How I Built NinjaFence

April 2026

From a real workshop problem

NinjaFence didn’t start as a product idea — it started from a real problem in a workshop.

I’m an embedded software engineer, but I grew up around woodworking. My father has over 40 years of experience as a carpenter, and many of the tools I use today come from him.

One problem we constantly faced was positioning the table saw fence accurately and repeatedly. Manual adjustment is slow, and small errors accumulate over time.

I wanted to build something that could make this process simple, precise, and repeatable.

The first prototype

The very first version was extremely simple — just a stepper motor and basic control logic.

There was no enclosure, no UI, and no refinement. But it proved one thing:

the idea works.

Early wiring and lab testing

After validating the concept, I moved into lab testing.

At this stage, everything was still exposed:

Loose wiring
Basic drivers
Manual control logic

This phase was mainly about stability and control reliability.

Custom PCB and system integration

To move beyond a prototype, I designed a custom PCB to integrate:

Stepper control
Power management
Signal interface
Touchscreen communication

This was the point where NinjaFence became a real system instead of a collection of modules.

However, this version was part of an early design that I eventually decided to abandon.

At that stage, I was not only trying to move the fence, but also to control:

Blade height adjustment
Blade tilt angle

While technically possible, the system quickly became too complex. Achieving a reliable and usable solution would require significantly more development time and effort.

The scope kept expanding, and the timeline became unpredictable.

So I made a deliberate decision:

focus on solving one problem well — precise and repeatable fence positioning.

The blade height and tilt control features were removed from the design. They may be revisited in the future, but only after the core system is fully stable and practical.