Quick Tip – Adding a Light to the Bandsaw

Those of you who follow Christopher Schwarz’ blog at Popular Woodworking my recall him writing about an IKEA lamp that he reluctantly fell in love with.  You can see his post Here.   The lamp that he raved about is called the Jansjo and is quite a handy little light.   At the time, I recall looking on the IKEA website and seeing that shipping was almost as much as the cost of the lamp.  Needless to say, I didn’t order one.  Well, I went to Seattle a couple of months ago and stopped by the IKEA store to pick one of these up.

A Jansjo LED work light from IKEA.

When I finished my bench, I tried the light out but didn’t find it that helpful.  I suppose the main reason for this is that my shop is quite well-lit already.  I have a series of fluorescent tube lights around the room and track/spot lighting above the workbench and tablesaw.  This Jansjo light works very well and puts out a nice bright light, but it just wasn’t needed on my bench.  I decided to re-purpose it.

My bandsaw could use a good task light so I figured that would be a good use of the Jansjo.  To use the light on the bandsaw, I need to affix it to the door or frame of the saw vertically.  I could have done this with some double-sided tape, but then the light can’t be quickly re-purposed to other tasks in the shop if needed.  The lamp has a rough cast metal base to give it weight and make it stable, so I thought, why not use magnets?

I looked on amazon and found these BYKES 1/2 x 1/8 Rare Earth Magnets.  I ordered them and as always, two days later they were on my door step.

A set of VERY strong rare earth magnets.

The lamp has a thin layer of foam on the bottom to cover the rough cast metal.  I arranged some magnets on the bottom of the lamp and trimmed the foam around them with a scalpel.

Positioning the magnets on the base.

I cut the foam away where the magnets are going.

The foam cut away for all four magnets.

I tried adding the magnets and attaching the lamp to the saw.  However, when I removed the lamp, the magnets remained stuck to the saw, not on the bottom of the lamp where I want them.  To fix this problem, I turned to J-B Weld.

J-B Weld

J-B Weld is a 2 part epoxy that is good for gluing metal to metal

Just like other two part epoxies, the two tubes are mixed before use.

I mixed up a small amount and put a little dab at each magnet location.

A little JB Weld in each location.

The magnets provide their own clamping force.

This epoxy takes a while to cure so I left it like this overnight.  The next day I tried it on the saw, and it worked perfectly.  Also, when I take it off, the magnets stay stuck to the lamp, as I had hoped.

Let there be light!

A perfect addition to the bandsaw.

Overall, I’m very happy with the addition to the saw.  This lamp only costs $10 and the magnets are $o.40 a piece, so if you have an IKEA nearby, this makes for a very cheap upgrade to your bandsaw.

The only thing that I would do differently if I was doing this again is to use only three magnets.  I don’t know what possessed me to use four.  This thing sticks to the saw like white on rice; like stink on garbage; like shit to a blanket; like a clenched nail; like…. well, you get the point.  Feel free to chime in with your own, if you have more.

– Jonathan White