February 4, 2012

Through Dovetails on the Leigh D4R Pro

 

It is no secret I like working with high quality jigs to make joinery. In the shop I have the Leigh D4R Pro, the older D4, and more recently I have been using the new R9Plus.

More than a few readers have written to me asking whether buying the R9Plus would mean giving up much capability, in exchange for a lower price. My reply is always that we never have easy compromises; yes, we do give up flexibility in joint design. For example, the D4R Pro gives just about everything we want in a dovetail and finger joint jig. You can read all about the D4R Pro features here.

I received the latest video on the flagship D4R Pro from Leigh:

 

 

This is perfect timing, because Leigh is offering FREE shipping during the holidays, on ANY order over $50. This alone will save you a chunk of change.

Disclosure: Leigh sends me equipment and accessories from time to time, for testing and evaluation purposes. I am not paid by Leigh for publishing about their products on my blog; and I am not paid for through clicks to the Leigh web site, so please feel to click on the banner at the top of the page, to visit the Leigh holiday Gift Guide page.

 

Al Navas

 

 

 

All holidays wrapped into one at Leigh

 

I chuckled — Leigh says “We’ve got an app for that!”:

 

And why not? I bought a new smart phone (only) a few months ago, and finally learned about apps. Now even my granddaughters know that I know what an app is.

Leigh has it all set up for YOUR holidays – get YOUR app, and be happy. You will be doing joinery in your shop in no time!!!  How? Simply click on this link to go get your app.

Disclosure: Leigh sometimes sends me jigs and/or accessories for evaluation and testing.

 

Al Navas

 

 

 

Invert the R9Plus joinery jig at the router table

 

A joinery jig that works well both right-side-up, and also upside-down, is a huge plus. I have already shown the Leigh R9Plus “right-side-up”. It worked great. But I was curious about the upside-down configuration, on the router table. I was in for a surprise, as it is a breeze to use this way, although it took me a bit to get used to feeding the jig into the router bit. How is that for a total newbie?

A huge plus of doing the joinery using this jig on the router table is dust collection (DC). I was pleasantly surprised, as nearly 100% of the dust and chips were taken by the DC system I have on the old router table. I just wish I could use this jig on the Laguna cast iron router table. But, without the proper insert, it is impossible to use the eBush designed to work with the R9Plus. I will follow up with the people at Laguna Tools, to see if it is possible to machine some inserts to use on their router table, and I will my readers know.

Here we go: the R9Plus on the router table, as I get to know it in this configuration. What do you think?

My personal opinion: This will be terrific, especially for very large work pieces, as it becomes trivial to make sure the work piece IS flush under the template. Or, should that be ON the template?

Stability: Used upside-down, the wide template rides on the surface of the router table, stabilizing the work piece. I must try this with a very large and wide board. I will report results.

I love it!

 

 

Disclosure: Leigh sends me jigs on occasion, for testing and evaluation.

Al Navas

 

 

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