Here’s a great accessory for minimizing tearout when making 90° cuts on your power miter saw. Start with a 48" length of 1/2" hardwood plywood with one dead-straight edge. Make its overall width about 4" more than the crosscut capacity of your saw. Leave the center section of this platform 16" wide, but taper the ends back to form wings as shown. Glue a fence to the panel’s rear edge, making sure its face is square to the surface of the panel. Center the completed overlay on the saw and clamp it in place. Next, drill and countersink a 1/4"-diameter hole through each end of the platform into the saw’s fixed extension tables. Drop a 1/4" flathead machine screw into each hole to secure and locate the platform. Done. I remove the overlay when making angled cuts, which would chew up the fence. To reinstall it, I just slip the machine screws in place—no nuts or clamps needed.
—Mark Spurn, Indianapolis, IN
