Thread: Fence Mounted Push Block

I've been meaning to make something similar, especially for narrow rips. I like the idea of the front hold down. I will pinch that bit and modify it slightly by adding fingers to maintain the downward pressure. The swing up rear pusher is a good idea too. OK, consider the whole thing pinched. (just thinking out loud here-would need to be able to lock it to the fence initially and then easily release as the workpiece moved past, cam action maybe.)

Originally Posted by NCArcher

I've been meaning to make something similar, especially for narrow rips. I like the idea of the front hold down. I will pinch that bit and modify it slightly by adding fingers to maintain the downward pressure. The swing up rear pusher is a good idea too. OK, consider the whole thing pinched. (just thinking out loud here-would need to be able to lock it to the fence initially and then easily release as the workpiece moved past, cam action maybe.)

Pinch away, it's all been pinched before by me.

I see what you mean by the locking (to prevent the block feeding with the workpiece), I thought last night about the fact that I need some movement at the front to actually apply downward pressure at the front when pressure is applied to the handle, I did not intend the front piece to actively apply pressure until I started applying pressure to the handle. I thought it might need a spring at the front to lift the push block slightly until I grab and hold down the handle, this way I can adjust the front hold down so that it is applying actual pressure once the spring is compressed (I hope that makes sense). A featherboard that holds the stock down the full time, would not work with my design as it simply straddles the fence and is not held down by anything other than the person, when the handle is grabbed.

If you were to go with the featherboard and hence wanted to hold the stock down when you don't have your hand on the handle, then it would like you say need to be locked into position and some form of quick release like a cam is required. It would also need to run on some form of rail, so that the downward pressure could be maintained when you are not holding the handle. I guess you may also need to release the pressure that the featherboard is applying (if you are ripping several pieces and have an outfeed table), otherwise pulling the push block back may also result in pulling the workpiece back. One solution with that might be to ride the push block on a track like in this picture below.

ramp.jpg

Effectively, it has a ramp at the end designed to remove the pressure of the featherboard enough so that when you start pulling the push block back, it doesn't want to take the workpiece back with it (I doubt it would take much of a rise, just enough to be certain it wouldn't hold on).

I can see how this could become a really complex addition if you wanted it to be.

Cheers,

Camo