ProGrip Guide Clamp or other bandsaw fence options?

[Jensmith]

My Dad picked up a very old but little used Multico BS35 14" bandsaw (from the 1970's) for me a few weeks ago and currently I've been using a 3 x 2 strip of wood for a fence.
It's not ideal though and very fiddly to adjust.

I saw the pro grip guide clamp and wondered if this will fit my bandsaw table.
It's possibly slightly long though as I think my table is 18" square which could be a problem. The shortest is 24" long.

If that's no good does anyone know of any other fences that might fit?

It's a cast iron table and it has a metal rectangular solid bar welded onto the table, about 1" away from the table edge which I assume would have been for a fence.
It length extends about half way along the table.

See pic (before it was cleaned up):

http://flic.kr/p/8GATrC

 

[Routermonster]

A 24 inch Progrip clamp guide should fit, as the locking bar is adjustable over its full length - you'll just have a 6 inch overhang on one side. You may find that it fouls the existing fence bar in some positions, and so may need to remove the bar.

Otherwise, the Progrip grips well and is very useful.

Hope I'm not stating the obvious!

HTH

Les

 

[Carlow52]

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0..._m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_r=06Q9EZHGJM5XB9J8P8SQ

shows fence and clamp in one unit

 

[Jensmith]

Thanks!

Do you know if you can use the T slots to fit your own fence?

 

[Mike.C]

This one from Axminster is pretty good

http://www.axminster.co.uk/axminster-ax ... rod362802/

Cheers

Mike

 

[OPJ]

In the new issue of British Woodworking, Nick Gibbs has fitted one of the Axminster fences (as Mike has linked to) to his Record Power BS350 bandsaw as an upgrade to the Pro-Grip system. It's dead easy to fit (drill two holes two mount the rail and you can then adjust the fence either way to compensate for the 'drift' angle).

I know that Bob (9fingers) also has one of these fitted to his Startrite saw and it looked very sturdy and reliable. He was also impressed with it.

 

[Jensmith]

Thanks. The thing is, it's a bit more than I wanted to spend and how do you drill into cast iron?

 

[OPJ]

Cast iron can be drilled quite easily using an ordinary cobalt drill bit. Some may advise you to use HSS but, I find that cobalt drills cut much faster. You may find it also helps to 'punch' a starting point or similar, so that the drill cannot wander away. Also, some kind of lubricant would help - WD40 seems to work well; no need to buy anything in particular for a one-off job.

 

[Jensmith]

Thanks Olly.

I'll decide how much I want to spend and go from there.

 

[Steve Maskery]

If you don't want to spend much money but do have plenty of time, you can make up the fence from FWW. It is featured in one of the Taunton books, but I can't remember which and I've lost the link. But if you do find it, you can read that article for free as part of the "see more inside" option. I can't find the link, unfortunately, but the article would date from the early/mid 90's. I made it up for my first tablesaw and it was excellent. It uses a piece of box section steel and a toggle clamp and is absolutely rock solid.

You could, of course, build my fine-adjust rip fence to go on top of it, too, if you were so inclined! It, too, is excellent, EIIDSSM.

Cheers
Steve

 

[Jensmith]

Hi Steve,

Thanks

What is FWW?

I did get your bandsaw DVD with the fine adjustment fence and it looked great, especially as I'm doing 1/12th scale work.
The only problem is I'll have to borrow a router to cut the grooves, unless there's another way to do it?