INCRA Miter V27 Miter Gauge Review
Twenty-seven mechanical angle stops and a bar that expands to kill slop. It fixes the worst part of almost every table saw.
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The mitre gauge that came with your table saw is almost certainly its weakest component. It has a stamped scale, a pointer with a millimetre of parallax in it, and a bar that rattles in the slot. Both of those problems produce the same symptom: a mitred frame that will not close.
The V27 attacks them separately. For the angle, it uses Incra’s AngleLOCK system — 27 machined positive stops at 5 degree increments across a +/- 60 degree range, with additional dedicated stops at +/- 22-1/2 degrees for octagons. These are mechanical detents. You are not aligning a pointer with a line; you are dropping a tooth into a groove, and it lands in the same place every time.
For the slop, the miter bar is adjustable. The GlideLOCK design expands at four points along its length to fill a slot that measures anywhere between 0.740 in and 0.760 in — which covers a new saw, a worn saw, and the variation between brands. Set it so the gauge slides with no side play and no drag, and it stays that way.
What is not included
There is no fence. The gauge comes with a universal mounting bracket drilled to accept a shop-made wooden fence or Incra’s own 18 in accessory fence. That is a deliberate design choice — it lets you fit a long sacrificial fence for crosscutting and a short one for narrow stock — but it does mean the tool is not usable out of the box without ten minutes and a piece of straight hardwood, or another purchase.
A removable T-clip is included for saws whose slots need it.
The limits of a 5 degree grid
Twenty-seven stops sounds like a lot until you need 3 degrees of back-bevel on a leg. Between the detents you are setting the angle against the vernier scale by eye, which is accurate enough and still better than the stock gauge, but it is ordinary work rather than the drop-in repeatability the detents give you. If most of your angles are arbitrary rather than standard, Incra’s 1000-series gauges with their finer indexing are the better spend.
The other hard limit is the slot. This is a square-sided 3/4 in x 3/8 in bar. Saws with T-slots that require a T-shaped bar, and the handful of machines with non-standard slot widths, cannot use it.
Worth noting
It works on a router table as well as a table saw, and it moves to your next saw. For a tool that outlasts the machine it is fitted to, the price reads differently than it does on the shelf.
What works
- The AngleLOCK stops are physical V-grooves, not a scale you line a pointer up against — the gauge drops into 45 degrees and is at 45 degrees, repeatably, with no test cut
- The GlideLOCK bar expands at four points to take up the slop in a worn 3/4 in slot, which is usually the real reason a mitre cut is out
- Special stops at plus and minus 22-1/2 degrees mean eight-sided work is a drop-in setting rather than an arithmetic exercise
What doesn't
- Stops are at 5 degree increments: anything between them is set against the vernier by eye, which is fine but is not what you bought the detents for
- No fence is included — the universal bracket takes a shop-made fence or Incra's 18 in accessory fence, so budget for one
- It only fits standard square-sided 3/4 in x 3/8 in slots; T-slot-only saws and some imports are out