[irbyka76]

I just purchased this saw and so far, I love it. I do have one question and would love some input. The saw comes with the built-in miter sled and I'm not a big fan of the miter gauge that attaches to it, it's clunky and I doubt its accuracy.

I was curious if anyone had tried to build a more traditional miter jig for this saw. This is a tough because the sled is a part of the tablesaw's surface and there are no true miter gauge slots for a miter jig to run in. Unfortunately, googling it produces nothing as it only takes you to sites with info about the saw itself since "miter sled" is a spec of the product.

I am thinking about modifying/removing the sled and possibly building a new top into that space with a miter slot. Curious if anyone had any better ideas? My planned projects to this point are boxes and picture frames where a true miter jig would help ensure good fits since the provided gauge is questionable. I included a stock photo and can take pics later to better illustrate. All ideas welcome.

Thanks,

 

[FrankC]

Seems to me most people are replacing miter gauges with sleds, why the step backward? I could see possibly tweaking it to gain accuracy if that is necessary.

 

[irbyka76]

Yea, maybe I'm reverting a bit here. I'll focus on ways to improve accuracy with what I've got.

The only other thing I dislike about the sled is it is slightly higher than the adjacent, non-moving part of the table surface. So far not enough to make a big difference if you are conscious of it but another thing to have to be conscious of lol.

Thanks for the input and keep em coming.

 

[jschaben]

Yea, maybe I'm reverting a bit here. I'll focus on ways to improve accuracy with what I've got.

The only other thing I dislike about the sled is it is slightly higher than the adjacent, non-moving part of the table surface. So far not enough to make a big difference if you are conscious of it but another thing to have to be conscious of lol.

Thanks for the input and keep em coming.

That saw looks like the BTS21 that I had. I think Ryobi was/is still trying to capitalize on the success of the Ryobi BT3000, which used a sliding table very successfully, without the precision, read expense, that was invested in the 3000. The sliding table didn't sit flush on mine either and attaching the crosscut sled I built was a study in Rube Goldberg methodology. I gave up on the thing in less than a year and sold it off for about 1/2 what I paid and bought a Ridgid 4510. Sorry I can't be more positive about the thing, I really did want to like it.:thumbdown: