Kreg Owners' Community

Hello everyone!

I am new to the site and will be purchasing the new Kreg Router table (Item# PRS1045) as soon as it becomes available. I've always enjoyed building wood projects but have zero expierence using a router or router table. Any tips for me of pitfalls to avoid? Router suggestions? I'm leaning towards the Milwaukee 5616-24. Thanks & I appreciate any feedback!

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Hi Josh take it slow and easy your be fine , if making dadoes or rabbets lots of shallow passes rather than deep passes which will cause tear out and could potential rip the work piece out of your hands. If edge shaping such as using a round over bit , practice on a scrap piece before committing the work piece that you have spent hours on to the router .Free hand routing when ever possible use a guide rail of some kind or a suitable jig for the task in hand. Always rout away from your body, clamp the work piece to a bench if free hand . These are the basics ,and I am sure many members can give you more advice, go steady Mick. 

Hi Josh,  gaining experience on a router table is one that will take you many hours to become fully acquainted with everything that you can do on a router table.  Get started  by becoming fully aware of all of the safety issues just as you would with a table or radial arm saw.   They are just as dangerous so the use of safety glasses and ear muffs are a must.  Since you are purchasing a new router from Kreg Tools you are getting a first class system of which will perform well for you and I will not go into router table and fence conditions.

Some of the most often forgotten or un-followed laws of safety is that of knowing where your hands are at all time in relationship to the router bit and it path of travel.  Routing of crooked, split of otherwise wood with structure flaws that can lead to a router bit grabbing and or exploding the wood as it is being router.  Working on the router while it is still plugged in such as changing bits.

The setting of the router bit's amount of cut being too great leads to unsafe conditions as well as poorly results in routing.  Sharpness of the bit also will determine the results of the cut.  An easy test to make to determine the sharpness of the bit is to drag the bit cutting edge across the too of your thumb nail.  It should remove a very light shaving from the nail.

The bit speed being too great as well as to slow leads to bit heating up and leads to failure with bit breakage.  A good suggested speed for a bit is determined by the diameter of the bit and also by the type of material you are cutting.  Above all do not run a router bit about it manufactures recommend or suggested speed.  An exploding router bit is like bullets.

A good Suggested bit speed is:  

Suggested Routing Speeds

Bit Diameter

Maximum Speed

1'' (25 mm)
24,000 RPM
1 1/4'' - 2'' (30-50 mm)
18,000 RPM
2 1/4'' - 2 1/2'' (55-65 mm)
16,000 RPM
3'' - 3 1/2'' (75-90 mm)
12,000 RPM

The above chart is from Sommerfeld tools and Recommended.  This is compiled from an experienced router bit designer and professional user of router bits.  

Direction of feed is important to prevent kick back of the material.  On a router table run the material from the right to the left as you are feeding the wood into the cutting edge of the bit.  There may be times when you have to run the material from the left to the right but be repaired for some jerking of the wood as it engages the cutting edge of the bit.  Hold on to the surface of the material as it will tend to want to take off from the rotation of the bit. Do not allow the material to engage the bit at a rapid speed but slowly move the material into the bit.  This type of cut is known as a "climb cut" and is a dangerous cut that should be avoided as much as possible.

Always use a fence and and make sure it is set correctly with the bearing on the bit.  It should be flush and on cuts that require a large amount of material removal make multiple passes over the bit.  Do this by adjusting the fence to limit the amount of exposure of material to the bit. 

On some routing procedures you may find yourself needing to rout an object of which you can not use the fence.  In this situation it can be done by use of what is known as a starting pin.  (a pin located in the table top and usually towards the front and to the right of the location of the bit)  In this situation you will place the object against the starting pin and slowly pivot the material into the bit allowing the bit to actually stop and rotate on the top of the bit.  It stops because of the contact with the spinning bit.  Once it has stopped then rotate the object to your left into the router bit.  ( Remember  right to left )   Do not force the object against the cutter faster than it will cut. 

Something you will soon learn after routing material is that all wood do not cut the same and that do not act the same way against a cutting bit even if it is the same species of wood.  You will find that there will be a speed of router bit rotation and you speed of feeding the bit that will result in perfect cuts.  This again will be determined by the sharpness of the router bit.   Too fast of a cut against a bit will result is rough cutting and too slow will result is burned wood.  This is caused by the high speed generating heat to a point of scorching the wood before it can complete its cut and move away from the bit.

Type of bits shank is also very important.  The best results are obtained by using a 1/2inch shank as the do not vibrate as much and are a much tougher and stronger bit making them more resistant to breaking.  In the 1/2 router bits the shank acts like a heat sink for the cutting head of the bit and act much like a heat sink in a computer processor.  It simply removes heat by absorbing it.  This fact alone makes your cuts smoother as the vibration is dampened more than a 1/4" shank and since there is less apt to be as much heat the cuts are also more apt to be free of burned and or scorched wood.  Sure the cost more money but they also last longer as like anything else heat is an enemy to the parts from the cutters to the bearing and the shank as well.

 Another thing to consider is that the 1/2 collet is one that will grip tighter and hold much better that that of the 1/4" shank simply because it has more surface to grab.

Am important thing to know is never allow the router bit to bottom out in the router collet before it is tightened.  What happens is that the bit will bottom out in the router and will result in such things as a loose bit that spins in the collet and ruins the collet, the bit shank and sometimes the end of the router motor.   A simple trick is to use a rubber grommet in the bottom of the collet .  The bit rests on the grommet and allows the bit to tighten fully without being bottomed out in the router.  The collet tightens the bit by gripping and pulling down on the shank of the bit.

In the event that you do end up with a stuck bit one method that often helps is to loose the nut and tap lightly on the side of the collet while pulling up on the bit.  Often it will release the bit.  The cause of stuck bits does not mean that you have a bad bit or a collet but sometimes it is the results of a seizure from the heat generated while routing.

Occasionally check the collets for rough surface and polish it carefully using a very fine emery making sure to make complete revolutions around the collet to avoid making any divots and or flat surface within the collet .  Do not oil the bit shanks or collets before inserting a bit as this will lead to a slipping and a loose bit.

There is much more to say but this covers the basics of beginning routing.  I am sure the manuals with your new router table will discuss zero clearance plates for the bits in the fence.  

Work safely and enjoy you experience with the router.  I might add this is gained from my own personal experience and not a You Tube or internet search results dialogue that I have seen on here.

Thanks Jay & Michael! The suggestions are great and I really appreciate you taking the time to help me out. Any thoughts on a particular router? Are you using a kreg table? Are there any other table "extras" or accessories that I should be looking at as well? Another important question is what brand of bits do you recommend? There are a TON available in the marketplace but I can't seem to find a consensus on which are the best to get. I'd rather pay for good ones and be happy with their performance rather than go cheap to save a few bucks. Thanks again!

Hi Josh, I use mostly sommerfeld bits available at www.sommerfeldtools.com.  I also use whiteside for some smaller routing projects like making molding.  The table I have is one made by sommerfeld tools and is a custom table that just finished building it a couple months ago.  Photos are on my photo page and a slide show link is there as well.   Before that I also had a phenolic resin custom router table also made by sommerfeld tools.  As for a router I am using the triton tra001 which is a 3 &1/4 hp  as it has some features that I like such as the triton motor blow the air through the motor from the top of the router and out the bottom which would be beneficial by preventing most of the dust and chips from going through the router.  Most of the others work the opposite and actually such dust and chips into the motor.  Triton has a great dust extraction features and has a winder that is bit height adjustable through the table top by using a winder (crank).  It has a one wrench feature allowing easier bit changes.  This my router choice of all that are out there.  I retired the hatichi mv 12 when I got the triton.
 
Josh F said:

Thanks Jay & Michael! The suggestions are great and I really appreciate you taking the time to help me out. Any thoughts on a particular router? Are you using a kreg table? Are there any other table "extras" or accessories that I should be looking at as well? Another important question is what brand of bits do you recommend? There are a TON available in the marketplace but I can't seem to find a consensus on which are the best to get. I'd rather pay for good ones and be happy with their performance rather than go cheap to save a few bucks. Thanks again!

Hi Josh , I am the same as Jay use Triton routers especially like the tra 001 very good in a table .The motor does not stall under load and that above table adjuster is great.

Josh,

There are several discussions on router tables & routers.

Perhaps you can find some helpful info in the following:

1.  You can do a search, using the "search field", located in the upper right hand corner of this page---enter an applicable work search--"router tables", "routers", or the like.

2.  This discussion covers a Porter Cable router.

http://kregjig.ning.com/forum/topics/adding-a-kreg-router-table-to-...

I'm partial to the PC routers---have had them for a number of years, and they've performed flawlessly,

as well as the Bosch routers.

Also, to consider when purchasing a router, is the available accessories that are available for the model you select---for table routers as well as hand held routers.

Consider a router that you can use hand-held as well as for use in an router table.

A fixed base that you can use in your router table, and a plunge base that you can use for hand-held routing operations.

I believe the largest selection of router accessories are available for the PC routers.

router tables are all about set up, you have to check an then recheck, an then check again. is that to many checks ? loooool. good luck

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