Folding Saddle Square

Blue Spruce Toolworks introduces the Folding Saddle Squares…tools designed for flawless joinery layout. Transferring a layout line around a corner with traditional layout tools calls for patience, dexterity, keen eyesight and…let's face it…luck. Even if you're off just half the width of your pencil lead, by the time you carry the layout all the way through and make your cuts, that tiny error could balloon into a poor-fitting joint. Think of the Folding Saddle Squares as straightedges that happen to have a hinge right in the middle…because that's exactly how we make them. The edges are milled after final assembly. That's right. After the parts are machined, anodized, laser engraved and fully assembled, they head back out to the machine shop where both edges get one more pass on the CNC mill, cutting both halves perfectly in plane with each other. They will stay in plane, too, because the hinge is tensioned to eliminate lateral play while still allowing silky smooth angle adjustment. You get a precision straightedge that will wrap itself around a corner.  Flawless Joinery Starts with Precision Layout Tenons are perfect examples of layouts that require precise registration of lines on edges and faces of your stock. With just two placements of the square (instead of 4), it's much easier to mark the shoulder line all the way around the board.  In the same way, having the Folding Saddle Square wrap along the end and down the edge saves you time and effort when laying out the cheek cuts of your tenons.   Another prime example where face and edge alignment are crucial is cross-dowel joinery. The bolt hole and the cross-dowel hole must intersect precisely or the threads won't line up. The Folding Saddle Square gives you that perfect alignment automatically.  So far, we've looked at square corners…but the Folding Saddle Square works just as well on angles larger than 90°. Lay out spline locations on hexagonal and octagonal boxes. Lay out angled bridle joints in table and chair construction. Carry layout lines around corners in multi-sided rooms. Anywhere you need to mark the same dimension on two adjacent faces, the Folding Saddle Squares will get the job done.  The two Folding Saddle Squares differ only in size. They have exactly the same design, just scaled down for the smaller one. In both, the joint is engineered to have no lateral play, yet adjust easily to match the face and edge of your material. The larger is 1-1/2" wide and 7-1/2" overall length. The smaller is 1" x 5".  Like all Blue Spruce products, the Folding Saddle Squares are precisely machined and carefully inspected right here in our Strongsville, Ohio, facility just south of Cleveland.