Thread: One Man's Jig Journey

With all this discussion about dovetail jigs and Roger Gifkins selling out I just have to tell others of my 'journey' and hopefully there may be something here for some people.

Confession- I love the look of dovetails. A box has 3 things going for it- the timber(s), the shape and the constuction. A mitred corner looks neat, clean and can be constructed to be strong but when I am looking at a box, the dovetailed corners display strength. Maybe it's a man thing?

I made hand cut dovetails at school but when I Saw roger Gifkins displaying his dovetail jig I just had to have one. (Bought the A10 and B 10 for those who know these things.) This was way back but not long enough ago to have the red base or something referred to in my manual. I made up quite a few boxes but there was a fair bit of frustration. As it turns out, this was mainly as a result of my poor preparation. Some boxes would go together perfectly but others- well they store bolts and screws now. What I learnt (the hard way) from working with the Gifkins jig in those days was:

* You must have a decent clamp- I can't believe I was using an el cheapo clamp that moved during the cutting process.
* You must prepare the timber exactly- square I mean. I found out my drop saw was out 1-2 degrees on one side of the fence.

As time went by the Leigh Jig started to look good. I always wanted to make a blanket box with some thick timber so when they went on 'Show Special' I paid for the D4. I suspect MIK were having trouble at the time as they didn't actually have the jig but took the $. I think it was 6 or 8 months later that it arrived. I made the blanket box out of Kauri & Camphor laurel - 500mm height routed in one go each time, perfect. To do these thicker dovetails I needed to purchase the cutters (CMT on special) and I used the big Triton router. (Stu has some great info on fitting the Triton to Leigh equipment)
With this success I decided to make boxes with the Leigh jig.

I had an old one speed Makita router (hard start) which is lighter than the Triton which I wanted to use. I went through a fair bit of agony just to be able to mount the bits. I had all the right equipment but there was just not enough space to fit in 2 spanners to tighten the collet.(thank you to Les Meyer for keeping me sane during this time.) made a few boxes but noticed that the bits 'dropped' on occasions. I eventually gave up on using the Makita and the Leigh jig to make boxes.

Just yesterday I decided to get the dovetailing all organised. Took the big Triton router out of the table, set it up to do the 3 boxes I had prepared for the Leigh jig. Mounted the cutter and started. Into the job, the bit 'dropped' slightly in the Triton. These bits have a narrow diameter and I do have the collet reducer but I just could not get it to stay.

My next plan is this:
* Big Triton stays in router table ( except when blanket boxes etc are to be done)
* Big Triton is used in table to cut Gifkins dovetails
* I get my act together to correctly prepare timber- even to a pre-determined width as recommended by RG.

I have been reading the recent posts and I can highly recommend the Gifkins jig. You may have an issue with preparing the timber but really you need to do this preparation for whatever jig you use. RG has written on how to do : variable spacing, long boards, different sized dovetails (on thin stock) etc.
You can do everything except half lapped dovetails like on drawers. I noticed that 'I Wantashed' had one of those jigs that makes them. I recommend to leave it set up for a particular thickness of timber and it's ready to go whenever you need it.

I have included a few piccies. The blanket box is the one mentioned. The others are made with the Gifkins jig. Discussions of my 'journey' with the gifkins jig and the leigh jig are her on the Forum (somewhere).
I hope this has helped a dovetail enthusiast somewhere. I know experience is the best teacher but can't all the right answers be written in a book somewhere?

Graham