Kreg Precision Bandsaw Fence

I recently received a Kreg Precision Bandsaw Fence from Woodworker's Supply in response to a suggestion I made for their “Solve-A-Woodworking-Problem” contest. The suggestion I made is not that important, and barely made the cut (of the 50 prizes awarded, I fell into the group numbered 46-50), but I must say I was surprised and delighted with the “award”. I couldn't recall seeing many user comments on this new “tool”, so I figured I'd take a few notes while installing it and make my observations available to the world. Not that the world was looking for them, but available nonetheless….

I had seen the Kreg fence advertised for a while, and had actually looked fairly closely at it as a possible future purchase. According to their website, the fine folks at Kreg Tools® teamed up with power tool guru Mark Duginski to design a fence with an "unprecedented level of rigidity, adjustability, and precision” . The jury is still out on the long term, but I can say I think they've come pretty darn close to their goal.

I mounted the fence on a Delta 14” bandsaw, model 28-206. I had considered their (Delta) fence, as well, but the arrival of this freebie made the whole decision process moot.

The fence came well packaged and complete with all the required hardware. It even had two sets of mounting bolts for use depending on your brand of saw (Delta or Jet, Craftsman, Ridgid, and Import Mount), as well as an extra set of small, nylon setscrews. All of the components felt beefy and the fit & finish was excellent. The instructions were well written, and provided plenty of information about how, and why, certain items were designed the way they were. And while installation is pretty straightforward, the instructions also included several tips to make the installation easier. Although, there are a couple of tips I will add as we go along….

The fence is designed for use without interfering with the use of the miter gage. To do this, the mounting rail must be installed just below the bottom of the miter gage slot. On the Delta, the slot is just a hair over 3/8” deep, so I set the mounting rail 7/16” below the top of the table. The use of a combination square or adjustable double sided square works very well for this. There was a tip that recommended threading the mounting bolts by hand, before attaching the rail , into the mounting holes to clear any debris that may have accumulated. I second that recommendation as mine did show some buildup. I was surprised, though, that cleaning of the table mounting surfaces was not mentioned. It's not a big deal, but it is something that should be checked before installing the rail. The instructions also did not specify how tight to make the mounting bolts, so I just used my calibrated hand to apply what I thought to be the appropriate amount of German Torque (i.e. “gudentite”, pronounced with the appropriate German accent).

Next came the assembly of the clamping block. I was a little concerned with the sequence. The first step was to insert the lens curser into the block. For those of you, like me, with the nimble fingers of a Moose, the prospect of dropping the block is nearly inevitable. Once gravity overcomes your grip, O'Toole's Law takes over (O'Toole thought Murphy was an optimist…) and the block will hit the first available hard surface, directly on the plastic lens. There are no obstacles that would prevent inserting the lens last, so I saved this step ‘til the end. If you felt the need, you wouldn't have to insert the lens curser all the way in to the clamping block before tightening. This will allow for a bit more adjustability of the fence in relation to the blade.

A couple steps further down, the procedure covers adding the adapter bracket to the block. The two holes drilled in the adapter for this purpose are not the same size. The back one is slightly larger to allow for adjusting the fence parallel to the blade. It is important to get the adapter square to the block during this step before tightening. This will save some heartache a little later in the procedure…..

Attaching the fence to the adapter/clamp block assy. is a piece of cake, and probably the most intuitive design feature of this fence. The open top slot design allows for amazingly simple removal, installation and adjustment of the fence. Absolutely brilliant!!

The fence can also be rotated for low profile applications when cutting thinner stock. Rotating the fence allows the upper blade guide to be lowered to the proper height when cutting thinner stock.

The next step was attaching the tape to the mounting rail. To do this you slide the fence up against the blade, without deflecting it. This wasn't mentioned, but tighten the lockdown knob at this point. (This is where ensuring that the adapter is square to the clamp block becomes important.) I also lowered the upper blade guide assembly down to just clear the fence before locking it down. With the fence against the blade, and secured, a pencil mark is made on the mounting rail “above and below” the red line on the lens curser. I wasn't quite sure where the “above and below” was they were talking about (and the picture in the manual didn't seem to help), so I made a mark on the raised edge of the tape groove and then, using my small square, carried the mark to the opposite side. I should mention here, again, that there is no mention in the instructions to clean the groove before applying the tape. I noticed several smudges from my grubby hands in the groove from handling the mounting rail that could possibly interfere with the tape sticking to the rail. Cleaning should actually be done before you even begin this step as it prevents the possibility of removing your marks. Installing the tape in the groove is simple enough at this point, albeit a bit unruly (no pun intended). The tape they provide is 4' long. I ended up cutting mine at 20 ¼”.

In the event the “zero” of the tape is not aligned with the blade, you can adjust the lens curser “in” or ”out” of the clamp block to make the correction.

You can now make the adjustments for parallelism and blade drift. If your table is already perpendicular to the blade, parallelism adjustments shouldn't be necessary, but it should be verified.

While the instructions do not discuss it, it has been my experience that blade drift will vary slightly depending on the width & sharpness of the blade used, proper blade tension, feedrate and the material being cut. It is also my experience that a properly adjusted upper blade guide (where the guide is set within ~1/2” of the material surface) will greatly reduce the amount of blade drift. I don't know about you guys, but I tend to change blades regularly to suit my needs. If the saw is set up correctly, any drift should remain fairly consistent. So I left the fence set parallel to the blade. I did review the procedure in the instructions, however, and will make any adjustments in the future, as required.

Installing the fence was simple and easy. The whole process took, maybe, half an hour. With the exceptions noted, the instructions were very clear and helpful. The available accessories were not covered because I didn't receive them.

Okay, I've covered the installation, now lets move on to using the darn thing….

I must admit that the reason I was not in any hurry to buy a fence is that most of the cutting I do on the bandsaw is curves, tapers or short cutoffs. The resawing I've done has been done using a shopmade guide block. The need for a fence has never been a necessity that couldn't be overcome by clamping a straightedge to the table. Now that I have it, I'm certain it will get used.

Setting the fence to the desired width is simple and quick, although it will take a little time, and practice, to get used to how far to loosen the lock knob for easiest alignment. If the knob is too loose, the fence will “rack”, which throws off the clamp block/tape alignment. Those of you who have ever used a Biesmeyer-type tablesaw fence will know what I mean. Kreg does offer a Precision Micro-Adjuster, as an accessory, to dial in the fence adjustments. And while I don't think it's a necessity, I can see where it might be useful.

I didn't run a lot of wood through the bandsaw after installing the fence, but what I did went through smoothly, without binding. I cut several pieces of ¾ oak at, several widths, with very satisfactory results. It will take a lot more experience with the fence for me to get a good feel for it. But my initial reactions are quite positive. And I even like the color!