Shopsmith cross cut sled

[jsburger]

The Incra sleds are more for precision work and not necessarily designed for cutting large or wide stock. I use one of the 5000's which I really like for certain cuts. For cutting wide sheet material for instance it would not do well. Better off making your own sled. For the SS you would probably need an outfield table and maybe even an infeed support. Dusty has posted an outfield table design that would work very well. Making your own sleds is not difficult and worth perfecting. There are lots of youtube videos on the subject. Making your own will allow you to make several for specific purposes such as miter cuts, mortising etc.
Paul

You are absolutely correct. To get any more crosscut width than the Incra or the SS crosscut sleds you need some kind of In/Out feed support. I have the standard SS crosscut sled and it works very well. At one point I needed more capacity so this is what I built. I don't have a chop saw or radial arm saw so the sled is used all the tome to crosscut all kinds of stock.

Yes, it is probably a bit of overkill but it works great ad I use it all the time.

[algale]

I said it before but I will say it again, I love that sled!

[jsburger]

I said it before but I will say it again, I love that sled!

Thanks so much. You can see my 45 degree sled against the wall. I use it on the same frame. 8/4 X 8"X 14' hard maple is no problem. As is any size of cabinet doors when trimming the stiles off the ends of the doors.

[algale]

I like that your sled design solves the infeed problem for a large sled. I am debating whether the frame you made needs to be as tall as it is with so much of it below the extension tubes. Did you consider a design that would allow it to be dropped over the extension tubes (rather than feeding the tubes through it)?

Also I take it you never make bevel cuts on it?

[masonsailor2]

That is a great solution for a sliding table John. There is no such thing as overkill ! The day you build a jig is the day you discover its limitations. Are you using just the miter slots for guides or does the frame act as guides for the sled also ?
Paul

[jsburger]

I like that your sled design solves the infeed problem for a large sled. I am debating whether the frame you made needs to be as tall as it is with so much of it below the extension tubes. Did you consider a design that would allow it to be dropped over the extension tubes (rather than feeding the tubes through it)?

Also I take it you never make bevel cuts on it?

The frame probably doesn't need to be as tall as I made it. My guess is I had a piece of maple around 7" wide so I just cut it in half. The only really critical dimension is to make sure top of the frame is level with the tables.

I did not consider a drop on design. My only concern would be that the whole thing would rotate off the way tube on the out feed side when the sled had material on it and was pulled all the way to the in feed side. One could certainly fashion some kind of clamp to hold the frame once it is dropped over the connector tubes. As it is it is not hard to install. I can do it by myself.

No bevel cuts with this sled since it uses a fixed table at both ends for support. Besides I also have a Powermatic PM2000 table saw in the shop so that does all the bevel cuts.

[jsburger]

That is a great solution for a sliding table John. There is no such thing as overkill ! The day you build a jig is the day you discover its limitations. Are you using just the miter slots for guides or does the frame act as guides for the sled also ?
Paul

That is my philosophy too.

I use just the miter slots. The frame is just for support. The miter bars on the bottom of the sled are made from quarter sawn hard maple. The miter bars also act as a stop so you can't push the sled too far and cut through the in feed side. If you look closely at the picture, the first frame cross member on the out feed side has notches cut in it to clear the miter bars. The second one does not. The miter bars stick past the out feed side of the sled enough so they hit the second cross member when the blade is just short of half way through the fence on the in feed side.