Thread: Mitre Saw Fence With Dust Extraction

The factory fence on my Dewalt MS has a 1.8mm bow in it. And I don't like the large opening either because it doesn't lend itself to cutting small pieces. Being too lazy to clamp, I've had a couple of scares when a small workpiece has been grabbed by the blade and thrown back at me. Luckily no fingers were lost. I decided I wanted a safer fence which included improved dust extraction. I found this but there are no construction details:

Miter saw dust collection for DeWalt DW716 : woodworking

With that design as inspiration this what I came up with. I used the original fence as a template to make the bottom piece. Used the bottom piece as a template for the top piece. The first iteration didn't have the holes in the fence. I found that when the blade made contact with the workpiece the sawdust generated bounced off the fence back into my face. The 20mm holes in the fence solved that problem.

I no longer have the ability to tilt the blade for compound mitres. But I can't recall having ever done that in the 15 years I've owned the saw. I also need to make another port in the other side of the fence back to plug the DE hose into if I ever need to swing the blade to the right. I do almost all mitre cuts on my TS anyway, so I'm in no hurry to add the second port.

Dust extraction is MUCH better than it was. Almost all visible dust is collected. And the fence is safer for smaller workpieces.