Shave a Hair Off a Cut
Registering a workpiece against a stopped miter saw blade so the cut removes a few thousandths instead of a full kerf — the way to close a joint that's barely long.
Measure Between Miters Exactly With a Pair of Test Blocks
Cut two short test blocks with the same miter as your workpiece, each a known 10 inches from long point to square end. Set one in each end of the run, measure square-to-square between them, and add 20 — that's your long-to-long length, no tape hooked on a knife edge.
measure long point to long point, shiplap mitered ends, measure between walls trim, cut tight miters both ends
The Problem
A piece with a mitered long point on each end can't be measured directly — there's no square face to hook a tape on, and reading to a knife-edge point invites a sixteenth of error at both ends. On tongue-and-groove or shiplap runs, where every piece has to land tight, those sixteenths show.
The Technique
- Cut two test blocks from the same stock, with the same miter as the workpiece, each trimmed to a known dimension — 10 inches from the long point to the square end.
- Set a block into each end of the run, long points seated where the workpiece's long points will land.
- Measure square-end to square-end between the two blocks. That's a clean hook-and-read measurement.
- Add the two block lengths. In the reel: 32 between blocks, plus 10 and 10, gives 52 long-to-long.
The blocks convert an unmeasurable knife-to-knife dimension into an ordinary tape pull plus known constants — and they're reusable for the whole job.
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