Cut Past 45° on a Miter Saw With a Hot-Glued Sacrificial Fence

The Problem

Miter saws stop at (or a little past) 45 degrees, and plenty of projects don't — a 60-degree corner on a planter, a steep splice, a decorative frame. The saw's detents give no direct way to get there, and freehanding a steep angle on a marked line is how fingers end up close to the blade.

The Technique

Shift the saw's whole reference frame by 45 degrees with a sacrificial board:

1. Hot-glue a piece of scrap board flat on the miter saw's table, in front of the fence, spanning where the blade passes. Hot glue holds firm and pops off cleanly later.
2. Set the saw to 45 degrees in one direction and make a cut into the scrap.
3. Swing to 45 degrees the other way and cut again. Pull out the wedge the two cuts free up.
4. Register your workpiece against one of those 45-degree cut edges instead of the fence. The saw's zero is now effectively 45 degrees, so the scale adds on from there: set 15 degrees on the saw and you're cutting 60; set 30 and you're cutting 75.
5. Any angle out to 90 degrees is reachable this way. When the job's done, pop the scrap board off the table.