I use dowels in a number of projects around my shop. For a clean appearance, and to soften the sharp edges, I like to chamfer their ends. To make the chamfer uniform, I made the jig shown here.
I cut a V-groove in the block to hold the dowel, and then glued a small piece of hardboard across one end to act as a stop. After beveling the end to 45°, I glued the assembly to a small hardboard base. To chamfer the dowel, just clamp down the base, turn on the sander, and rotate the dowel counter clockwise against the stop until its end is chamfered all around.
