Improved Lighting For My Scroll Saw

[CharleyL]

I have been very unhappy with the one original DeWalt light that came with my DeWalt 788 Scroll saw. I've tried several alternatives, including halogen drafting board lights. Having two lights, one on each side of the saw made a big difference in reducing the shadows around the blade, and whiter brighter lights also helped. The halogen lights worked, but they were very hot. I frequently burned my forehead on them and after cutting with them all day the backs of my hands would get sunburned, but I continued to use these lights, while looking for something better.

 

I recently found and purchased two of these LED lights to mount on my Dewalt 788 scroll saw in place of the single original DeWalt light

Shop Style Selections 15-in Adjustable Brushed Steel LED Clip-On Desk Lamp with Metal Shade at Lowes.com

I designed and built a bracket to mount two of these lights to the upper arm of my DeWalt 788 saw, after my initial plan of clipping the lights to the rear of the saw table failed, because I kept bumping into the clamps with my work. The new bracket that I made wraps around the upper arm of the saw just ahead of the DeWalt label, and extends out from both sides of the saw arm. Each side extension of this bracket has a hole where I attached one of the lights, after removing it from it’s original clamp. Only a slight trimming of the bottom edge of the plastic piece that holds the saw speed control and power switch is necessary. The rest of the saw does not have to be modified to add these lights and bracket.

 

Adding the bracket and attaching the lights to it required dis-assembly of the lamp head by removing the two screws in the plastic lens of the lamp. The lens and PC board with the LEDs attached to it can then be removed from the lamp head. Un-solder the wires from the back side of the PC board.  Then remove the wires from the flex tube, and then remove the original clamp from the base of the goose neck.

 

After installing the base of the goose neck on my new bracket I then re-threaded the wires up through the the goose neck tube into the lamp head, re-soldered the wires in their correct positions, and then re-assembled the lamp head. There is a small flat on the back edge of both the PC board and the lens that must point toward the goose neck as the lamp head is assembled. The same was done with the second lamp. The lights run on low voltage DC, so it's necessary to maintain the correct polarity of the wires when they are re-attached. There are tiny + and - signs on the PC board and one of the wires has a line of - signs on it, so it attaches to the poing with the - next to it. The other wire by default is the + wire, so it attaches to the point with the + sign next to it.

 

I twisted the wires from both lamps loosely together and routed them back along the left side of the upper saw arm fixing them in place with tie-wraps. The switches for the two lights ended up along side of the rear saw frame casting, so I attached them to this casting, one above the other, with double sided carpet tape. Between the switches and the power supply/plugs there are several feet of additional wire that would easily reach a wall outlet if one was directly behind the scroll saw, but I have mounted a power strip to the left side of the rear leg of the saw stand, so I loosely twisted the wires together and then plugged the lights in to this power strip. The saw and foot switch for the saw are also plugged into this power strip.

I’ve now been using these LED lights for almost 6 months and find them ideal for my purpose. They are very bright and emit a very white, non-flickering light that is perfect for scroll sawing. Being able to easily position them on each side and slightly forward of the blade and shining down at about a 45 deg angle at the blade eliminates all of the blade shadows and makes it very easy to follow the lines of my patterns. Running all day long the lamp housings never heat up to much over 80 or so degrees, so I never burn my head on them either.

These lights would make great auxiliary lighting for most any shop tool and the price is right to have many of them, either mounted on their original clamps or on specially made brackets. I now own 7 of them, not only on my two scroll saws, but also on my band saw and drill presses.

Be careful not to buy the weighted desk top version of these lights. The base of the flexible shaft looks the same but it is different than the one with the spring clamp shown in the link above. If you buy one of these it will be much harder to modify for use on a bracket, like I did.

Attached are photos of this installation on my DeWalt 788. I'm now in the process of making a slightly different bracket to mount two more of these LED lights to my Delta Q3  40-650 scroll saw.

 

If you are unhappy with the lighting on your scroll saw and have difficulty seeing where the blade is cutting because of the strobe like shadows being caused with the one light and the upper blade grip, then this modification will solve all of it for less than $45. They are great unmodified for use on other tools too. 

 

Charley

[Malcolm161]

You may have been better off buying a magnifying light, which I have found to be a great benefit.  It helps to see the smaller areas very clearly.

 http://www.amazon.co.uk/Swing-arm-magnifying-lamp-SAM75/dp/B006N92KW8/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&qid=1452979156&sr=8-6&keywords=desk+lamp+magnifier

 

Malcolm

Edited January 16, 2016 by Malcolm161

[ike]

I just bought a magnifying light and love it. I bought it from menards for $40 I don't know if there is one near you. but that is your bst bet.

[LarryEA]

I like your lighting scheme. Looks like it does a great job.

I'm sorry, but I only read the first chapter of your book. I'll finish it later.     just kidding, I did read it. good instructions

[bandaideman]

I use a Magnifying lamp as well and can't see myself without one. It really makes a difference on the old eyes.

[tvman44]

What do they use for a power source?

[heppnerguy]

Thank you taking the time to explain in such a complete way and easy to understand way, what is needed to obtain a lighting system as good as these you have a lot more talent then I do I am afraid that had I made these on my own they would not be even close to the great job you did here. I had a really nice, large and lighted magnifying lamp but did not like having something between my own eyes and the piece I was attempting to cut. Your lighting idea looks like it would be just the ticket because I would not have that sort of a problem with the lights that bothered me with the magnifying light.

Thank you so much for sharing this with all of us

 

Dick

heppnerguy

[Young_Scroller]

all I do is have a couple of adjustable lights that have clamps on them and have endless possibilities to where I can put them just about anywhere. they are also pretty cheap too.

http://www.amazon.com/Woods-5-5-Inch-Reflector-60-Watt-6-Foot/dp/B000HJDATW/ref=sr_1_5?s=hi&ie=UTF8&qid=1453006055&sr=1-5&keywords=clamp+light

[CharleyL]

Dick,

 

I made a spare bracket like the one shown in my post. I sent it to a guy, who has now decided not to use it. If you are interested in doing this and If/when I get the bracket back from him I will let you know.  Are you using a DeWalt 788? The brackets that I made will only fit on the 788 or the similar Delta saw. I can also try to make a drawing of the two parts of the bracket and post it, if anyone is interested in doing this.

 

 

Young_Scroller,

 

I tried the lights like you have. Getting them positioned so that the blade shadows are eliminated from the blade cutting point puts them too close to my face, and they get hot. My reason for going to all the trouble of mounting LED lights on my saw was to get away from using hot lights and yet be able to position them so that they completely eliminate the blade shadows and upper blade gripper shadows from around the blade cutting point. My LED lights can run all day long and only reach about 80 degrees F, so if I bump my hands or face into them I don't get burned. When I had the halogen drafting lights installed on both sides of my saw, they did a great job of lighting the area and removing the shadows, but they ran very hot and I kept burning my forehead on them. My hands also got sunburned from working under them all day. 

 

Using only one light, like the original DeWalt light, produces many shadows around the blade area that make it sometimes very difficult to see the blade in the shadow. If the light is too high the upper blade grip movement produces a strobe like shadow on the blade cutting area. My goal has been to use two lights that I could position so that one is on each side of the blade to eliminate these shadows. Finding and installing these LED lights has also eliminated the chances of burning myself by them. 

 

Look carefully at the photo that I posted of my scroll saw with the 2 LED lights positioned above and off to each side of the saw table. There are no shadows on the table at all, not even from the upper blade grip. This makes scroll sawing tiny things like the 3D reindeer for making ear rings that I've posted here so much easier to do and I don't get as exhausted or eye strained like I used to.

 

If you have any interest at all in these lights, go to a Lowes store near you and try one out. When I first found them and turned one on in the store, I knew immediately what I was going to use them for. Two of them came home with me that same day.

 

 

Here is a link to my ear ring post to give you an idea of why I wanted no shadows to interfere with my visibility of the blade.     http://www.scrollsawvillage.com/topic/17757-christmas-ear-rings/

 

 

Charley

Edited January 18, 2016 by CharleyL

[tvman44]

CharleyL, what do those LED lights from Lowe's use for power?  I looked on line but Lowe's does not mention the power source.

[CharleyL]

tvman44,

 

The LED lights come with a small wall wort kind of elongated plug/power supply that converts the 120 VAC into 12 VDC. In the last photo of the first post of this thread you can see them both of them plugged into the power strip on the rear leg of my saw stand. I left their wiring basically unchanged and just used them the way they came, except for removing them from the spring clamps and mounting them on my DIY bracket, but a friend has rewired his lights to run both lights from one of the wall wort power supplies and,.so far, his lights are working OK. He used a small aluminum box to mount his lights on instead of my bracket, and he put a small toggle switch on the box to turn both lights on and off, so his box receives power from one power supply wall wort. Then in the box it goes through the toggle switch and then out of the box to power both of his lights. The only problem that I see with doing it this way is the loss of about 1" of throat clearance of the saw. My light bracket minimizes this lose to less than 1/4". The lights are light enough that they don't significantly change the weight of the saw arm, so my Jim Dandy Products arm lift still works without even changing the spring counter balance adjustment.

 

I've had the power strip on the rear leg of my saw stand for the previous light schemes, so I just continue to use it. The two light plug/power supplies, as well as the saw, all are plugged into it, but there is enough wire on the lights for them to be plugged into a high outlet in the wall directly behind the saw, if you wish to do that. I think from the plug to the inline light switches in the light wires there is about 3' of wire. It's about 22 gauge twin lead wire with a white stripe along the side of one wire to indicate the negative lead. From the inline switch to the LED light head there is about another two feet of wire. Without changing anything there was enough wire to route the wires from the lamps back along the upper saw arm to the rear casting of the saw, so I just attached the wiring to the upper saw arm and mounted the two switches on the casting using just double sided carpet tape. There is a tie wrap at front of the upper saw arm just ahead of the DeWalt label and another one at the rear end of the saw arm and then a larger one around the base casting after the switches to hold the wires in place. I used an additional small tie wrap near the power supplies to keep the wires from untwisting.

 

Charley

[amazingkevin]

I have been very unhappy with the one original DeWalt light that came with my DeWalt 788 Scroll saw. I've tried several alternatives, including halogen drafting board lights. Having two lights, one on each side of the saw made a big difference in reducing the shadows around the blade, and whiter brighter lights also helped. The halogen lights worked, but they were very hot. I frequently burned my forehead on them and after cutting with them all day the backs of my hands would get sunburned, but I continued to use these lights, while looking for something better.

 

I recently found and purchased two of these LED lights to mount on my Dewalt 788 scroll saw in place of the single original DeWalt light

 

Shop Style Selections 15-in Adjustable Brushed Steel LED Clip-On Desk Lamp with Metal Shade at Lowes.com

 

I designed and built a bracket to mount two of these lights to the upper arm of my DeWalt 788 saw, after my initial plan of clipping the lights to the rear of the saw table failed, because I kept bumping into the clamps with my work. The new bracket that I made wraps around the upper arm of the saw just ahead of the DeWalt label, and extends out from both sides of the saw arm. Each side extension of this bracket has a hole where I attached one of the lights, after removing it from it’s original clamp. Only a slight trimming of the bottom edge of the plastic piece that holds the saw speed control and power switch is necessary. The rest of the saw does not have to be modified to add these lights and bracket.

 

Adding the bracket and attaching the lights to it required dis-assembly of the lamp head by removing the two screws in the plastic lens of the lamp. The lens and PC board with the LEDs attached to it can then be removed from the lamp head. Un-solder the wires from the back side of the PC board.  Then remove the wires from the flex tube, and then remove the original clamp from the base of the goose neck.

 

After installing the base of the goose neck on my new bracket I then re-threaded the wires up through the the goose neck tube into the lamp head, re-soldered the wires in their correct positions, and then re-assembled the lamp head. There is a small flat on the back edge of both the PC board and the lens that must point toward the goose neck as the lamp head is assembled. The same was done with the second lamp. The lights run on low voltage DC, so it's necessary to maintain the correct polarity of the wires when they are re-attached. There are tiny + and - signs on the PC board and one of the wires has a line of - signs on it, so it attaches to the poing with the - next to it. The other wire by default is the + wire, so it attaches to the point with the + sign next to it.

 

I twisted the wires from both lamps loosely together and routed them back along the left side of the upper saw arm fixing them in place with tie-wraps. The switches for the two lights ended up along side of the rear saw frame casting, so I attached them to this casting, one above the other, with double sided carpet tape. Between the switches and the power supply/plugs there are several feet of additional wire that would easily reach a wall outlet if one was directly behind the scroll saw, but I have mounted a power strip to the left side of the rear leg of the saw stand, so I loosely twisted the wires together and then plugged the lights in to this power strip. The saw and foot switch for the saw are also plugged into this power strip.

I’ve now been using these LED lights for almost 6 months and find them ideal for my purpose. They are very bright and emit a very white, non-flickering light that is perfect for scroll sawing. Being able to easily position them on each side and slightly forward of the blade and shining down at about a 45 deg angle at the blade eliminates all of the blade shadows and makes it very easy to follow the lines of my patterns. Running all day long the lamp housings never heat up to much over 80 or so degrees, so I never burn my head on them either.

 

These lights would make great auxiliary lighting for most any shop tool and the price is right to have many of them, either mounted on their original clamps or on specially made brackets. I now own 7 of them, not only on my two scroll saws, but also on my band saw and drill presses.

Be careful not to buy the weighted desk top version of these lights. The base of the flexible shaft looks the same but it is different than the one with the spring clamp shown in the link above. If you buy one of these it will be much harder to modify for use on a bracket, like I did.

 

Attached are photos of this installation on my DeWalt 788. I'm now in the process of making a slightly different bracket to mount two more of these LED lights to my Delta Q3  40-650 scroll saw.

 

If you are unhappy with the lighting on your scroll saw and have difficulty seeing where the blade is cutting because of the strobe like shadows being caused with the one light and the upper blade grip, then this modification will solve all of it for less than $45. They are great unmodified for use on other tools too. 

 

Charley

that's the exact ones i use on my dewalt,no shadows either!

[tvman44]

Thanks CharleyL, I missed the wall warts on the last picture.

[NC Scroller]

The light that Charles talks about is amazing. I have one of his custom designed bracket.

 

Hi Charley..... Scott here. Welcome to the Village.

[NC Scroller]

The light that Charles talks about is amazing. I have one of his custom designed bracket.

 

Hi Charley..... Scott here. Welcome to the Village.

[Lucky2]

Charley, thanks for posting this, I think that maybe I'll give it a try.

Len

[ike]

I have tried all kinds of lighting but none comes up to the magnifying light I bought at menards. the one I clipped to my table was in the way for large work.. it is mounted to my saw stand i had to add p piece of wood to get the mounting study. the magnifier helps this old man wee what he is doing. and it only cost $ 40.

it sets all the way to the back of the stand. It has a 45" reach.and only took with modifying my stand 10 minutes to set up.

[CharleyL]

Ike,

 

If you are happy with what you have, that's all that matters.

 

I wasn't happy with single source lighting, even the light with a magnifying glass, and that's why I've gone through several versions of two lamp lighting. With the two LED lamps I think I've found what makes me happy and I've stopped searching for a better way. The halogen lights that I tried were actually brighter than these LED lights, but they got too hot and burned my head and hands. The LED lights don't get hot, are shadow free when placed in the correct position, and are perfect for me. When cutting tiny work, like my reindeer ear rings, I do use magnification, but I'm using a wearable head band magnifier, so the lenses move with me. When I tried the magnifier/light combination I found that when I moved my head the outer areas of the magnifier lens produced distortion that bothered my eyes. The head band magnifiers don't have this distortion.

 

I'm still exploring better alternatives for magnified scroll sawing and may have a great solution for this, but I'll hold off on posting my idea for now. I'll create a new post to explain it, if/when I have the design for it worked out. 

 

Scott (NC Scroller), you must now have your lights installed and working, and you sound very pleased with them. That's great! I still have another copy of my bracket on it's way back to me from the guy who chose not to use it, and a complete bracket with two of the LED lights installed that I'll likely modify slightly to install on my Delta Q3 scroll saw.

 

Charley

[Rob]

Hi Charley.  I also have a Delta Q3 so would be interested in whatever you come up with if you would be so kind to post about it in due course.

 

Rob

[CharleyL]

Rob,

 

I will definitely post information about my light bracket for the Q3 when I get the time to make it. Do you have access to a Lowes store in NZ to get the lights? I haven't seen them for sale any place else here in NC other than Lowes. 

 

Charley  

[Rob]

No Lowes here unfortunately so I would have to find an alternative light source.

 

Rob

[firstmuller]

Rob

could you order them on line from Lowes? I sure like mine.

Allen

Edited March 4, 2016 by firstmuller

[WLDraper]

I really liked CharlieL’s idea of using 2 LED Clip-On Lights mounted to the arm of the saw.  But Lowe’s has changed the design of their clip-on lamp since his original post.  They still offer a very good lamp for about the same price, but modifying the wiring per his instructions is not possible with the new lamp configuration.  I made a little bracket that will fit on the arm much like the original.  I immediately ran into the same problem Charlie discussed.  Clamping the lights to my original piece of ½” Baltic ply gave me a real clearance problem if working on a sizable project.  There is a  is a simple solution however.  Just add another ¾” Plywood spacer and it will not only pull the ends of the clamp handles up, it gives the clamps a much more staple clamping surface. Now the lights don’t need to be modified and they can be easily removed and used in other areas of the shop if needed.

[Sycamore67]

I use an Ottlite magnifier.  It has the circular fluorescent tube and came with two glass lens....3X and 5X.  The lens are large with good optics to see your work.  I had a smaller, cheaper lens setup that gave me a headache.

For me, I do not like attaching a light or magnifier to my saw.  When I did that with my Hegner even small vibrations caused the light to move and gave me eye issues.

I think each person should try a coupe of setups and see which works best and most comfortable on their eyes.  This is probably really important with us older folks whose vision has deteriorated.

[OCtoolguy]

On 1/16/2016 at 12:41 PM, CharleyL said:

I have been very unhappy with the one original DeWalt light that came with my DeWalt 788 Scroll saw. I've tried several alternatives, including halogen drafting board lights. Having two lights, one on each side of the saw made a big difference in reducing the shadows around the blade, and whiter brighter lights also helped. The halogen lights worked, but they were very hot. I frequently burned my forehead on them and after cutting with them all day the backs of my hands would get sunburned, but I continued to use these lights, while looking for something better.

 

I recently found and purchased two of these LED lights to mount on my Dewalt 788 scroll saw in place of the single original DeWalt light

Shop Style Selections 15-in Adjustable Brushed Steel LED Clip-On Desk Lamp with Metal Shade at Lowes.com

I designed and built a bracket to mount two of these lights to the upper arm of my DeWalt 788 saw, after my initial plan of clipping the lights to the rear of the saw table failed, because I kept bumping into the clamps with my work. The new bracket that I made wraps around the upper arm of the saw just ahead of the DeWalt label, and extends out from both sides of the saw arm. Each side extension of this bracket has a hole where I attached one of the lights, after removing it from it’s original clamp. Only a slight trimming of the bottom edge of the plastic piece that holds the saw speed control and power switch is necessary. The rest of the saw does not have to be modified to add these lights and bracket.

 

Adding the bracket and attaching the lights to it required dis-assembly of the lamp head by removing the two screws in the plastic lens of the lamp. The lens and PC board with the LEDs attached to it can then be removed from the lamp head. Un-solder the wires from the back side of the PC board.  Then remove the wires from the flex tube, and then remove the original clamp from the base of the goose neck.

 

After installing the base of the goose neck on my new bracket I then re-threaded the wires up through the the goose neck tube into the lamp head, re-soldered the wires in their correct positions, and then re-assembled the lamp head. There is a small flat on the back edge of both the PC board and the lens that must point toward the goose neck as the lamp head is assembled. The same was done with the second lamp. The lights run on low voltage DC, so it's necessary to maintain the correct polarity of the wires when they are re-attached. There are tiny + and - signs on the PC board and one of the wires has a line of - signs on it, so it attaches to the poing with the - next to it. The other wire by default is the + wire, so it attaches to the point with the + sign next to it.

 

I twisted the wires from both lamps loosely together and routed them back along the left side of the upper saw arm fixing them in place with tie-wraps. The switches for the two lights ended up along side of the rear saw frame casting, so I attached them to this casting, one above the other, with double sided carpet tape. Between the switches and the power supply/plugs there are several feet of additional wire that would easily reach a wall outlet if one was directly behind the scroll saw, but I have mounted a power strip to the left side of the rear leg of the saw stand, so I loosely twisted the wires together and then plugged the lights in to this power strip. The saw and foot switch for the saw are also plugged into this power strip.

I’ve now been using these LED lights for almost 6 months and find them ideal for my purpose. They are very bright and emit a very white, non-flickering light that is perfect for scroll sawing. Being able to easily position them on each side and slightly forward of the blade and shining down at about a 45 deg angle at the blade eliminates all of the blade shadows and makes it very easy to follow the lines of my patterns. Running all day long the lamp housings never heat up to much over 80 or so degrees, so I never burn my head on them either.

These lights would make great auxiliary lighting for most any shop tool and the price is right to have many of them, either mounted on their original clamps or on specially made brackets. I now own 7 of them, not only on my two scroll saws, but also on my band saw and drill presses.

Be careful not to buy the weighted desk top version of these lights. The base of the flexible shaft looks the same but it is different than the one with the spring clamp shown in the link above. If you buy one of these it will be much harder to modify for use on a bracket, like I did.

Attached are photos of this installation on my DeWalt 788. I'm now in the process of making a slightly different bracket to mount two more of these LED lights to my Delta Q3  40-650 scroll saw.

 

If you are unhappy with the lighting on your scroll saw and have difficulty seeing where the blade is cutting because of the strobe like shadows being caused with the one light and the upper blade grip, then this modification will solve all of it for less than $45. They are great unmodified for use on other tools too. 

 

Charley

Charley, that looks great and I will be giving it some thought. I was wondering though how much weight is added to the arm of the saw. Will it still stay up with the arm lifter that most of us are using? I don't see one in your pictures so I was just wondering.

Ray

 

Edited April 8, 2018 by octoolguy
I read the entire thread and found my answer.