Taper and Parallel sled

[Sharp Shooter]

How do you make a sled for parallel and taper lams? Tony

[rmorris]

I started off by purchasing a set of .002 and .001 tapers. I then taped them to a piece of bamboo wood flooring with dubble stick tape and run them in the plainer. When you remove the taper you then have a taper sled  that you can tape your soon to be tapers.  For parallels I just run some kind of wood or in my case bamboo wood flooring becaue it does not warp or twist and then just use double stick tape once again. Back a while ago someone was selling some aluminum pre made sets.

[Trux Turning]

What Ralph said or I believe Kenny will sell you a set of wooden ones.

[rmorris]

Tony, sorry it took me so long to find but here is how I make tapers and parallels along with the sleds. In this one I was using purple heart as the sled but I have since moved to bamboo flooring. Also there may be some safety issues with how I cut my blanks on the table saw so only do what you are comfortable with or take Kennys advice and do it on a band saw. I hope this is some help and good luck.

 http://tradgang.com/noncgi/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=125;t=007206#000000

[Sharp Shooter]

Thanks everyone for your help. That's what's so good about Tradgang, if you have questions or a problem, there's a lot of talented people that can help. Thanks! Tony

[swamprat26]

So you can make them in a planer?  How thin can you go with the planer?  Thanks

[rmorris]

Rene, when you go thinner than 1/8' with wood it sometimes explodes in a planer, I would bet the reason is wood had very inconsistent grain sometimes. With bamboo wood flooring I can go as  thin as .040" with a good blade. I am also using a ryobi 13", 2 blade planer. I don't know what those 3 blade dual speed planers are capable of.. best of luck and hope it works for you.

[swamprat26]

Thanks