I did SO Google Dado blades!

[Swingman]

The Freud dial set is not a wobble set and leaves a flat bottom. Quick setup, easy repeatability, and not having to futz with shims, is well worth the money if you cut a lot of dadoes.

[B A R R Y]

Doing it right in the least amount of time is absolutely required when profit is involved.

Personally, I think those "dado cleanup" router bits are a tad silly for the following reasons:

1. On plywood, any good dado set, including the mid-line Freud, leaves a dado bottom that's flat enough for casework.
2. On solid stock, a shoulder plane can clean a lot of ridges before the router can get set up and plugged in.
3. The biggest reason? You can simply cut the darn thing with a router from the get-go, if that's what's required!

[CW]

This is NOT a woblier. Different deal entirely.

[CW]

$200.00 for a dado blade or several thousand for a CNC. Hard choice.

[Leon]

It dies not wobble. The outer adjustable blade has wider teeth that overlap the chipper blade. When it is dialed and cuts slightly wider, the overlap of the outer wider teeth is less. When cutting narrower, the overlap is greater. All blades rotate in a plane perpendicular to the arbor. The adjustment dial works like an adjustable width shim.

[boorite]

If it's "nonsense," then it's nonsense that Woodsmith (for example) saw fit to print (Feb. 2004, p. 10. "All About: Getting a Flat-Bottom Dado.") Their advice: "Combine the table saw and a hand-held router to get clean, perfect dadoes." I find similar advice all over the place.

If you have a different preference, then OK. But it's a tried and tested idea, not "nonsense."

Too much bluster here.

[CW]

Good advice for the guy that has a cheap dado set but, if I were doing this for a living, I would not have a cheap dado set. The time it takes to do it twice is not worth the savings on the blade. BTW, just because it is written doesn't make it right.

[B A R R Y]

That's because "Woodsmith" is often full of nonsense.

[boorite]

It may not be right, or, more aptly, one might have a different preference. But if it's widely advocated by professionals, it probably rises slightly above the level of sheer nonsense. Perhaps there is a tendency to overstate one's case on the internet.

I totally agree that if I were doing this for a living, I'd get a Forrest stack. In that case, $240 really is pocket change.

On the other hand, if I were visiting an in-law who had half a mind to slap a bookcase together, and I'd somehow forgot to bring my entire shop, I'd probably stack 3 circ saw blades on the TS and clean up the resulting mess with a router bit, and it would look great. And the poster did ask about el cheapo solutions that would actually work.

There's more than one way to get things done. Too often, what I hear on RW is that the only way is to spend top dollar on a certain brand, and any other way is simply dismissed as absurd. It's one of the reasons I'm not a frequent poster.

[boorite]

The pictures are nice.

[B A R R Y]

Why not just rout it and skip the table saw altogether?

[CW]

Yep. only reason I could see for doing it twice would be to fix a screw up.

[Leon]

Most pro's don't change a fast way to a slower way because WoodSmith shows a novice how to achieve good results with cheaper tools.

[Wayne K]

">> And how do you handle the slightly convex curve left at the bottom of the

Exactly- Bottoms are plenty flat. I tried a adjustable twin blade years ago. What a exercise in frustration. When Freud came out with thier adjustable, I couldn't wait for the ww show to see it in action. I questioned the demonstrater and he answered all my questions while showing me how on the saw with the blade on the saw. Bought one right there and have not regretted the extra dollars. BTW-I was in the market for a new set and was ready to spend a couple hundred dollars on the last set I would ever buy. This one fit the bill perfectly.

[boorite]

Faster and easier to set up and rough out and repeat on the TS, I think. You don't have to make a jig and set it up for each cut.

Everyone's talking about how much extra time the cleanout bit would take. What, like 5 minutes for an entire piece's worth of dados? If that. It's a piloted bit.

Whatever.

[Pat Barber]

Freud is still the best in my opinion...

have two sets... a 8" and a 10" and they are very nice.

The dial up model does appeal to me very much...

Robatoy wrote:

[Patriarch]

"CW" wrote in news:grWKg.6227$ [e-mail]:

If you look at it that way, no.

"Several thousand for a CNC" vs $200 for a dado blade, and $1700 for a Unisaw makes the economics a little closer.

If that's the way one justifies tooling costs, at least.

Patriarch

[Rick M]

Well stated. While a CNC router is not the "only tool you'll ever need", it sure does some jobs much better (go ahead and ask me!). Rob has been looking at CNC routers for some time now ... and I was just reminding him that this was yet another job that might be better done (expecially in volume) with a CNC router.

Regards,

Rick

[CW]

If you've got the work for them, they are the way to go (we have six). I was under the impression that he was more of a hobbyist. Don't know why I thought that other than that is mostly what makes up this group.

[boorite]