Review biscuit joiners

Need to buy biscuit joiner for several projects, and would like to know which to buy.......

Reply to
cheapdave
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If you can afford it, Lamello. Otherwise, Porter Cable, next is DeWalt. Avoid the real cheap ones as they are not as accurate.

Reply to
Ed Pawlowski

Lamello, save your $.

Reply to
Phisherman

Don't bother. Dowels are far better, and the equipment cost is minimal.

Joe

Reply to
Joe

And a butt joint is faster. Dowels are fussy about exact location, biscuits have some play in one direction. Biscuits are perfect for attaching trim without nails, panel glueups, fast joinery. Not as strong as mortise-and-tenon or dowels.

A lot of biscuit jointers' dust bag gets clogged and you end up removing the bag and letting the sawdust fly. Dust hookups can be clumsy with hand power tools. I have a cheap Skil biscuit joiner, it does the job, lasted 20 years and still going. It requires an allen wrench to adjust the plastic-nylon fence, and the fence does not tilt.

Reply to
Phisherman

Don't bother. Dowels are far better, and the equipment cost is minimal.

Joe

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But dowels can be such a PITA to align.

Reply to
Ed Pawlowski

Right. But you can get dowel markers - little brass inserts with a pointy-nipple. You drill the first hole, insert the dowel marker, and press the two pieces together. The dowel marker leaves an impression on the second piece where the center of the second hole should go.

Reply to
HeyBub

Check out the dowel alignment jigs at Woodworkers Supply, among others. They have one model at around $42 that does both boards at once. Looks to me like a totally painless way to get perfect alignment, possibly better than a biscuit rig. My personal set up involves an alignment jig with bushings and if I remember to mark both boards real carefully, everything lines up just fine. I also use my ShopSmith set up for horizontal drilling to get quite precise surface matches on fussier projects. So far, I can't see much reason to invest in a biscuit joiner, but its good to keep an open mind and use whatever material/tool does the best job. They might some day get biscuits as sturdy as oak dowels, so we'll see.

Joe

Reply to
Joe

Joe

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I've tried a couple of things, but they can still be a PITA. If you get them marked perfectly but still drill at even a slight angle, they don't fit properly. The oak dowel may be stronger, but the biscuits have been plenty strong enough and easier to use. Since I have the DeWalt jointer I don't see any reason to spend another $20 to use dowels.

Reply to
Ed Pawlowski

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