Scott,

* Scott Murman <smurman@s...> wrote: 
> so what is the advantage here over using a tail vise with bench dogs?
> rigs that leave the board free to jump off the table drive me nuts
> personally, and both of these would.

If you're planing thin stock a vise / bench dog setup can flex the board
in ways that prevent you from planing it flat.  I've found that the
problem you describe becomes less and less of an issue with practice,
although it is sometimes challenging to control the want of a board to
twist out of the way unless you have some sort of stop to prevent it.

                         ++ <--- additional stop
    ++                   ++   
    ||+---------------------+
    ||| board to plane      |
    ||+---------------------+
    ++

I seem to recall either Frank Klauz or Ian Kirby advocating the use
of a single planing stop even for things that most people would clamp
in a front vise (like edge jointing) because he claimed you'd be more
likely to get a perpendicular face if you were disciplined enough to
be successful at planing the edge with the board upright and supported
only by a stop.  Probably in The Workbench Book somewhere.  Never really
worked for me.

I can say that once I got used to my stop (which is just a 1 x 6 thrust
through the bench and held in place with two bolts) I very rarely ever
use my tail vice and bench dogs for anything other than holding my SS
apparatus.

Chris
-- 
Christopher S. Swingley          www.frontier.iarc.uaf.edu/~cswingle
Computer Systems Manager         cswingle@i...
University of Alaska Fairbanks

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