Cutting plywood and easily breaking down sheetgoods is something you can do if you have one tool,
and it’s called the Kreg Rip Cut tool. And this is awesome because it only costs $26
to $34, you can attach it to your circular saw, and you don’t have to buy a table saw
which costs hundreds of dollars. So I’m going to show you how to use the
Kreg Rip Cut tool in today’s video, which also ties in nicely with a project I’m doing
at home for our bathroom mock up, which is part of Bathroom Repair Tutor. And in the
end I’ve got an awesome surprise for you, so do not miss this video. I think you’re
really going to like it. Let’s get to it. So here’s my bathroom mock up that I’m
working on for Bathroom Repair Tutor. We’re going to be putting in an entire bathroom,
step by step, and share it with our fans over at Home Repair Tutor and Bathroom Repair Tutor.
But in order to do that, one step of the process is to install subfloor.
So we’re using ¾” Tongue & Groove wood subfloor for this project ‘cause we’re
going to be tiling over it using Ditra, and Ditra needs to go on top of the subfloor.
So how am I going to rip down these subfloors without having a table saw?
Well the Kreg Rip Cut tool comes in handy for me because I don’t do too many sheetgood
projects, and I don’t want to spend the $300 or $400 that I would have to spend for
a table saw. So I’m going to show you how to set up the Kreg Rip Cut tool. It’s super
easy to use with your circular saw. And let’s do that right now.
This is the bathroom mock up. Here is the subfloor. We have, as you can see, a 13”-wide
by 8’-long piece of subfloor that we need to cut to size. I’m going to use the Kreg
Rip Cut tool to do that. You can place 2x4s on a flat surface to support
your sheetgood when you’re cutting it with a circular saw. I don’t know about you,
but ¾” Tongue & Groove plywood is some heavy stuff. Let me shuffle this over.
So guys, the other thing is this is the nice side of the plywood that I want facing up,
but because of the way that the circular saw cuts, I’m going to put this face down on
the 2x4s. So the cool thing is you don’t really have
to measure with the Rip Cut tool, but I want this board to be farther out than 13”. So
it’s about 14’ from the edge. That way I won’t cut into the 2x4 when I use the
Rip Cut tool. There are three parts to the Rip Cut tool:
there’s the sled—this attaches to the circular saw; this is the rail; and this is
the edge guide, which runs along the edge of the sheetgood or the plywood. The base
plate of the circular saw goes up onto the sled here. So what you’ll do is you’ll
slide this on, and the blade goes in between here into these slots. So you can just slide
it on like so, and you use these to tighten it down. What you do from here is simply slide
the rail onto the sled. You need to calibrate the saw’s blade with
the Rip Cut, so what you’ll have to do is this: simply push the Rip Cut tool until the
edge guide is flush up against the saw guide. So as you can see here, the edge guide will
be up against the saw guide. What you’ll have to do is pull the saw guide up so that
the edge guide can touch the saw blade. So there you go, and just push the edge guide
up against the saw blade and calibrate the Rip Cut tool with my circular saw. You’ll
want to lock the Rip Cut tool into place, and then move the cursor to the zero mark
that is on the rail. So there’s a zero mark on the rail. You
want to line the cursor up with that zero mark, and make sure it’s flush with the
edge guide. Here is the 13”-mark, and I need to move the sled down to that, and just
line it up with the cursor. Once it’s lined up with the 13”-mark, I just lock it into
place, and that’s it; I’m good to go. So I did want to show one other thing. I’m
using the saw blade that’s an Ultra Finish saw blade. It’s got 60 teeth in it. It’s
really going to make a nice cut with this Tongue & Groove subfloor. The Rip Cut tool
will allow you to cut a piece of 4x8 sheetgood in half. So we’ll go out 24”.
Now I’m ready to make my cut with my saw and the Rip Cut. So what you need to do is
this: hold the saw with one hand and the edge guide with the other, and simply move the
saw through the material. You can switch the edge guide to the other side of the rail.
So if you’re left-handed, you can hold the saw with the left hand and the edge guide
with your right hand. The other hot tip I have for you is this:
you should always make your saw blade about 1/8” to ¼” deeper than the depth of the
material. So in this case, I made my saw blade 1” deep because my material was ¾” thick.
Pretty awesome. Well there you go, guys. Cutting plywood couldn’t
get any easier using the Kreg Rip Cut tool. You can use it with your circular saw, and
it only costs $26 to $34. And here is the surprise: I talked to Kreg—I actually approached
them—and they gave me the go-ahead to say this in this video, but they’re willing
to give away two Kreg Rip Cut tools to two random fans of Home Repair Tutor.
So head back on over to HomeRepairTutor.com, click on one of these links here; it’ll
take you back over to that page, and you’ll see how you can enter into that giveaway.
It’s pretty sweet. I think that you’ll love this tool. It could help you with your
plywood project or any kind of sheetgood project you have going on. All right? So check that
out. And if you haven’t already done so, subscribe
to the YouTube channel here so you don’t miss out on any of these awesome giveaways.
But remember, go back to Home Repair Tutor by clicking on one of these links, and you’ll
be able to enter into the random giveaway. Thanks for watching. Take care, and I’ll
talk to you soon.