Thread: Has anyone tried this before?

Lidcome TAFE teaches a variation of this method
the changes are
remove the full depth in one pass — it's 3 phase machine about 400mm wide capable of taking something like a 15mm bite
use a stop board to locate the start of the taper – much simplier than trying to align marks on the work piece with marks on the fence
use a jig to "carry" the piece across the knives – the jig helps keep your fingers out of the way

it took two passes with a finely set plane to clean up the chatter marks

Arry, which direction did you feed the legs in, against the grain or with the grain?

moning all....
I normally use the jointer for tapered legs. I just ducked down to the shed and did this one and it took less than 5 minutes including ripping the blank to size. The method I use is slightly different. I mark a line around the blank at the point the taper starts. I set up a stop on the infeed table so that the mark aligns with the top dead centre (TDC) of the cutter, I set the infeed table down to 1/8" cut. Start the jointer, lower the blank onto the blade and push it slowly through, holding the end that will be the foot down onto the bed. About 3 passes normally gives enough taper. Then, to make the spade foot as below, I put another stop on the outfeed table, set the depth of cut to 1/4" and slowly push the leg through as before. Normally a light sand is all that is required to finish the leg. I have found it much easier though to do do all mortising while the leg is still a square blank!

fletty

Good stuff fletty

I've never tried tapering a leg and leaving a foot on it like you've explained and posted a pic of.

I've always done that on a Spindle Moulder by making a cradle for the leg to sit in, with it having a tapered edge that runs off the parallel fence on the machine, using a large rebate/square cutter block, and run it up to a stop for the taper on all four sides. I also had another jig to then stand the leg upright(foot down), a straight cutter set to the angle of the taper in a white hill block, then square out the bottom of the taper where it meets the foot (so you don't have the scollop from the cutter block). Then finish the top of the foot off with a small mould.

Do you leave the taper to foot section as you've shown in your pic? Any other tricks for doing what i've tried to explain!!?? (Hope it makes sense!)

Matt

Hi Matt,
The photo doesn't show it clearly and I WILL post a better shot of the foot, but normally the leg taper flares out wth a radius above the foot section and that radius is equal to the radius of the cutter on the jointer. I normally give the foot section a few swipes with a handplane to make the taper on the foot section parallel to the taper on the leg. My current project requires tapered legs BUT the taper is on the inner faces only so this mockup also has only 2 faces tapered .... and is a bit rough because I hadn't had my morning coffee!

fletty