Re: cheap alternative for kitchen worktop jig?

I did a worktop using this method with a jigsaw and a fine blade.

For the "receptive" half of the join I carefully marked out the main cut and the intersecting 45" cut - made the intersecting short cut first then the main one. (cut from the underside of the worktop unless you have a down cut blade for the jigsaw). Then simply cut the matching corner of the end of the other half. Finally I routed a 1/4" slot into the mating ends of the worktop - added wood glue and hammered in a wooden lath (a long biscuit if you like). Fitted the first half of the worktop in place and then tapped the mating part of worktop into place using a club hammer and a bit of scrap softwood to protect the end of the worktop. The join was not as "perfect" as you will get with the template - but a good deal less unsightly that those nasty joining strips!

Reply to
John Rumm
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I would have thought the trick is to make one of the 45 deg cuts, and then place the uncut bit into position in the corner and lay the cut bit in position but on top of it, and use it to mark the exact cut angle needed. This should automatically take into account any variation intruduced by the corner not being perfectly square.

Reply to
John Rumm

That won't work. If you did that and the corner wasn't 90 degrees, the front edge won't meet up properly. If you do do a mitre right across, the two pieces have to have the same angle.

Reply to
John Armstrong

Depends on how far of square it is I suppose - a couple of degrees is not going to make that much difference in the slant length of the cut. Also any small discrepancy can be positioned at the back against the wall where it will normally be obscured by the worktop to wall seal.

Reply to
John Rumm

You are technically correct. However a small discrepancy with the angle on one side would most probably not cause a noteworthy problem. The biggest issue here would be at the back edge of the worktop where the two corner pieces meet - one would be longer than the other causing a slight overhang - but as the rear edge of worktops is invariably covered by tiling and similar wall covering that's not normally a big problem to hide.

I recently acquired a 650mm Screwfix worktop jig. The thing I noted fairly quickly was that it takes a little care to align the plastic pins to the workpiece - if you apply pressure to the alignment then the angle could change very, very slightly. I guess I was a bit surprised that the alignment wasn't more precise in that respect.

I don't see that as a fault of the jig, most likely more of a feature to enable you to offset the angle very slightly in the event you might want to do so, to take account of angles between walls which aren't precisely 90 degrees (and let's face it, few are).

PoP

Reply to
PoP

I am used to dealing with my house which definitely isn't square :-) One corner of my kitchen is around 5 degrees out of square, which if you cut one of the bits of worktop with a straight 45deg cut would have that diagonal cut 65mm longer than the other. If it was 2 degrees out the difference woud still be 28mm.

Reply to
John Armstrong

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