Hadn’t run a table saw on a regular basis in most of thirty years. Still, with the larger pieces being cut, it was a two-person job - one person pushing the wood in, keeping it against the guide, the other holding the pieces as they came out, keeping them level and the gap even. Otherwise, the outgoing wood would fall and twist, putting the saw into a bind, maybe bending the blade. That might be what’s going on here…
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I would think that would help. A zero-gap throat plate is also useful for thin wood.
Updated:
First and foremost, thanks for all the tips! Many of them went into application today.
Second, after hitting the timbers with a sanding block last night, I decided to proceed with the bits I cut. I find it helpful to pose my 1:24 crew, as it forces me to slow down and think. The picture below shows the (rotten) fruits of last week’s labor:
I sorted them for relative uniformity. The bottom timbers only needed to be evened out. The middle set were alternatively straight, but, as the inspector on the right shows, that end can serve as end beams. The last beam, which was wrong in every way, was sold to X Legio.
Kid-zilla tottered out to help align our beams…
…before deciding to leave me to do battle with Table Saw alone with the 1:24 gang.
While the results won’t get me an apprenticeship as a fine cabinet maker anytime soon, they were good enough to proceed.
As the Triple O wastes nothing, I decided to see what I could salvage from these timbers. There was enough to make at least the chassis for another cane car chassis (I have an idea for a water car for the field workers). There were also enough useful bits to make a second car of this design,
As Table Saw was out enjoying all of this, I decided to engage in the ancient art of “practice” on the remains of a once proud pine plank. A butchered plank is of no value. A plank rendered into 12" long 1/2"x1/2" (ish) strips might at least inspire an idea. I did apply some of the tips above, cutting the plank into 12’ lengths first and using a wedge to hold the cuts open. The results, while still not a step towards fine cabinetry, are below in all their inglorious “beauty.”
Someone will need these…For what, I’ve no idea. Hopefully, nothing that requires clean cuts and equal-length timbers!
At this point, I invited Kid-zilla to help me actually start building his crane car. He applied the Titebond III…
…and we clamped the whole center bit together. Tomorrow, time permitting, we’ll clue on the end beams and stringers. I bought an electric pin nailer last year to rebuild my father-in-law’s buildings, then ended up not needing it. It’s time to try it out. Let’s see if this becomes another powered nemesis!
Updates as the situation merits!
Eric
Eric,
What you have is more of a jig saw vs a table saw. A table saw has a circular blade, what you’ve got is a thin blade that moves up and down. It’s the same thing as you jig saw but just mounted upside down and not hand held. I’m thinking that a jig to hold pieces as they get cut might help your issue of a straight line.
Well, I’ll be… I honestly had no idea! I had honestly assumed a table with a saw in it must be a table saw.
Let me do a thought exercise on a jig. A big issue I have is that the support for the guard is so thick, I have to set the rail off by abut 1/8" to get the wood to pass on either side. One solution, of course, is to make nothing longer than about 8". Of course, I may have misdiagnosed the issue. What I tried to do was:
- Set the rail to the appropriate width.
- Start feeding in the board, using my hands to hold it down against the table and up against the rail.
- As the board got shorter, use the compass to push the board the rest of the way to the guard. I stuck a wedge in the cut to help guide it around the guard arm support.
- Use a pusher to ease the remaining inch or so of the blade.
I had considered making / buying a featherboard before this project. Didn’t trust my ability to make something using a saw I can’t use, and didn’t find a featherboard at the hardware store.
The next big cuts won’t come until we make the bolsters for the trucks. There is time to work this through!
Yes, I was puzzling about that, until Craig posted the side view of your saw. I’ve never seen an upside-down jig saw (also called a saber saw around here.)
Though Craig mentions the “thin” blade, it doesn’t look that thin to me. A finer-tooth blade may make finer cuts? A sharp blade will always work better than a dull one.
I have a Micromark mini table saw, with a 3.5" blade. I have several different blades for different purposes, and it comes with a lexan zero-clearance throat plate for cutting thin strips. Pics on my recent thread:
https://largescalecentral.com/t/cutting-brass-on-my-mini-table-saw/82189
For finishing timber with cut debris (like the bits hanging off your planks,) I use a small finish sander. Like this one (but cheaper):
What’s happening to Eric I think is the blade is “thin” and it causes it to wander. Same issues on a band saw when you try and feed too fast.
Thanks, guys. I do note that the blade tends to lean away from the rail when I cut. Maybe I do need a thicker blade? I can take a look to see what they have the next time I go to the hardware store, which, incidentally, will also be when I will also look at finish sanders! Our disc sander gave up its ghost last year, so a finish sander would be a useful purchase, anyway,
Eric
Update:
Kid-zilla and I grabbed the new sander and had at this project this afternoon.
I had thought the stringers were equal length. Nope. They were just enough off, so we tried to square the ends and use the sander to get them into shape. The plan was to glue everything together and use the pin nailer to help reinforce the joint before calling it a day and focusing on running trains.
Did I mention I had never used the pin nailer before? It took us about 15 minutes to successfully nail something to our cutting board. After that, we did succeed in actually getting nails into the frame only to find that they are too short to make much of a difference. I also found that centering the pin nailer does not put the pin nail in the center. Maybe the fact the nails go on the left side of the feed tray should have tipped me to that point…Normally, I am happy to show my failures. This time, though, I think I’ll hide my shame behind sanding filler and paint.
After all this, we lined things up to the square again…
Ugggh…
We’ll try and sand things to shape tomorrow. Or maybe I’ll Dremel-it. Or get out Sabre Saw! Regardless, our 12" car is already about 11". If we sand it enough, it’ll ride on a single archbar truck and enter service on the M&K Sugar Co.
In all seriousness, I am beginning to wonder if it is time to consign these timbers to the “Gemuckabucket” (Coffee cans sorted by material to hold scraps available to all hands for any project) and use the “off-the-shelf” strips I found. I am surrounded by little projects made from the same material cut to the same dimensions by the same saw in the hands of the same non-carpenter, making this all the more confounding.
Eric
Eric in this picture your blade is lined up on the inside of the line, which is going to make the cut short to begin with. Try to always go to the offcut side of the line leaving the line and then sand to the line.
After marking the wood to be cut, maybe even though you are using clamps it is moving a bit on the middle boards you should try cutting them one at a time.
Consult with the White hard hat guy in the picture, he is the foreman and should be held accountable for the overall precision of this operation! 
Thanks for the tip! These 1:24 guys are good, but sometimes they get lazy!
Update:
Kid-zilla and I spent about 30minutes today sanding and testing…My computer is being wonky, but, in short, there is something drying on the lanai that should, with some sanding and patching, work. Still, I bought some 1/2"x1/2" strips at the hardware store today as a backup.
Pictures to follow.
In the meantime, have a great week!
Eric
Sure enjoying following along.
Thanks, @Devon_Sinsley !
For those who were wondering about the results of our gluing and sanding…
…even the 1:24 gang had to hang their heads in shame! On the other hand, I have a nice, solid parallelogram I am willing to exchange for a few shreds of dignity!
The plan for the next try involves knocking this apart, sanding things smooth, then using my right-angle clamp to get at least one square corner. I’ll do the same for the opposite corner, then slowly sand things to fit, using the same clamp to ensure 90 degree corners. Lastly, we’ll sand and fit the center beams.
No progress without practice, though I wouldn’t have minded getting this right.
Eric
Eric, don’t show the frame up against a square nor leave it parked on a straight piece of track and no one will ever know 
Or make up a back story of how it got pulled out of square while recovering a large load 
@WaverlySouthern Dan, I am sorely tempted to do just as you recommend! I am also getting sorely tempted to mount the LGB trucks to that LIONEL flatbed to ensure I have a working base. Still, I need to isolate the issue, here, to see if there is a technique I can use to overcome my unique carpentry skills and still get a square corner.
Eric
my projects are rarely straight, square, or level. I try to blame the wood.
I blame the saw! Or the Dremel…or the drill…or the X-Acto…
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@Eric_Mueller I have a large porcelain tile on my workbench, which is pretty flat. I also have some small squares (about 3-4 inches) from Micromark, which are handy and let me support a corner while the glue dries. They include what Micromark calls a “thin beam” square:
Thanks, @PeterT . There are clearly some tools that I need to invest in to make the most of this saw. In the meantime, I broke up the frame, sanded it smooth, and started over, working one corner at a time.
Eric