A Little Help for the Shear
by Sheldon Jaffe

I have a simple 6" sheet metal shear that’s useful for rough stuff, but it’s difficult to see my cut lines and often material shifts as I cut. Plus, it’s hard to hold the sheet metal level, so it tends to flop around and pull away from the shear blade when cutting.

Faced with a few dozen pieces of 3/4" x 1/16" aluminum angle with 45° ends, I looked for a better way and once again the scrap box came to the rescue.

A piece of 1/2" x 4" aluminum plate was attached to the shear, using some 1-1/2" x 1/4" aluminum angle. A slot was milled in the plate to fit a miter gauge I rescued from an old junky table saw. I also machined a recess on the bottom of the plate where it attaches to the angle to set it at the same height as the top of the lower shear blade. The new table was bolted to the shear using the same bolts that hold on the lower shear blade.

The first try was well within my requirements and all the 3/4" angle bar was cut with zero rejects. It’s a quick-n-dirty project when I get ambitious I’ll make one that’s prettier.  

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