Sliding Picture Frame Cutting Jig

[Willworkfortools]

I FINALLY finished my picture frame cutting jig. The original was designed by Robert Hamon and published in Fine Woodworking circa 2012. Many people have made variations and I “borrowed” various features from David Picciuto, Grant Alexander, Badger Workshop and Michael Alm on YouTube. The one thing I didn’t like was the “tippiness” and back-heaviness of the original. To counter that, I added my own innovation. I built a platen out of 1/2” plywood and then mounted the sled to the platen with a pair of drawer slides that I recessed into the jig. This is very stable. The one potential “drawback” is that, with a 10” blade, the thickness of the platen and the drawer slides allows a maximum of about a 2” molding thickness. For 98% of picture frames, this is not a problem. On the featherboards, I cut the teeth down to the height of the ruler because at full height, it had a tendency to make the molding “roll” off-vertical. It's very accurate and precise and makes it a lot easier to make picture frames, especially if you are making many of the same size. Even for one-off frames, it's a big help because you just measure the artwork, set the stop and go. For those of you who are concerned that the drawer slides might impart instability, that is not the case. I think it is because they are mounted in parallel.