I’m going to be making 100s (probably 1000s actually) of dowel joins soon. Does the space have one of these gadgets?
If we don’t have one, I’ll donate whichever one I end up getting. There are a number of different types out there and I’d appreciate any advice as to which are worthwhile. I’ll be wanting to make corner and T joins, with repeatable alignment from the end of the piece. The one in that picture is selling itself to me with its adjustable side stop…
That style that’s pictured looks good to me!
We only have the cheap ones at the space which could be modded to be more effective…
I just noticed they have it set up wrong in the pic. Material thickness set to 26ish mm but placed on a 12ish mm edge. Have fun drilling those “holes” 
Hi Tom.
What was the outcome of this?
I need to dowel 10 x 1m lenghts of 44mm x 44mm maple either end so keen to hear recommendations.
Thanks
One drawback is that the drill guides don’t go all the way to the surface of the wood. There’s a recess which I think is there to collect chips? Combined with the relatively short guide, there’s enough wiggle room in the flutes of the drill bit to be a mm or so off in any direction.
The guage on the side is not super accurate, so I wouldn’t rely on it to get dowels exactly centered on the end of something. Rather you should just nominate an A and a B side for the joint and make sure the A side always goes into the same corner of the jig. As for alignment in the other axis, it doesn’t have an adjustable stop like the one in the OP. Instead I’d just rest the jig and the edge of the wood on a flat surface before tightening the clamp. Some technique required, but is well behaved in terms of keeping all its moving parts from moving when they’re not supposed to. I have drilled holes for ~170 dowels with it and all the joints went together flush. 7/10 points.
Um thanks for reading my tool review.
It’s definitely an upgrade from the cheap kind, but I feel like there’s probably a much more capable tool out there that makes completely consistent holes with 0.1mm accuracy every time. Probably last made out of a half tonne of cast iron in the 50s and now jealously guarded by elite cabinet makers.
Oh, and the project I bought it for is going to take ages at this rate so if the space wants one, it would be better to buy a new one!
Thanks Tom. Yes I figured that wiggle might be a problem. Anyway good to have this detailed feedback and a link to the product. I will update accordingly with my experiences when the time comes.
