JoinTech SawTrain and current SS OPR

[iclark]

Ed's impressive posts have gotten me to wondering about using the 520 JT SawTrain with the SS OPR.

one thing that I cannot tell from the pictures or the JT site:
will the clincher fit between the SS way tubes?

would this work on a 520?
- connect a floating table to the OPR table with a pair of connecting tubes (with the way tubes vertical and between the floating and main tables)
- clamp the JT base to the floating table
- slip the clincher between the way tubes and attach to the JT base and fence

looking at the Sawtrain manual, another possible issue might be the thickness of the OPR table.

has anyone tried this combination?

Ivan

[reible]

Sorry no pictures for you but here is an idea of how this might work. Either the jointech or the incra systems have a way of mounting to routing tables where you take them off the the piece that connects them to the shopsmith and then remount them to a 3/4" piece of plywood. The plywood is then clamped to a router table and you are back in business.

For the newer OPR you would need to be up the height of the table plus the 3/4"... that is assuming you are using say a floating table and legs. I'm guess at this point you would want to have that out the back side and the problem then would be the distance between tubes vs the width. I can measure the jointech and tell you if that would fit... Even if it does you will have limit distance of set back as the fence is rather wide... and tall, still it would have some limited use. You could come out the front but that might be hard to work that way...

So depending on what you hope to do it might work for you but with limited flexability.

It might interest you to know that the old OPR and original incra jig were actualy sold together by shopsmith. In the next couple of days I will be moving the photo collect over with pictures of that. It might also be worth while knowing that the old orginal incra jig is being sold again. The old one I have is gray but the new one is black, you can see it at:
http://www.rockler.com/product.cfm?page=11494&filter=incra

It might be a better "fit" for you???

Ed

[iclark]

thanks, Ed.

after the conversations here, I'm being tempted by that end of year sale at JT. so I'm thinking about non-traditional uses for it. since the fence on the OPR looks to be minimal, the JT looked like it would be a significant improvement and I liked the concept of the near-auto-centering capability for routing a series of mortises down the edge of a board.

putting the floating table out the back and slipping the clincher between the way tubes seemed like a good use. if it would fit there.

in terms of the OPR table thickness, this is probably a _really_ naive question, but...
if the router fence is parallel to the grooves in the main table, why can't you just use the main table with the OPR?

[charlese]

Hi iclark! Just wanted to throw this comment into the mix - - (Sorry it might be a bit off the main subject)

Fences for the new OPR are very simple to make and they function much better than the aluminum ones furnished with the tool. You can see the fences in the Sawdust Sessions dealing with the OPR. There are downloadable plans for a couple of fences on the Blackboard in those sessions.

The only problem about their use is the milling of slots on the OPR table. One of those fences is a simple single straight board. It serves either on edge or flat on it's face. You will have to buy a couple of Stove bolts to use it. Beautiful simplicity!:) My kind of thing!

[reible]

Hi,

I checked and the jointech can fit between the tubes. I didn't actually do it but my handy tape measure says it will work.

Again the best way to do this would be to put it together to make sure there are no problems. From what I can see the jointech fence and knobs sticking out the back means you will be out about 4" from the tubes to start with. Add in the dia. of the tubes then maybe a little slop... then there will be the bit that is to wide to fit the opening... So as a big fat guess you might have as much as 15" of movement left but it could be less.

If you just plan to do mortises then you are right, just mount the JM to the floating table and away you go. But it will be some effort to put it together as parts will have to go through vertical then twist to fit. BTW the Jointech system is a lot heavier then it looks... as any of the new owners will tell you, it is a bit of shock.

Maybe someone here owns all the parts and can put it together and take a few pictures??????

Ed