# About the Incra dovetail jig



## Jerry Bowen (Jun 25, 2011)

I'm a new comer to woodworking and this forum. My question has to do with the worth of the Incra dovetail jig. I don't see much about it in the web except what Incra uses to sell the product. I am having pretty good results with it but wonder what experienced woodworkers have to say about it. Did I make a mistake by purclhasing it.

Also since I am new and don't know my way around the forum yet, I don't know where I will find an answer to this question so I am giving you my e-mail address, you may not want to use that to help me but it's worth a try. The address is [email protected]

Thanks,

Jerry


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## Big Steve (Feb 12, 2012)

Try searching on Incra.


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## Jerry Bowen (Jun 25, 2011)

I've read all of Incra's stuff, I was hoping to hear from somebody other than Incra that has an independent opinion of the jig, but thisnks for writing. Jerry


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## Dmeadows (Jun 28, 2011)

Jerry, if all you wanted an Incra for was making standard dovetails, then there are much easier and quicker systems available. But the Incra gives me very accurate ways to many other things as well. I use it as my primary router fence, period. Have used it for about 15 years and have not seriously considered using anything else. I do use auxiliary fences and such with it for certain uses such as raised panels. 
I also occasionally move it to my table saw. I like it's flexibility, accuracy, and relative ease of use once you are familiar with it.


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## Stuck (Feb 3, 2012)

As far as i'm concerened there is nothing more accurate than the Incra. I was a machinist for 30 years, so i kinda know what accurate is. If you just want to make simple dovetails, buy a jig. If you want to make beautiful decrative joints, go with the Incra.
Gary

You can look at my downloads and see the first box i ever made.


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## bobj3 (Jan 17, 2006)

Hi

I have the Incra and many other tool/jigs to put dovetails in place ,the Incra is the last tool I would use ,after all I'm working with wood..many go over the deep end with accurate dovetails the wood is not dead and will move..


==


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## john880 (Aug 18, 2010)

I am a buyer of Incra when they first came out, and have a nasty, nasty inpression of them. BUT their fence will do what they advertise even with my Incra's dinosaur.In my case, it make just a very expensive and a limited router fence.


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## Hsobel (Jan 25, 2012)

I have had incra positioners for almost twenty years. You cannot get a better built or more accurate system but....there is a learning curve and you only get out of it what you put in. In terms of creativity the sky's the limit. If all you want is a quick system to make dovetails buy the MLCS Fast System. If you want more then you won't be sorry you spent the extra money for the Incra. It's up to you. I hope that helps you.


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## Jerry Bowen (Jun 25, 2011)

Thanks for the comment Gary. I bought the jig and other over a year ago and have been doing a lot of practice and havre not actually finished a real project yet, I do have several sort of finished project that I am using in the shop to keep odds and ends in. I have conversed extensiviely with Mark Mueller at Incra and he has a great help. 

So far, you are the only person independent from Incra that has made a comment on the jug. I am not an experienced woodworker or a machinsist, but I do appreciate accuracy. I spent several year in Precision Benchrest Shooting and in that endeavor one swages his own bullets, I am not talking about hand loading which one does too, but making really good bullets requires working in .0001", so I am familiar with the importance of accurcy and like to work with accurate tools. I have found, at least so far believe that it is difficult to cut wood as accuracy as one might cut metal. By that I mean, that with the fence locked on the table saw it is difficult for at least to cut two workpieces that are really the same length. They are fine for wood working, but never are really the same length and will vary by a few thousandths of an inch, certainly now what one would expect when working with metal. 

Thanks again for the reply,

Jerry


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## Jerry Bowen (Jun 25, 2011)

I a

m very happy with the Incra tools and since I have had no experience with anything else I had no way to make comparisons. So far, most of the replys to my question have been positive and encouraging, only one peson seemed to be in happy with Incra, but not necessarily with their tools.

Thanks for taking time to write back to me on this matter.

Jerry


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## Dmeadows (Jun 28, 2011)

Its not so much about adjusting to .001ths as it is absolute repeatability to the nearest 32nd.


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## Jerry Bowen (Jun 25, 2011)

I sure do know about wood not being stable, maybe I need to get rid of my incra jig and go to something simples and less expensive. i may have just wasted my money on the tool. i not trying to be sarcastic, you have pointed out something that I am aware and realize that you are probably right. When I started my quest into woodworking I should have thought about what you reminded me of. I probably will keep the Incra jig since I have it but will keep in mind what you have reminded me of.

Hope you have a good day, and thanks for taking time to reply to me.

Jerry


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## TwoSkies57 (Feb 23, 2009)

Hey Jerry, welcome to the community. Allow me to try and ease your angst regarding the purchase of the Incra system. Long about 3 yrs ago I began putting together a router table. One of the reasons for the table at the time was that I wanted to be able to do dovetails. I wanted em to be crisp, clean and good looking. As with most things I do, I do along of reading and research. When it comes to dovetails (and box joints for that matter) I came to realize that there are a few issues that are hard to argue. First and foremost, you just can't beat handcut dovetails period!!! There is something about doing it yourself with handtools that goes well beyond anything a tool with a plug on the end can make. There are those who will argue that a dovetail is just a dovetail and in many regards they are correct... it comes down to just how ya want to go about it. 

Not having the patience to "learn" how to do em with hand tools only I began looking for a jig.

Secondly, and perhaps at the root of it all is that there are ALOT of ways to make a poor to good joint and only a handfull of ways to make it just right! Even with the best of jigs, if its not properly set up or you use the jig improperly or have bushings that are at fault one way or the other.. or the bit isn't centered....etc, etc. etc...you'll end up with a less that perfect fit. Once I learned how to use my LS17, I have never had a problem with joints not fitting properly..I also have a Porter Cable 4216 and was going nuts trying to figure out why the joints I attempted to make did not fit. Finally I measured the factory bushing and found it to be undersized. I went and got a proper sized bushing and like a miracle, the darn thing worked beautifully. 
You got pins and you got tails and they gotta fit right! Period, no if's ands or butts. and the Incra will do that for you, as well as several others. The thing about Incra that sold me was that its not really a dovetail jig, its a complete fence system with accuracy and repeatability that is hard to argue with. If its just a jig you need, then ya don't need an Incra. If its a high quality, versatile fence that is capable of producing quality joints then you made a excellent purchase. 

Wood movement is something that you need to consider no matter what your doing with wood. Smallish items, boxes and the like have a minimal amount of movement/expansion. Put on a coat of sealer and a finish layer or two and you slow down the movement even more. Expose anything to extremes one way or the other and its a crap shoot as to what will happen. Anything in a captured setting such as drawers, is matter of "sizing" the entire piece into the opening that it is intended for. Wood movement is one of the considerations. Intended environment is another, type of wood used is yet one more. 

I'm starting to rant here, so I'll leave it at that *L* You have one helluva fine 'jig' there, it should serve you well for yrs and yrs to come.


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## billg71 (Mar 25, 2011)

Jerry Bowen said:


> I'm a new comer to woodworking and this forum. My question has to do with the worth of the Incra dovetail jig. I don't see much about it in the web except what Incra uses to sell the product. I am having pretty good results with it but wonder what experienced woodworkers have to say about it. Did I make a mistake by purclhasing it.
> 
> ............


Jerry, if it's giving you good results why would you think you'd made a mistake buying it?

Mine works well, very precise and absolutely repeatable. It does double duty in a custom table with my table saw and router. I have to flip the fence and carriage assy' around to use it on the router table, when I go back to the saw it's just a simple matter of zeroing it again and I'm good to go. I used to check alignment with the miter slot after putting it back but it never changed so I skip that now.

I think back on the days I spent bumping fences, cutting all parts of a width before I moved the fence only to find I should have cut 2 spares and never getting the fence back to just that width again... AAARRGH! With the Incra, you want a 4" rip, set the fence on 4", lock it and rip away. Today, tomorrow, next week, it doesn't matter. 4" is 4", no bumping, squinting or trying to split the line on a cursor. The first thing I did when I got mine installed was attempt Mark's "4+6=10" demo, to my absolute amazement it worked! I was sold, never looked back...

As far as dovetails go, there are other jigs on the market that offer features the Incra doesn't, mainly the Leigh D4R. Continuously variable spacing is a nice thing to have, same for not having to machine your through dovetail material to a thickness that matches the bit. 

While it may be difficult to achieve accuracy to .001" in wood, it's certainly doable. Check out Quillman's site, he's all about getting machine shop accuracy in wood, plastics and aluminum using routers and an assortment of carefully made jigs.

Here's another :sold: on the Incra!

Bill


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## Big Steve (Feb 12, 2012)

Jerry Bowen said:


> I've read all of Incra's stuff, I was hoping to hear from somebody other than Incra that has an independent opinion of the jig, but thisnks for writing. Jerry


Jerry, I was suggesting to search on "Incra" here in the forum. There are several threads with Incra experiences.


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## bruce thom (Apr 2, 2008)

Checkout NickBee's post on his dobledovetail process.
vcery informative.


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## jw2170 (Jan 24, 2008)

Abthom said:


> Checkout NickBee's post on his dobledovetail process.
> vcery informative.


Hi Bruce.

Nick has not been around for a while. Was he one of your "men's group" ?

How is he going. 

He was a master on the incra jig.


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## bruce thom (Apr 2, 2008)

I don't know he posted a nice how to on this forum and I have saved it for info.
very nice job and I hope he is well.


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## john880 (Aug 18, 2010)

In coming back to re-read this post on the Incra jig and then trying to be short on my first answer,,,,I have this desire to Be more specific on why I am at odd with them.

I bought there first anizioned gold aluminum fence system the year they came out with it at the Woodworking Show where I live. That's when they went from a plastic to the metal system. At this show three buddies and I went and three of us out of the four bough a router table micro-adjustment system, it was brand new then. I was the only one to buy the," Incra Jig Ultra" the whole shebang package. My other buddies could not understand (believe) why I picked them over the Jointech. It had many features built in that the Incra did not ~~~built in dust collection // zero clearance insert and the way to install them ( if you use a router fence system of any kind, investigate why the zero clearance inserts is VERY important, and can really help your cut, they are worth it ) // High fence capability // X-Y Stop Block & Fence Scale // a built in adjustable fence off of the aluminum one // at any later date any improvement or fixtures they made, they design it to work with their original fence system that you bought/owned // an opening in that aluminum that was big enough to accept the larger bits ~~Incra's opening is 3/4" X 3/4",,,,,,,on and on.



Well Jointech went out of business, so go figure. But Incra Ultra wasn't so Ultra after all. They realized that their fence system had some BIG flaws. So they came out with a newer improvement fence system, BUT did it adapt ,,*delete* NO !!!! Now I realize that there are going to be improvements . I ask if there was any trade in compensation. but They came back at me saying sorry charlie, but you have to buy a complete new fence system the new design is complete different, and on top of that,, get this (!!!!) ALL (now thats ALL!!!!) of the slide on fixtures that you bought when you paid extra for your/our Delux Ultra. why buddy, the new Ultra we designed every last one of them, why they just wont work,,, so you are going to have to buy every one of them over also. ( It help line their pockets with my cash)

BULLSH,,, *delete*.

Incra Jig Ultra Router System


Now as I stated in my earlier post, the heart of the system it still does a lot of what the new design one does, But you would not believe what I have had to make in additions, to get it to do what that Jointech did in the first place OR what the new model does out of their box. I was a chump, and now a bitter one.

A small side note here;; If any one is thinking about buying a use model of Incra's first, out there somewhere say maybe off of Craigslist, dont !!!!!


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