I am excited to be back and sharing some great knowledge that I gained recently when Sandra pushed us all out of our comfort zones and challenged us to try a new joinery method! Cutting Lap Joints in Wood Written by Doityourself Staff. I watch very few blogs but this is a great one. All plans are for private use only. Once the measurements are marked, the blade height on the saw can be set. Can’t wait to see you there! Here are a few tips to make an easy half-lap joint: Used technique on very wide deck gate. Although it is my intention to provide accurate plans and clear instructions, not all plans have been tried and tested. Build the jig You can make a simple half-lap joint on your tablesaw with a dado blade, miter-gauge extension, and a workpiece stop. I always struggle with that. Joe is a handy guy, who’s always on the lookout for ways to make the job of home improvement easier and more efficient. You form a biscuit joint between two wooden pieces gluing a wooden disk in adjacent slots. Head on over to my blog for the full tutorial and free printable plans for this Round Pedestal Dining Table! on Jan 27, 2010. When you have your fences ready, you will want to clamp them to your workpiece. Set it to roughly half the thickness of the board. They are cut in such a way so that the pieces are joined without adding height. Alright, with the saw set up and ready to go, cutting can commence! Note: Using a dado blade would be much quicker, but seeing as I didn’t have one, I was still able to make it work! Break out the slivers by hand, or hammer. Once you cut your kerfs into the wood, you can remove them by hand chisel and a hammer to make it easier. Angles can get really tricky, but once you have done the math, ahem…I mean traced the board with the angles you need, it’s pretty simple!! They may take different paths and use different tools to make their final product. This board should be flat and square. Sheesh! But the nature of a circular saw makes it a little more challenging to cut at an angle. Ugh, yeah it’s hard to deal with me sometimes! You have entered an incorrect email address! First, let’s take a bit of a broader look at circular saws before diving into the deep end with these tools. First, let’s. Well, I’ll show you how I cut that as well! This power tool that can perform most kinds of cut, a circular saw is a perfect option. Glue and screws will help hold the boards in place while the edges or shoulders of the joint support the weight. You don’t need to stick with 90-degree angles when you are cutting these joints. In this article, we will be discussing a topic related to the flexibility of woodworking: the circular saw joint. But it will be more challenging with a circular saw than it would be with a table saw. The versatile power circular saw is, ideal for carpenters because of the types of cuts they want to make. In woodworking most people will use for them in their tasks. That is something Sandra has also already taught me, there is a place for pocket holes, but not on every piece of furniture! Using your fences in creative ways can make it easier to cut angled joints as well as straight ones. Well, one of the X’s is just for looks because as much as I wanted to lap and interlock it with this X, my brain couldn’t even begin to figure that out, so the second one looks good but doesn’t add any strength! While you can certainly measure the thickness and divide by half, this can sometimes be impractical and lead to slight error. Here are a few tips to make an easy half-lap joint: Measure the width and thickness of the wood; Mark a square line the same distance from the end of the board as the board is wide; Use a circular saw, with the blade depth set at half the thickness of the board, to cut on that line Hey there Sawdust Girl Friends! An easier method is using a combination square. I then took them out to the table saw and using the lines, I was able to determine the angle! Plus, she is such an inspirational woman (so cliche, but seriously), she truly encourages us to just go for it…fail or win she doesn’t care, she just wants us to give it a shot! Try the half lap joint as the most popular joint type that you can make with a circular saw. There are high powered precision advanced saws made for experienced carpenters. I mean where was their mother?! In situations where two pieces of wood need to be tightly connected at right angles (for example constructing a wooden gate) a half-lap joint is ideal. Later cuts have more space and the slivers as you showed aren’t that strong. With any design you make the model different ways depending on your tools. Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. Try the half lap joint as the most popular joint type that you can make with a circular saw.