Well Stocked Shop Multi-Marker If you’re constantly resetting your gauge to a single measurement, a 3-in-1 Brass Wheel Marking Gauge second gauge, like Lee Valley’s brass Marking Gauge #153490, $15.99 05N65.01, $24.50 3-in-1 gauge, may solve the problem. leevalley.com This gauge sports a head that you Marking and can outfit with a pin, knife, or blade, so you can select the cutter best suited to the task at hand. Cutting Gauges What I like best about this tool is its size. More than one way to make your mark woods. Filing a flat on one side of Like a 4" square, the pin can correct the tendency the compact gauge By Jeff Day to tear out, but your best bet is to fits neatly into my cuttingpartner gauge it with a cutting gauge. apron pocket so it’s With a knife-edged marker, a always in easy reach. Marking and excels at making M cutting gauges crisp, clean lines across the any years ago when I A pin-headed gauge is good grain. Compared to a pin- began tooling up my shop, I for establishing lines parallel scratched line, the cutline helps quickly discovered how much One of my first purchases to the grain, such as you’d need prevent splintering and tear- I could accomplish with basic was the markingonly member gauge of the when laying out hinges, grooves out, a handy attribute when hand tools. Though many were gauge family that is technically for drawer bottoms, rabbets, or chiseling dovetails at their antiques, it wasn’t long before called a due to the thickness of a board when baseline. This line also offers they earned their keep and made its use of a pin-style marker. preparing stock by hand. In a tactile edge for registering my all-time favorites list. Among Before the commercial models a pinch, you can also use it to a chisel or saw blade in the Veritas Dual Marking Gauge them were marking and cutting entered the scene, woodworkers scribe metal. However, the pin- scribed line prior to cutting. #153362, $59.99 gauges like those featured here. and carpenters would often shaped tip isn’t perfect; it leaves Unfortunately, super-sharpness Consisting of a bar, a fence, fashion their own gauges from a fuzzy line when scoring across isn’t an advantage when and a marker, this simple tool scrapwood and finish nails. the grain and often gouges softer marking with the grain. Often, is much more than the sum of the wood will close up behind its parts. A gauge makes laying your cut and hide the line. For out a one-handed operation. Wheeledthis, you’ll want gauges to use a pin. Marking and cutting gauges wheeled are useful for everything from gauge preparing stock (establishing The cutting wheel of a Marking Gauge thickness and width), to #153558, $19.99 can serve in place of a joinery (laying out dovetails, pin or knife. Unlike a pin, the mortises, and tenons). wheel cuts equally well both Although I’ve known some with and across the grain. The Mortising Gauge woodworkers who can get resulting line isn’t quite as thin #145464, $53.99 by with just one gauge, I’ve as a cutting gauge line, but is found that one is not enough. thick enough to see even when Marking and cutting gauges marking with the grain. I find may appear identical, but that the bevel-edged wheel they’re not. Each excels draws the gauge’s locking fence Mortising gauges in specific applications. tight against the stock. (For Considering the seamless joinery, position the the gauge to scribe a line, you small investment, fence so that the wheel’s bevel can use this tool to measure the While you can employ any of the Cutting Gauge it makes sense to #145465, $38.50 faces the waste side of your cut.) depth of a drill hole or mortise. gauges mentioned above to lay own a few so you Wheeled gauges often have Simply drop the bar into the out mortise-and-tenon joints, if Featured products available from always have the Woodcraft Supply unless otherwise noted. measurement lines printed on opening until the cutter touches you plan to do a lot of handwork, right68 woodcraftmagazine.comtool in hand. Oct/Nov 2012 thePhotos: bar. Larry In Hamel-Lambert addition to setting the bottom of the cavity. Oct/Novconsider 2012 woodcraftmagazine.com adding one more gauge 69 Mortising gauges to your assortment. Instead of relying on the corresponding tenons have two markers, saving dimensions, set the pins to with the same setting. time and avoiding the correspond with your chisel, Remember to keep the fence mistakes that come from router bit, or drill bit, and along the “best” face of nyour constantly resetting a then lay out your mortises in stock to ensure that the single-marker gauge. one pass. You can also lay out joint members line up. Controlled curves At times, woodworking that the curves are even, and consistent radii. To convert this requires a few curves. the groove sides are parallel. gauge into “compass mode,” Whether you’re rounding Sure, you can use a carpenter’s simply flip the fence so that the a corner, or building a part gauge like a standard gauge, pin end points down. Use the for a jig or fixture that must but it really shines when you measurements on the bar to pivot or tilt, it’s important want perfect curves with ensure that your radii are spot on.

Veritas Carpenter’s Gauge 05N36.01, $23.50, leevalley.com

70 woodcraftmagazine.com Oct/Nov 2012