Cutting a 45 degree miter on a 12 foot piece of trim by myself was a dumb idea

I was trying to install some crown molding in a living room and didn't want to wait for my helper. I had the 12 foot piece balanced on my miter saw stand, holding one end up with my knee. My cut was off by a solid 1/8 inch. The guy doing the tile in the next room walked by, saw me struggling, and just said 'rent a stand, man.' I went and got a proper roller stand for 30 bucks and the next cut was perfect. How do you guys handle long cuts when you're working solo?

4 comments

4 Comments

kelly4701mo ago

Watch people fight with a basic task for an hour before they just go get the right tool. I mean it happens everywhere. You'll see someone trying to open a box with a butter knife instead of walking to the drawer for the scissors. Or balancing a phone on a cup to record a video instead of using a cheap stand. We all seem to try to muscle through with a bad setup first, idk why. Maybe it's just pride or not wanting to stop what you're doing. That roller stand is a perfect example, you suffered for way longer than the trip to the store took.

ray56215d ago

Gotta disagree a bit here. In my experience, the janky setup actually forced me to learn why my cuts were off. I spent an afternoon on my knees fighting a 10 foot piece of baseboard, and by the end I could feel the exact moment the board shifted. @milalewis might know what I'm talking about, sometimes that struggle teaches you the fundamentals better than the perfect tool. A roller stand is great, but if you never learn to brace and balance without it, you'll still make bad cuts when the stand isn't around. Take that with a grain of salt though.

ward.diana1mo ago

Learned that lesson the hard way too. I ended up using a couple of those cheap plastic saw horses and a long 2x4 as a makeshift support. It was still kind of janky but way better than trying to knee-lift a giant piece of trim. Honestly, just having something to take the weight off makes all the difference. That roller stand sounds like a solid buy though, might grab one myself.

milalewis1mo ago

Totally feel that, the janky setup is a rite of passage. My first time I tried propping a long board on a trash can and a stack of books, which was a disaster waiting to happen. Anything beats fighting gravity with your own knees for sure.