Illustration

Sometimes the most effective method for communicating technical information is a quick drawing on a whiteboard.

A number of years ago, I acquired a Craftsman tablesaw from the 1930s:

Although it was somewhat the worse for wear:

I installed a modern rip fence, table extensions, and an outfeed table:

I’ve been meaning to write up my experience adapting a new fence to this ancient saw, but I’ve been stymied by the problem of how to illustrate the story.

I wanted to avoid the time-consuming work of creating a parametric representation of my work (Sketchup or OnShape), and I was interested in a more informal look, so I tried creating sketches on my ReMarkable 2 tablet.

My modern fence (a Delta T3 Biesemeyer-style fence) is based on a heavy L-section bracket secured to the front face of the saw table. The main beam is then bolted to this bracket. Unfortunately, the table on my old saw wasn’t thick enough to provide for a vertical face to which to secure the bracket:

The saw did have three threaded mounting holes on the underside of the front edge of the table. I used these holes to mount a 1x1 steel tube to the bottom:

With the tube mounted, now there was a surface tall enough to support the bracket…

…making it straightforward to mount the bracket: