Festool wants to ban this (DIY Track Saw circular saw guide jig)

ah [Music] today i'm going to show you how you can make a simple diy track saw with no special tools we're not going to need a table saw a straight edge all we're going to be using is a circular saw and a screwdriver and stay tuned after we're finished with the build i'm going to show you a way that you can use your track saw without having to clamp it down and deal with the clamps being in your way when you make a cut let's fix this mess you're going to need a piece of plywood that is about two inches wider than the base of your saw and long enough for you to be able to cut a full sheet of plywood you're not going to be using any factory edges so just go ahead and mark it and cut it as straight as you can [Applause] my case i'm going to make it about 63 inches long that'll allow me to cut a 48 inch wide piece of plywood when the jig is finished now we need a straight line to align our first side of the track to you could use a chalk line or a straight edge but i'm just using a piece of string to show you you don't need any special tools i'm going to be using this tile edging as a guide for our track saw the circular saw or your skill saw is going to ride against this and i picked this because it's aluminum it's lightweight it's really easy to cut you can pick this up at the home center in the tile department or the flooring department and it's really inexpensive i think i picked up two pieces of this for about twenty dollars i checked this tile edging out on my table saw and it's really nice and straight which is good that's exactly what we want but i'm also going to use this string as a guide just so i know when i'm screwing it down i'm not bending it out of place it's always good to have two points of reference when you're screwing this down i picked lap screws to screw this down because they have a nice big truss head on them and they have a sharp point so i don't have to do any pre-drilling i can just start screwing this down to the plywood you want to take your time with this part it's really important that the the guide or the tile edging is nice and straight so as you're screwing it down pay attention to the string make sure you're not pushing it out of whack and you're drilling it nice and carefully because the rest of the jig is going to be dependent on this first guide that we put down this one's the most important so take your time make sure it goes down nice and straight [Applause] for the next part you're going to want to remove the blade off of your saw this is going to allow you to lower it down as much as possible that way the saw is going to be nice and stable when we use it to set the rest of the jig so go ahead and take your saw blade off and while you're at it get some masking tape and put it along the edge of the saw table that's going to make it a little bit thicker so when we set the jig using the saw table it's not going to be too tight when we're finished just a little bit of gap in the masking tape now we're going to use the saw with the masking tape on the side to set the opposite side of the track just push the second track up against the saw and screw it down and then move the saw along and screw it down working your way from one end to the other don't make it too tight don't leave it too loose you have to just get it in between so you have a nice snug fit when you're all finished take your masking tape off and check the fit another benefit of this build is you can loosen the screws and adjust as needed now you just take a few pieces of the edging and cut them so they'll fit the track saw and you'll notice there's no place for clamps to go onto this track saw we're not going to need them when we're finished with the build i'll show you how to make it so this track saw doesn't need any clamps to hold it down nothing worse than having your saw bang into a clamp when you're trying to finish up a cut now you want to take your saw with the blade you're going to use in it and lower it down so it just touches the plywood and run the saw the whole length of the track saw this is going to make a score mark on the plywood that we're going to use for the next step in building the track saw now i'm taking a 1 8 inch bit and i'm drilling all the way through the track saw from one side to the other it's going to give me a pilot hole to follow up with a larger bit i'm spacing these out about 12 inches the spacing isn't that critical you just want to make sure you have enough holes so that you'll be able to see the line on whatever material you're going to cut with it and i'm going to drill through with a larger bit i'm using a one inch bit that should give me enough clearance to view the line that i draw on the material i'm cutting and i'm going to drill halfway through from one side flip the track saw over and drill the rest of the way from the other side that way i won't have any worries about blowing out the plywood from one side or the other after you finish drilling your holes you want to carefully lower the saw into the track saw while it's running and cut from one end of the jig to the other take your time with this and be careful it can be a little bit dangerous plunging the saw into the jig for the first time as you can see the track saw moves around i don't want to have to use clamps because if you've ever tried using a straight edge to cut with a circular saw it seems like the circular saw always bangs into the clamps or something like that so i'm going to show you something different i'm going to do to this so i won't need to use clamps i'm applying non-slip tape to the bottom of the jig so it won't move around during use you could use self-adhesive sandpaper or even skateboard tape if you can't find it locally i'll put a link below where you can order it online i like this tape because it comes in a long roll and it won't have any seams to get caught as i'm placing the track saw down for a cut so the track saw is no longer sliding around even on this slippery mdf now we should be able to cut a straight line no problem so i hope you found this video helpful and if you do you'll hit the thumbs up button maybe even subscribe and hit the notification bell that way when i put out a new video you'll see what i came up with next now i just need to figure out a way to use the circular saw and my fancy new track saw and make cuts without dust flying anywhere if you have any suggestions or have seen a video put it in the comments down below i'd love to hear it i'm always looking for new ideas so let me know if you have some ideas for me thanks for watching

Channel: House Doctor Ray

Views: 1,434,436

Keywords: easy, diy, how to, how-to, simple, hacks, inexpensive, cheap, track saw, tracksaw, festool, makita, wen, dewalt, porter cable, woodworking, art, how to make, tools, plexi glass, plexiglass, update, circular saw, skilsaw, zero clearance, jig, homemade track saw, guide rail for circular saw, homemade track saw guide, circular saw guide, diy guide rail, diy track saw, track saw for circular saw, circular saw guide rail, saw, homemade track saw makita, makita track saw, makita guide rail, homemade

Id: DOWMtyq1n-I

Length: 9min 18sec (558 seconds)

Published: Sat Jan 22 2022