Router advice

davgtrek

hi all
an aldi shop i was in yesterday has some park tool routers, a router table & biscuit jointers. my terminology for roters is non existant so here goes.

i am thinking at €35 the router is a no brainer.
apologies for my ignorance here but do routers generally have the same "chuck" size. is that called a collet ?

is the aldi router any good ?
can anyone advise on a good allrounder reasonable bit set ?
( i'm thinking i need to do a 8-10mm round chamfer edge to a worktop.
and a few 5mm deep decorative grooves to side panels of a side board/dresser )

are their router tables any good ?
is a router table important ?

thanks for any feeback

dubtom

The aldi router will do fine,it's more than likely a 1/4'' collet,which will accept nearly all of the router bits you see in boxed sets everywhere. They probably sell the boxed sets also, which will do fine,I've had cheap sets for years which are still going strong. A set usually will have all you need shape wise,buying seperatly can be very expensive.
I would avoid the router table.The table itself maybe fine but the fences that come with them are usually plastic and don't support or hold the wood sufficently for a repeatable accurate route, which when using a table is what it's supposed to do. For routing a groove I'd just use wood clamped as a guide,which is easier to set up than a table and you can see what you are routing (with a table you would route the piece face down and have to use a start line and a stop,takes a bit of practise and very accurate measuring)

ennisa

davgtrek,
I have one of the aldi router tables and as dubtom says the fence isn't great. I've made some 'adjustments' to beef it up and it's servicable but not ideal. There is a large number of plans on line for making router tables and they are generally simple and sturdy construction. Once you get into using a router then you will see the advantage of a table. So i would recommend skipping the intermediary frustration and build your own table. I have the aldi router and it is grand for light work like edging/rabbeting(rebating) and dado's etc. It's a good place to start. The router bits I find did dull quickly but buy a cheap starter box and you will soon find which ones you use the most and as they need to be replaced you can just buy a single more expensive ones as you go. If you are just cutting plywood or mdf then the cheap ones are fine but cutting any decent amount of hardwood will dull them pretty quick.

Hope this helps.

SpitfireIV

Like the guys said, avoid the table, they aint worth it! I even heard of some guys who were interested in the table to use as a mounting plate in a larger table but even still they said it wasnt great, wasnt perfectly flat etc.

If you did really want to have a table, do like ennisa said and make one! It'd be a nice, relatively easy first routher project! Get yourself an offcut off a worktop (Ie something thats flat, solid and has a good smooth surface). Go to 'Rutlands' or 'Axminster' and buy yourself a router table plate and a couple of lenghts of t-track and bobs yer uncle, you'll have a good strudy router table!


Oh, and by the way, once you start using a router the possibilities are endless, you'll wonder where the machine has been all your life! :pac:

davgtrek

thanks lads. gonna try to get one tomorrow if they're still left.
for now itll be mainly putting grooves in mdf (if thats possible ) and some profiles in SW. I saw how hard it was to cut a solid beech kitchen worktop 3 years ago for my own place. i ended lobbing the square into a local joinery to shape it for a few euro.

i have a long plank of it left over that prob sounds perfect as a base for the made up router base as croppy suggests.

my only massive problem now is a "space" to do all this. the steel shed may have to get a good clear out !!! always some hurdle.

dubtom

Wear a mask when routing mdf,it's letal.

davgtrek

good point dubtom. thanks.

ennisa

yes indeed good point, routing and cutting mdf, actually any power tool that touches mdf and produces a lot of dust you should have a mask. And something slightly better than the simple elasticated cloth ones. Go for something a little more dart-vader ish and while you may think you look a little silly it really is helping more than you realise. Plus in the grand scheme of things they are not that expensive. I don't have any recommendations for masks as I have yet to work with mdf for any length of time.

Do you guys have any recommendations?

Take care.

davgtrek

i did some fitted wardrobes for my own house 2 summers ago and decided to buy the sheets of MDF from a local joinery who for €5 extra would cut them up any way you wanted which was a good deal. Collecting the cut up doors and shelves etc. was an experience. That is some environment to be working in 8 hours a day. I know they have industrial extraction but some serious dust in the atmosphere all the same.

yep. darth vader all the way.