Router Mania
December 10th, 2008How Many is Enough?
I thought people were kidding when they left comments saying they had several routers. Now I can see how that happens.
I got a big ol’ plunge router, intending to put it in a table. Now it’s installed. So I have no handheld plunge router. Sure, I can uninstall it when I want to use it. And I could also do my routing using a sharpened spoon. It’s not going to happen.
The router experts say you need a nice fixed-base router AND a nice plunge router, but you don’t want a giant one like my table router, because the little ones are easier to handle.
I need to get rid of my old Sears table. Maybe I should keep the router.
Here’s something cool. A Greek guy named Dino has come up with a strange rail-based system for routers and circular saws. It’s amazing. You can cut 8-foot sheets of lumber accurately with this thing. You can get near-furniture-quality cuts with a 24-tooth saw. He has a thing that connects a router to it, standing up, and you can move the router around like a CNC deal. You can literally write your name with it. Although now that I think about it, that’s pretty easy with a router you hold in your hands.
There are other track-based systems, but his is the most interesting, because it’s just one lone nut, competing with Festool and Dewalt.
I have to make dust collection a priority. I wish I could blow it out into the yard, but as I have pointed out previously, it’s not easy to make a machine that both sucks and blows. Maybe I should just pressurize the garage with my compressor and run a Y-shaped hose from the fence and router to the yard. Will the compressor be big enough? Maybe I can find a surplus jet engine. And perhaps I could put wings on the garage while I’m at it.
Sooner or later I really have to build something.
December 10th, 2008 at 9:53 PM
Something that both sucks and blows is called an eductor. If you blow high-pressure air into a venturi, it entrains air into the nozzle and out the back end. Shipboard damage control people use them with water. A 50 GPM handybilly pump connected to a 3″ eductor can eject 200 GPM from a flooded compartment (but only lift the water 1/4 as high). It’s also the basic principle of a jet engine afterburner.
You don’t have a lathe, so you can’t make a really good venturi, but two 1″ to 1-1/4″ PVC reducing tees, little ends stuck together with the shortest possible piece of 1″ PVC pipe, makes quite a good approximation. It doesn’t even have to be glued.
Then you need a 1-1/4″ elbow. Drill a small hole, such that you can put a piece of rigid tubing through it that’s centered on one output of the ell. Connect that to the venturi made of reducing tees with a short piece of 1-1/4″ pipe.
Apply compressed air to the little tube. Compressed air blowing into the venturi causes a vacuum at the open side of the ell, and blasts whatever is picked up out the open end of the nozzle. Adjust the little tube in and out for maximum vacuum. No bags, no crevices for stuff to collect in; it just sucks on one side and blows on the other, exactly as desired. It’s even remarkably quiet, modulo the sound of the compressor running.
It’s inefficient as Hell, especially since you can’t get a good smooth venturi, but it works like a champ. It’ll take you a long afternoon to try it, and cost about $15 – $20, both being spent mostly at Home Depot looking for the appropriate pipe pieces.
Once you’ve convinced yourself that it works you’ll want a foot-controlled valve for the compressed air, either directly or a footswitch running a solenoid valve. Stand on the footswitch while cutting, step away afterward to let the compressor recover. Not magic, but an odd bit of technology most people don’t know about because there are much more efficient ways of doing the same thing if you don’t mind spending a lot more money.
Regards,
Ric
December 10th, 2008 at 10:16 PM
Don’t forget about a “D” handle router, too.
December 10th, 2008 at 10:25 PM
I had to reverse-engineer a rotted patio door with a solid glass center, because the measurements were odd (about 3 inches shorter than a standard exterior door, and 1½ inches narrower).
I used a circular saw to cut down a standard door, then the same tool to open up a rectangle in the middle, with a sabre saw to finish the cuts.
But what to do about the beveled wood edge around the glass?
Having intentionally cut the rectangle a half-inch too small, I used a router to bevel down on one side of the door, then to open up the other side completely so the (transferred) glass would drop right in. A million small nails and some ½-inch plastic trim finished out the wider side.
There is nothing you can’t do with a router.
December 11th, 2008 at 1:13 AM
Next thing you know you’re gonna want one of these, a palm router:
http://www.rockler.com/product.cfm?page=16819&cookietest=1
to do door hinges and other precision stuff freehand or with one of these templates:
http://www.nextag.com/Bosch-83038-Deluxe-Door-62245462/prices-html
I replaced all of the Luan doors in my 1963 vintage house last summer with six panel slabs bought from the local big box home improvement store. Didn’t have to look at any incompetent butt cracks but my own in the three day process.
December 11th, 2008 at 7:35 AM
This:http://www.amazon.com/Woodshop-Dust-Control-Complete-Completely/dp/1561584991/ref=pd_bbs_sr_3?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1228997955&sr=8-3 is the Bible when it comes to dust control.
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Heck, if I could find mine, I’d mail it to you.
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I have a cyclone system, but that’s overkill for a garage shop. A smaller collector with blast gates is kosher if you are using one machine at a time.
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Three things to keep in mind:
1. Use a machine with, or upgrade to bags with a 1 micron or better rating. It’s the small particulates that kill your lungs.
2. If you use PVC for your piping, GROUND IT! Static can make your shop go boom. Yeah, the chance is small, but you don’t seem like a corner-cutter. Steel is better, although more of a PITA to install.
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3 These things are the shiznit: http://www.amazon.com/PSI-Woodworking-LR110-3-Ranger-Collector/dp/B00004S9AI/ref=sr_1_8?ie=UTF8&s=hi&qid=1228998697&sr=1-8 They come in 240, too. I have one main unit with 4 remotes around my shop.
December 11th, 2008 at 8:40 PM
You need one of those small routers, I’ve seen ’em referred to as trim routers. We have a small air-powered router that always has a corner-rounding bit installed. It’s amazing how much better any of your home-made stuff looks after you’ve rounded the corners and edges of the wood.
FWIW: PVC ducting might give you a Zap! if it’s ungrounded, but it’s extremely unlikely that you’ll have an explosion. From what I’ve read, there has never been a documented case of an explosion in a small woodshop due to static charges on PVC dust collector pipes. Besides, to do it right is quite complex, just attaching a wire doesn’t do the job.