I was handed down a 4/1/2 Montgomery Wards Model 15fd250 Jointer. I am
65 so this is old. Works like new, and I use it for hobby to make picture frames. Manual says use rabbeting arm on front table. I have no idea what the arm looks like, or how or where to obtain one. Any help or suggestions would be appreciated. Probably obsolete. Thanks for any reply.
Probably just a ledge to the left of the infeed table, and coplanar to it, just before and perhaps extending beyond the axis of the cutterhead. Usually you have to remove the guard to use it.
Given the age (the tool's, not yours), I'd say the instrument has yet to be devised that can measure the possibility of getting one.
Furthermore, of the 13 known methods of cutting rabbets, 12 are superior to using the jointer.
If you look closely at your jointer you will see a piece of the feed table casting that wraps around the end of the blades on the front side of the jointer. This is known as the rabbeting arm. It serves as a table for your board when you want to cut a rabbet along an edge of the board. To use it you move your fence way over to cover all of the knives except for a small amount of the front end (the width of the rabbet that you want). You pass your board over this remaining area of the knives while holding it up against the fence. When you do this you will see that the board rides on this wrap-around piece of casting. If you keep lowering the feed table in small increments and making passes over the exposed portion of the jointer blades you will cut a rabbet in the board's edge.
This used to be a cabinet maker's preferred way of quickly making a rabbet in the edge of a board, but we seem to have shifted over to router bits and dado blades now. It still works just as good as it always did and I find myself still using it as a method of choice whenever I only want to make a rabbet in the edge of a solid wood board. I don't like the results that it gives on plywood or end grain, so I always do these with a router or dado blade and will likely do the whole project this way if it involves any cross grain rabbets. There are always several ways to do each cut in a woodworking project and this is just another one of them.
Thank you for your reply. Tried this way before and the problem was once the board passed the knives. it would slide under the cut out part of the fence. Any suggestions. Appreciate your time for the reply.
The flat of the board goes against the fence, with the edge down against the rabbet ledge.
Kevin
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