be tough to effectively use guide bushings on a smaller router (I did using a third party baseplate on my DeWalt trim router).
@@MasonWoodshop Thanks for the reply. My third party base plate accepts the Porter Cable bushing, and I do think I have it centered - I used a centering cone. I assumed even if the bit is not exactly 17/32, it would cut the tail and pins such that they would fit each other. I am outside the US and routers that take 1/2 bits are very expensive. Again thanks.
Looking for some help. I have the jig and tried half blind all day doing these instructions and can’t get it right. My issue is the tails are always too wide to fit into the pins. I tried raising the bit and lowering the bit and can’t get the tails to fit at all. One note: I do not have the 7 degree but that came with the poster cable jig. I bought a set at rockler which came with a 14degree and 8’degree bit. I’m using the 8 degree bit and noticed the one that came with the jig was 7 degrees. Not sure if that matters. Also had to buy the router collar from rockler as I couldn’t find that one as well. Any help is greatly appreciated.
@@MasonWoodshop what size or diameter is the collar your using? I’m using a 3rd party collar that fits perfectly into the jig slots. That could be an issue also. I don’t have the original collar for the router but that came with the jig.
@@StephenCombs17I don’t recall exactly (and I no longer have this jig) but I always used the Porter Cable guide bushings specified by the manual with a 1/2” collet router bit.
For half-blind dovetails both the pins and tails are cut at the same time, so it shouldn’t be too much of an issue. For through dovetails (and really any of these), I would always recommend marking the front, back, and then label the matching corners. The manual does a good job covering marking the pieces.
It’s a Porter Cable PCB330BS. Really nice bandsaw that’s can be found on a good sale quite often at Lowe’s. I’ve generally been very happy with it, but I need to tackle some rust buildup on the cast iron before getting back to using it.
