Jigs & Improvised Tool Guides

    An improvised jig for drilling holes at 45 degrees.

    Jigs can come in many forms...

    Jigs are devices that can add some capability to existing tools, increase the accuracy and/or reliability or repeated tasks, or simply make a task easier. They can be made out of any material, and in any design to get whatever task you need done.

    This is a jig that helps me to drill 45o holes for dowel joints. It uses a welding square, two pieces of wood, and several clamps for easy disassembly. Clamping my right angled brackets on, and drilling with the drill press makes it a "turn key" solution with repeatable results. Best of all, the wood breaks down easily and goes back into the scrap pile when done.
    This commercial jig is a more versatile version of my improvised one above.

    Buying jigs can be great, but also as expensive (if not more so) than buying some tools...

    This is the Woodpeckers adjustable, compound angle drilling jig. Ok, it's precision made, and can adjust angles on two planes, rather than mine which.. really didn't adjust on any. However, my jig did offer a precision-ground 45o angle on a single plane, (due to using a precision made welding square) which is all I wanted it to do.

    At $340 US dollars, (that's over $500 Australian at the time of writing ! not including shipping)... that's more than some people earn in a week. It's an amazing piece of kit, and it'll last for years, but it's clearly for pros making lots of angled holes on a routine basis. It's clearly not aimed at the DIYer on a budget!

    I spent... well... nothing on mine, and I simply unclamped it, and put my square, clamps and scrap wood away. No extra space needed. See the drilling section below for a video on how to make a jig much more like this one.

    Done wisely, jigs can save you a ton of money, either by adding uses to tools you already have, or helping you to save time, while avoiding costly mistakes.

    Jigs come in all kinds and price points. Some are "one trick wonders" while others offer several functions. This can be a double edged sword, as it can make the jig more complex to use, and perhaps less reliable.

    Whether you need to save money by making them from whatever you have laying about, or simply can't spare the time to go into the store and/or wait for an online delivery... DIY jigs can be just as good (or even better) than the bought options.

    There are some amazing commercial jigs too (Brand names like "Kreg" and "Woodpeckers" make various kinds of jigs) and I own several. However, whether buying or building numerous jigs.. they can easily start to take up a lot of space. You don't always have to build them in ways that they don't come apart easily. Keep that in mind.

    What is perhaps the most commonly made/used jig? The table saw sled.

    Jigs are great, and there are many designed for the table saw, but perhaps the best and most famous, is the table saw sled.

    Why would one want a sled?

    At the most basic design, it ensures that your cuts are square and the materials are supported throughout the entire cut. This leads to better angles, and cleaner cuts.

    More advanced designs include stop blocks, adjustable mitre and even bevel angles. However, again, as you add more features, each adjustment needs to be both understood and "locked down" during cuts to stop drift and other unfortunate mistakes.

    How to make a multi purpose sled for your table saw.

    Straight cutting jigs and jointer alternatives.

    Cutting wood straight isn't always as easy as you might think. In fact, some tools, despite being designed to cut straight edges, can't guarantee that any cut made in warped pieces are straight.

    Often, tools like a table saw, or thickness planer ensure opposing sides of your timber are parallel, but this does not mean they're straight, or square (at 90o to each other). If one edge is curved, the other will likely be as well. If one surface is twisted, the other will follow suit.

    Wood is a natural material. If you're using natural timber, rather than engineered woods (ply, chip board, MDF, etc) then the edges are seldom straight. Even if you've trimmed the wood down to straight, square, and true boards previously, they can warp, twist, cup, and bow after milling.

    A table saw is great at cutting straight cuts, but if the wood you're cutting has a curve in the referenced edge (the edge pushed against the fence), the cut won't be either.

    Sure, you can use a jointer to plane an edge straight, but that's an expensive tool to buy, and takes up precious space in the workshop. Also, as jointers go up in size, the ability to straighten longer boards, to even straighter edges goes up.  Which cost even more money, needs more power, and takes up even more space. Many good jointers are upwards of 1.5m long (5 feet) or even 2m (roughly 7 feet).

    So how about some ideas to use a table saw, or an electric hand plane to make a viable alternative to the jointer?

    Simplest straight edge jig for a table saw, good for straightening shorter boards with curved edges.

    A similar straight edge cutting jig for a table saw that's aimed at straightening thicker boards

    Straight edge table saw jig for longer boards, although it can be made to handle boards of any length.

    Jigs that make your circular saw even better (and cut straight)

    The circular saw is a versatile tool in many workshops. But anyone who has ever used one to cut long cuts in large sheets of wood knows it's not exactly accurate, or easy to keep in line.

    However, a circular saw can easily be turned into a functioning track saw, or even panel saw, with the appropriate jigs, and those are two (more expensive) tools that are aimed at cutting large sheets of wood and other materials.

    If you regularly break sheet stock down into square/rectangular pieces, the DIY panel saw jig will be a revelation to you.

    If you want complete freedom to cut a straight line at any angle across the sheet stock the track saw jig will be a huge help.

    Have a look at the jigs for that in the videos below:

    A simple track saw jig

    DIY panel saw jig for your circular saw

    Cutting circles using jigs.

    You can use several tools to cut circles. Obvious choices include:

    • Router
    • Band saw
    • Jig saw
    • Drill (with holesaw bit)
    But with the right jigs, you can even use table saws and rotary tools.

    Each have their pros and cons, like accuracy, ease of use, and the quality of the finished cut, but also some are better suited to circles of certain size.

    However, each tool will probably need a different style of jig to work with it effectively. Have a look at the video to the right for some examples.

    Circles being cut in multiple ways:

    Jigs for flattening and surfacing boards

    Ok, so you've got your boards cut straight, but maybe you want to thin it down to get rid of a rough surface, or to make it fit into a particular dimension.

    On the left, we have a video for making jig that allows a thickness planer work with uneven/rocking boards by creating an adjustable height "sled" to support the wood as it goes through.

    On the right, we have a video for making a jig that uses a router to flatten wood that's simply too wide to fit into a normal thickness planer, or to replace a thickness planer altogether.

    Thickness planer sled for twisted boards

    Router sled surfacing jig

    Jigs for drilling

    There are all kinds of jigs to make drilling more reliable. If you have a hand held drill, then drilling holes straight is an issue, so you might want one that guides your drill to always drill at 90o to your surface. (See left video)

    But what if you want to drill at different (un)usual angles? Well you could tilt the drill press table, but they're notoriously difficult to adjust accurately, and may just be a pain in the neck to adjust at all. Using a jig can make the job so much easier. (See middle video).

    What if you want to easily drill many holes precisely...

    If you own a drill press, simply adding a fence (straight piece of wood) with a couple of clamps, ensures you can drill a perfectly straight line of holes by simply sliding your wood along the fence. (You'll still need to measure the holes for even spacing though). This is far cheaper than adding a compound table to your press.

    If you're going to add a fence, it might well be worthwhile adding an entire drill press table. This is basically the drill press equivalent of a table saw sled. Extremely popular and be as simple or as elaborate as you like. Additional features may include side supports, dust management, convenient height adjustment, and replaceable inserts. (See video on the right).

    If you're looking for something even better to do with a drill press, how about building your own spindle sander jig? (See video below).

    Jigs to drill straight holes

    Tilting drill press jig

    DIY drill press table

    DIY drill press spindle sander jig with dust extraction

    How to make the spindles for drill press spindle sander.

    Jigs for doing joinery...

    Whether you're fan of dovetails, box joints, mortise and tenons, there are a ton of jigs that can help you with that. You'll probably find that most jigs are designed to work with routers or table saws in any number of useful and creative ways.

    A"loose tenon" mortising jig.

    Dovetail jig for table saw

    Box joint jig

    Using hand tools to replace bigger and more expensive tools.

    If you have a bunch of hand held power tools, you can absolutely build attachments for them to make them operate like much bigger, and more expensive stationary workshop tools.

    The key difference between hand held power tools, and larger stationary tools is that you usually bring hand tools to the work piece, and move the tools by hand. For one off tasks, or where precision/repeatability isn't as important, there are real advantages to the "creative freedom" such tools offer. But if you want that repeatable, precise control, using hand held tools this way requires some skill to achieve this, and for that reason, that can become challenging.

    Conversely, with stationary tools, the tools don't move, and you bring the work piece to the tool, and move the work piece through the machine (often with some sort of feature that controls distance/depth/position, (or a mixture thereof).... which makes repeated tasks much simpler and reliable.

    It usually makes sense to use whichever involves the least effort, and offers the most control. Whatever improves your odds of success.

    Things to consider:

    • Mounting your router to the underside of a small table with a fence to make.... you guessed it a router table.
    • Mounting a jig saw upside down to the underside of a table to create a band/scroll saw like device.
    • Mount your circular saw to the underside of a table with an adjustable fence to make unsurprisingly, a table saw.
    • Mounting an electric hand planer upside down into a mount with a fence to make a benchtop jointer.
    • Creating an adjustable mount for a belt sander, mount it upside down (or vertically) to create a DIY linear sander/finisher (sometimes called a "linisher").
    • Mount your hand held drill to a home made "drill press jig". For extra points, attach an electro magnet to the base for precise metal drilling on steel.
    • Using a drill as the motor/chuck of a small hand made wood lathe.
    • Put an angle grinder on some sort of linear rail (makes it move in a very straight line) to replace a cut-off saw. Add a way to control the angle of the cut, on one or two planes, perhaps some stop blocks for repeatable lengths, and you have a seriously useful tool for very little.
    • Using any sort of spinning tool (drill, angle grinder, broken circular saw) to create a perfectly functional disk sander. Add some sort of dust collection and it'll be even better.
    .

    Want inspiration?

    There's almost certainly a YouTube video for all of them. In fact, there's probably several for each, ranging from ultra basic, (but oh so simple to build) to pro-grade equivalents. All you'd need to do to find such videos is enter:

    DIY jointer/table saw/router table/wood lathe/linisher/metal cut off saw, etc. You get the idea. Then simply pick one you like. It's usually a good idea to watch a few though, so you can pick the best one, or simply add the best features of them all. You decide.

    Conclusion:

    If there's a task that you need to do accurately, or perhaps more importantly, repeatedly, then a jig can be a huge help.

    Remember, that most jigs need to work with some sort of specific tool. Often that's a router, or a table saw, or a drill. Obviously, whether you're building or buying your jigs, you need to find one that suits the tool(s) you have.

    There are many amazing and even famous commercial jigs. The company "Kreg" offers jigs that assist in pocket hole joinery, installing concealed hinges, door locks, drawer runners, hardware (handles) placement, drilling adjustable shelf pin holes, jigs that assist building decks, turning your circular saw into track saws, and many others.

    Woodpeckers offers several drilling, routing, and flattening jigs, along with specialist coping sleds and many others. They're very good, but also very expensive.

    Leigh make a ton of jigs, mostly for routers, and table saws that facilitate tenons, box joints, and dovetail joinery.

    There are many other brands of jig-like offerings. There's the Woodrat and knock-off "Router boss" which enables routers to do some amazing adaptable joinery. The pantorouter, invented by Mathias Wandel and refined by Kuldeep Singh does a similar thing in a different way.

    You could also argue that clamping jigs, ensuring square glue ups should also make this list. I'm a huge fan of Fireball Tools squares (as eye-wateringly expensive as they may be) are a joy to use for both welding and wood working alike.

    A final, thought before I go:

    The best tool is the one you can use, how, when and where you need it. So for this reason, I think the humble trolley, or anything that helps you to move (and use) your tools more effectively (and often) should also be considered a jig. However, a trolley isn't just some wheels on the bottom, because you can also incorporate jig-like features to ensure accuracy and repeatability, tool holding/storage spaces... you're only limited by your creativity.

    Have I missed any jigs you think I should add?

    Feel free to let me know through the contact us page.

    All the best in your DIY jig-enabled improvisation.

    Ham.

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