The best way to build your next crosscut sled!

hey welcome back everybody i just got a new table saw which means my old table saw sled does not fit but that's okay this thing was due for retirement anyway so we're gonna build a new one today now there's a ton of videos out there on table saw sleds i know but however there's two really important points that i think a lot of them are missing and we're really going to focus on those today the first one is how do you get this back fence here perfectly flat and straight everyone says just grab some three-quarter inch plywood and double it up and use that as your fence because you know it's flat that is not true okay my first table saw sled i assumed that was true and i got everything lined up and perfectly dialed in with a square just like this and it was perfect as long as i was cutting items that were exactly this length but as soon as i cut something longer this part was further down the curve on my fence that i didn't know was there which meant everything was coming out slightly out of square and it drove me bananas it's going to drive you bananas and we're not going to do that i'm going to show you how to do this right the other thing i think a lot of videos miss is how to set up your fence so a square to the blade a lot of people say you gotta put in one screw over here as a pivot point and then you just through trial and error you keep adding screws into the bottom and moving it over as you adjust your fence to get it perfectly dialed in that seems like a lot of extra work to me so i'm going to show you how you can get this fence dialed in at 90 degrees to your blade with just two screws and then once you get it perfectly dialed in then you can put in more screws or brads or glue whatever you want to do to get it locked in so first step is to start cutting down some plywood for our new sled i'm also using a bit of 2x6 for the back fence and here i'm putting a flat edge on what will become the bottom of the vents after that i'll use a straight edge and a feeler gauge to make sure the bottom is super flat i've got links to the straight edge and the feeler gauge down below to make the reference face super flat i put a good rip blade in my saw and then attach the fence to the sled before running it through the saw this is just like using a jointing sled or tapering jig but this is what i was talking about at the beginning of the video this face has to be perfectly flat if you want to make good square cuts and without a joiner this is the best way i know of to do it take your time on getting the fence right because it's definitely worth it the blade doesn't go high enough to go all the way through this piece and that's fine i don't want a super tall fence on this sled anyways so i'm just going to rip off the part that it couldn't reach but before i do that i'm going to mark it so i know which side is is the face i'm going to be referencing from and which is the top [Music] so this is my old sled and it's always a good idea to chamfer this little edge right here so that way as sawdust starts to build up on the surface and you slide your work piece up to it it won't accidentally push it out from the fence a little bit giving you an inaccurate cut so i got my new fence right here i'm going to go ahead and chamfer this edge [Music] so next we've got to cut the runners that are going to go into the miter slots and i'm going to use this piece of red oak i got at the big box store one because red oak is pretty hard and stable but secondly because this particular piece is exactly three and a quarter inches thick which is the size i need for my slot i'm also going to cut it so the thin piece falls off of this side of the blade so i don't have to try to cut some super thin piece between the blade and the fence [Music] that is perfect just below the surface just like i wanted okay i'm sure you've seen this before now that you have the runners cut you need to attach them to the sled you just drop a few pennies into the miter slot drop your runners in there put some glue put your sled on top and let it sit that's exactly what we're doing but one thing slightly different this runner is going to be lined up with the back that's normal this one is pushed forward just a little bit about the width of the fence and this is going to make sense later when we attach the fence okay so the runners are dry and the sled is sliding really well that's good that's what we want and a lot of people add screws to hold these in place better i've never had them come loose so i'm just going to leave it with glue and i feel like these kind of get rebuilt every year or so anyways so if these runners stay in place with just glue for a year then i'm happy so next step is we're going to put some grooves right along here on the top to accommodate some t-track and we can use that t-track later for some hold downs to keep our work our work piece in place as we're using this lead so let's do that next need a little more one more path should do it oh shoot still need more just a hair there we go i put it right over the runners so if their screws go a little bit too far they'll go right into the runner and they'll have plenty to bite into time for the vents you can see that i have already installed the t-track on the sled and along the top of the fence and a small block for the front fence initially i'm just going to clamp the fence in place while i drill some holes to attach it this will be my pivot screw which is no different than how most sleds are made i'm using a kreg pocket hole drill bit and crag screws because the bit will automatically make a clearance hole and counter bore in one step and i'm using kreg pocket hole screws because they have a flat washer type head that matches the counter bore perfectly here's where i do things a little differently for the other screw which will be used to lock the fence in place i'm using a much larger clearance hole so the screw has lots of wiggle room i'm also using a washer to ensure it will hold tight remember i said to push that runner up a little bit before gluing it on here's why i'm putting the screw directly in line with the runner which means i don't have to countersink it and it will ride along inside the table saw's miter slot and not rub on anything this allows me to have a lot of room to pivot the fence while i'm getting it aligned with the blade just one screw to adjust no checking for square adding a new screw checking for square again repeating repeating etc see now i have about an eighth of an inch of travel on the fence and just one screw for adjustment once aligned you can throw in a bunch more screws to lock the fence in place for dialing in that perfect 90 degrees i just used a good square in that same feeler gauge there's nothing wrong with the five cut method i've done that before but this method has always worked for me i didn't go super tall on the fence here because pretty much everything i work with is three quarter inch so if i ever have to cross cut something that's taller than this fence there's plenty of other ways to do that i love the size of it it keeps the weight down i didn't want a really big heavy sled so i purposefully made this one smaller than my last one this is my first sled with t-track in it so i'm really excited to get to know that process and using that another thing i like is i put these t-tracks right over the runners which makes it really easy to line this guy up when i just pick it up and i can almost perfectly drop it right on the saw because i know right where those runners are so that's it i hope you enjoyed this video be sure to like and subscribe and check out these other awesome videos right here [Music]

Channel: Maker Beach

Views: 8,923

Keywords: crosscut sled, table saw sled, cross cut sled, table saw, how to, how to build a crosscut sled, cross-cut sled, crosscut sled for table saw, how to make a table saw sled, miter sled, how to make a crosscut sled, how to make a cross cut sled, table saw jig, diy crosscut sled, woodworking cross-cut sled, best table saw sled, woodworking plans, shop project, how to make a cross-cut sled, tablesaw sled, diy table saw sled, cross cut, pocket hole screws, pocket hole

Id: ZhhykcLA2pw

Length: 8min 7sec (487 seconds)

Published: Sat Feb 19 2022