Making A Marking Gauge

Mike Cox describes a handy accessory that makes an ideal beginner’s project.

Marking gauges are familiar items to woodworkers and they are used to scribe lines parallel to the edge of the work piece. Typically, they are used to mark out tenons. Similar gauges are not so common for marking metal. Metal workers tend to use Jenny callipers (also known as odd leg callipers) or a scribing block to mark lines parallel to the edge of a piece being worked on.

Jenny callipers can be quite tricky to use especially when marking out distances a long way from the edge. They are also time consuming to use because the callipers must first be set up by reference to a steel rule.

The tool described here is very simple to make and it converts a steel rule into a versatile marking gauge that can be used to accurately mark off distances from an edge and draw lines parallel to an edge. It is one of the most used tools in my workshop.

Photograph 1 shows the finished marking gauge. It consists of two components: a steel rule and slider that can be clamped at any point along the rule by turning the knurled knob at the centre of the rule. Thus the slider can be set at a distance along the rule and then the slider can be aligned with the edge of a work piece at that distance marked off . The point of a scriber can be held at the tip of the rule and the gauge then slid along the edge of the work piece to scribe a line parallel to and a set distance from an edge.