Portable Circular Saw

If I could own only one portable power tool, I’d pick a portable circular saw. It may not be as versatile as an electric drill, and it may make an awful lot of noise, but when it comes to eliminating hours of arm-wrenching labor, a circular saw can’t be beat.

The circular saw is a fairly simple tool, but if you set it up right and use it carefully, it can turn out surprisingly accurate work.

First step is to fit it with a good blade. Most saws come with a cheap, throw-away blade, and that’s what you should do with it. Throw it away. In its place, get a good carbide-tipped blade from a maker like Freud, Forest or Systimatic. In my experience, Freud usually offers the smoothest cut for the money.

Once you have a good blade, your cut quality will increase tremendously. Now to do something about cut accuracy. A portable circular saw should not be used freehand. To make clean, straight cuts, you’ll need to use a guide. For long rip cuts, a straight board clamped to your work at each end will serve nicely. If you do a lot of ripping, you might want to invest in a metal ripping guide, sold at any good hardware or tool outlet.

For making crosscuts and 45-degree miters, you can make a simple guide - like the one in the sketch – that’s cheaper and easier to use than store-bought guides. To make it, cut out a triangle from a scrap of 3/4-inch plywood. Make both arms exactly 12 inches long. This is a useful size, and if both arms are the same length, you’ll have a triangle with one perfect 90-degree corner, and two other corners both exactly 45 degrees.

Next, orient the triangle as shown in the sketch, and glue on a ”fence” of one-by-one pine. Make sure it is dead flush with the edge of the triangle, but don’t worry about the length at this point. Just make sure the fence is long enough so it sticks out past both corners of the triangle about 10 inches. We’ll cut off the excess after the glue dries.

Glue set? You are now ready to make a trial cut. Place the guide on a board as shown in the sketch, with the fence pressed up snug against the edge of the stock. Hold the guide firmly with your left hand. With your right hand, place your saw in cutting position, with the left edge of its sole plate pressed up against the right edge of your guide. Squeeze the trigger and make a cut.

As you make your cut, you will saw off some of the excess fence. In doing so, you have created an automatic offset gauge.

What’s an offset gauge?

Well, if you have ever used a guide before, you know how it goes. You measure your stock, and put a pencil mark where you want to make your cut. Now you put your saw and guide on the board, and slide them around, trying to align the saw blade with your cutoff mark. This can be a real adventure. The blade guard makes it hard to see the blade without leaning way over, and the saw is usually hopping all over as you over-correct first one way and then the next, trying to slide it into perfect position.

Your offset gauge eliminates all this. Now, any time you want to make a crosscut, just measure your stock and put a cutoff mark with a pencil right at the front edge of the board. Plop your saw guide down on the stock, align the end of the fence with this mark and you are ready to saw. It’s that simple.

Once you’ve made your trial crosscut, make a trial miter cut. Flip the guide around so the fence rides the rear edge of your stock. As before, hold the guide with your left hand, and make a cut with your right. But this time, run the base of the saw along the hypotenuse of the triangle.

Again, you’ll saw off some excess fence, and again you’ll create an automatic offset gauge, this one for miters. To use it, measure and mark your miter cut on the rear edge of the stock, align the offset gauge with the mark and saw. It’s that simple.

Two final tips:

Keep your blade clean and it will cut faster, smoother, and with less burning. If pitch and gum begin to cake up around the teeth, take the blade off and clean it with household ammonia. Rinse with hot water and wipe dry.

Periodically rub a coat of paste wax onto the base plate of your saw. This will let it slide more easily over the stock, and give you a better ”feel” of the saw.

Portable Circular Saw

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