MasterGage/Classic

Way over-priced. I could make something almost as good out of heavy wood and add a 3rd-party gauge. Don't understand what all the fuss is about. Awkward and poorly designed in many respects. With the addition of my favorite 3rd-party gauge, the balance is very bad and needs the insertion of a heavy weight inside the body to keep it from tipping over. Would not recommend or buy again, for sure.

I have been making segmented wood turnings for about two years and the one thing that I realized from the very beginning was that accurate sawing and sanding of the segments before gluing them together is an absolute necessity. "That's close enough", just doesn't get it done when you are working with sixty to two hundred pieces of wood that will be glued together to make a beautiful vase.Over the last 6 months I have purchased four of the most highly rated instruments for setting the accuracy of woodworking machinery. Three of them were pretty good but fell short of the perfection that I was looking for. The fourth one that I tried was the MasterGage/Classic. I was quite impressed with the Classic as soon as I opened the case it was stored in. Then when I slipped it into the miter slot of my cabinet saw and found that the earth magnets held it snugly against the side of the slot I was more impressed. With the MasterPlate fastened snugly on the arbor I slid the MasterGage/Classic from one end of the plate to the other and found that what I thought was a dead-on-accurate table saw set up was not dead-on at all, it was dead-wrong. I made the necessary corrections to my table saw and moved on to my 12" disk sander, 8" jointer, 14" high rise band saw, 12" sliding compound miter saw, 15" wide belt sander and finally to my 24" OneWay Lathe. The only machine in my shop that did not need to be readjusted was my OneWay Wood Lathe. To say that I was thrilled with the accuracy of my next segmented project would be an understatement. My shop machinery had never worked that well before.As I purchased the machinery in my shop I always tried to research each item so that I would be able to get the best equipment available. And I admit when I bought the setup gauges I chose the cheaper ones first. After all dial indicators are all about the same. Well you get what you pay for. You need a good dial indicator for sure, but if the rest of the setup equipment that you are attaching that dial indicator to is less than perfect you will be accepting the "That's close enough" theory.Needless to say the first three gauges were returned and I'm happy and content with my MasterGage/Classic. I have always heard that nothing else measures up once you have had the best. What more need I say?

The MasterGage was a godsend for setting up my tablesaw accurately. I had always used my quality square to set things up and for those setup steps that the square can be used for, it did work pretty well. But there are many steps in saw setup that a square simply cannot achieve with a real degree of fine accuracy. This is where the MasterGage's mounts and dial indicator come into play. I discovered my table saw miter slot was not terribly well squared to the blade or the rip fence. It was a fair way out in fact. Using the MasterGage and the miter slot cradle bar I was able to quickly and easily square things up. The dial indicator is essential for also measuring arbor runout and arbor flange flatness, and well as any bearing wear on the table saw (it can also measure this on drill press spindles, jointer blade drums and other tool components as well). It is also great for ensuring your router collet spindle is square to a router table top when mounted upside down in a router table configuration. The tool also can be used as a depth setting gauge or a blade height setting guage and can be used to offset fences as well (up to 3 inches) if need be. The tool is well made and accurate and is a great asset to any workshop. Recommended!

I recently bought a Master Gage Classic. To say I'm pleased would be an understatement! With the instructions included it is so easy to use. I have aligned my table saw, miter saw, my brothers radial arm saw, table saw, and miter saw. I have also aligned a friends table saw. All of them were very impressed with the ease of use and the concise instruction manuel. Thanks Paul for a fine product. Ed Morgan

There are few issues in the woodshop that are more important than the set-up and calibration of the machinery that we use. Virtually all cutting tools including the table saw, band saw, planer, jointer, mortiser, shaper, router and sander demand accurate and precise set-up to operate at their peak level.We've used Paul Reilly's MasterGage products for a long time in our shop because they provide such reliable and accurate information when we're adjusting or calibrating our equipment. We have the Classic model (as well as several others) which can address any of the above machines.The quality is uncommonly high, the precision unquestionable and I've found the sense of confidence it gives me when operating my machinery has become something I'm unwilling to do without.