3D Printed Featherboards.

Boys and Girls,

 

Still flying the flag here 

as there is no 3D printing category and I haven’t a metal printer, for metalworking projects.

 

While I consider mag switches worth a 10* out of 5*, this post is not directed at them,  but I’m giving them a worthy mention as they play a staring role in this woodless trist.

 

Being a gadgets man, sometime in the past I started using these Grip Tite magnetic switches,

Then I went to the woodshow in Melbourne (circa 2008, dated by the creation date of the user manual I scanned on my computer). I discovered and immediately bought these Magswitch featherboards,

Unfortunately, the magnets were built into the jig, but at the time I was none the wiser… a trait I carry to the current time.

Then the boffins at Magswitch Colorado USA, either listened to their users, or more probably hired an Aussie graduate, that designed and released this new versions for the bandsaw,

and this one for the tablesaw,

 

They both had removable magnets that could be repurposed on demand.  It turned out that the “tablesaw” jig had detachable feathers 

for flipping, to permit bi-directional use,

 

The removable magnets spurred me onto making my own featherboards out of timber (pine),

that often suffered catastrophically when dropped,

 

thereby needing surgery with metal implants.

 

Then I bought a 3D printer (same wood show, years later), and started designing featherboards,

and eventually settled on these for general tablesaw use,

with a collars that permitted use of the 30mm as well as the 40mm mag switches.

 

Fired up the printer and churned these out for the tablesaw,

I also created some smaller ones for the fence and small thin stock (appart from the thin green one in above picture),

that can also be used with my router table’s fence/tabletop. 

All my featherboards are reversable so that they can be used either side of the blade and the choice between the tabletop and fence.  I had some customised versions that rode the mitre slot, however, they seem to be hiding with the spiders and mouses. 

Thanks for watching.

 

Keep an eye out for my upcoming Dremel’s 3D printed hits and misses.

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