Clockwise from top left, a mitre saw jig offering a range of cutting angles, a 45° mitre box, a dowelling jig and drill bit, a multi purpose joint cutting jig, a dovetailing jig and drill attachment, and a mitre cramp.

Special aids for picture framers include (clockwise from top) a plastic mitre box with extra saw guides, steel and nylon framing cramps with tensioners, a simple mitre cramp, a four part cam cramp and a combined mitre cutter and cramp.

One of the simplest devices is the mitre box, which is used to cut 45° angles on the ends of wood up to about 75 mm wide, door architraves, picture frame mouldings and the like. It's a wooden, plastic or metal 'trough' with opposed pairs of slots in the sides to guide the saw at the correct angle across the work piece, which sits on the base of the box on a piece of scrap wood. Some also have a pair of slots for making 90° cuts. Similar in principle is the mitre saw jig; here the slotted saw guides can be adjusted by sliding them along steel pillars, giving a variety of cutting angles as well as 45°. There are also various patented cut­ting jigs that are a variation on the mitre box principle, with adjustable guides that allow various other joints to be cut, half laps, or the tenon part of a mortise and tenon joint, for example accurately and repeatedly. Some can even be used to make the angled cuts necessary for dovetail joints. They're a great help to the amateur woodworker who finds accuracy hard to achieve, and will soon repay their cost in terms of the amount of wood that is no longer wasted. Another jig that is a great help to amateur and professional alike is the dowelling jig, which is used to ensure

that the holes for the dowels are drilled exactly at right angles to the edges of the work pieces, and are in precisely the right place on both components to ensure an accurate fit and a strong, well assembled joint.

Cutting dovetails neatly is perhaps the most difficult of all joint making challenges. As already mentioned, some joint making jigs can help with making the angled saw cuts for the pins, but that still leaves a lot of chisel work to do. A dovetailing attachment for your power drill can take all the hard work out of the task, giving neat, accurate dovetails that will fit together perfectly every time. The attachment consists of a special cutter with a side handle that you can fit into the chuck of your power drill, and a special guide template that is cramped to the work piece. The cutter is then inserted into the cut outs in the template to rout out the wood leaving just a little trimming to be done before the joint can be assembled.

Jigs and cramps that hold joints together while the adhesive sets are a great help also.

The simplest are the various types of mitre and picture frame cramp, which hold the components at the correct angle and prevent them from slipping past each other, out of alignment.

You can also get special cramps for assembling panel type constructions using dowels, biscuits, or joint blocks; these hold the components accurately at right angles while the joints are assembled.