need a new router plate

[sunnybob]

I'm, fed up with "phenolic" plates. (hammer) (hammer) (hammer)
Any one know where I can buy a metal one with interchangeable inserts at a reasonable price?
My kreg plate is warped badly enough that I cant line it up with the table. This is the second one. The first warped very quickly, and even though Kreg replaced it i cant be doing with the hassle because I have to wait while they send it from america.
Ali or steel, anyone?

 

[Droogs]

Bob with the amount of kit you have and metal experience, can't you make a steel one yourself?

 

[yetloh]

From a quick Google I think you might struggle to find a steel one. Axi do a 6mm thick UJK item which should be up to the job. It has 38mm insert with other sizes extra. My phenolic plate is still good after 10 years or so with a big Dewalt 625 hung on it; could your problems be to do with the Cyprus heat perhaps?

Jim

 

[sunnybob]

Droogs, I can cut the shape, but I dont have a metal lathe and cant make the interchangeable inserts. I cant do without those as I use bits from 3 mm right up to 40 mm wide on small pieces of wood.

Yetloh, I dont think it can be the temperature. I find others have reported the same problems on other forums as well. And my makita still has its springs in. I use my home made lift pushing from below against the springs, so they should even support the plate. I use the Kreg levelling corners but they cant cope with a dip inside the edges.
This has gone in exactly the same place as last time, left side. When the rest of the plate is level to the fence, the outfeed side has a gap between fence and plate.
On most work it would not make much difference, but I do a bit of birds mouth routing which needs the outfeed fence to support a knife edge taper as the wood moves across the bit.

I suspect if you laid a straight edge across yours front to back and side to side you would see daylight.

There used to be a guy on ebay selling stainless steel plates, but i cant find him lately.

 

[Droogs]

Why not make a steel plate and then use your drill as a vertical lathe and make plastic inserts

 

[sunnybob]

Having spent a while surfing the web I might end up doing that.
From 20 quid chinese though 100 quid UJK (85 for the plate, rings EXTRA!), to untold hundreds for some american makes.
But I dont want to. That will take me the best part of a week and I want to make wooden stuff, not keep replacing manufacturers poorly made stuff.

The really annoying part is that I like the kreg interchangeable discs, its just this tilt and sag that is unacceptable.

 

[marcros]

A (very) long shot, but try a PM to dibs-h and ask whether there are any left over from the group buy. I have my doubts, but you may be lucky.

 

[sunnybob]

Marcros;
huh? who?

 

[marcros]

That is the username. Dibs used to post a lot, and has popped up from time to time recently.

 

[marcros]

router-insert-interested-t54884.html?hilit=Group%20buy

 

[Peter Sefton]

We have had some Incra plates half price and a new 10mm thick Ali one that might suit your needs if that helps.

Cheers Peter

 

[sunnybob]

Peter, =D> I have just been surfing your site and made a wish list including that plate. Do you have any idea if my Makita RP 1801 will fit the undrilled? It mentions the diameter of the fixing holes in the blurb. I will have to get mine out of the table to measure.

And are you likely to run short of them at that price? I wont be in the UK till easter and suspect postage to Cyprus would hurt my pocket book.

 

[sunnybob]

Marcros, just read that thread, he mentions all he has left are rings.

 

[TFrench]

Could you get a steel or ali plate machined to fit your existing kreg rings?

 

[AES]

I'm not into routering too much (yet - must be careful that SWMBO doesn't read this!) but with my limited experience I can't understand why any manufacturer offers router support plates in phenolic. Where's the benefit in that material, AFAIK it's not even much cheaper than ali?

I don't understand what your "rings" are/are for Sunnybob, but to me Peter Sefton's 10m thick ali plate sounds ideal.

When I get round to it I've got some nice flat hard ali plate (7000 series I think) about 12mm thick (ex aircraft side freight door frame) and plenty big enough. So I'm going to make one from that.

As said I don't understand your "rings" but in theory anyway, I can't see that making a router plate can be all that difficult, especially if I take the (plastic) bottom plate off my (cheapo) router and use that as a template. "Easy peasy" (says he before he's even tried)! Am I in for a big shock once I "gettaroundtoit"?

 

[marcros]

The rings are like a zero clearance insert. The cutters come in various sizes so you have a number of different sized rings to choose from. They fit into a larger sized hole in the plate itself.

 

[sunnybob]

Tfrench, no. To get the kind of skill that would take would place the cost of the plate well over shop prices of new.

AES, Marcros has it. Not so much if you are routing dados in door frames (or similar large work) but you need to have the wood supported as close to the cutter as possible.
Because I do a lot of small work on quite short pieces of wood, I cant have a 3 mm cutter in the middle of a 50 mm hole because the wood would fall into it. Conversely, when I use a large 50 mm wide cutter, I need the hole wide enough for clearance. The kreg comes with three easily replacable rings of different apertures, and others are available to make your own sized holes.

Annoyingly, I actually have a Trend steel plate that has a selection of rings, but its a lot smaller than the Kreg so to fit that I would have to make either a lot of supporting brackets or a whole new table top.

The incra may well be the answer.

 

[AES]

OK gents, I think I get it now (the rings that is). I'll give the matter some more thought before I start on my own router plate - it's some time away anyway.

 

[sunnybob]

Just to repeat... this is only important of youre doing small fiddly stuff, a site carpenter would not have to worry about it.

 

[Peter Sefton]

Peter, =D> I have just been surfing your site and made a wish list including that plate. Do you have any idea if my Makita RP 1801 will fit the undrilled? It mentions the diameter of the fixing holes in the blurb. I will have to get mine out of the table to measure.

And are you likely to run short of them at that price? I wont be in the UK till easter and suspect postage to Cyprus would hurt my pocket book.

sunnybob

Our experience suggests you should have no problem using Makita RP 1801, however I unfortunately cannot find a mounting hole diagram so cannot confirm this.
Should the hole spacings be ok with the plate the only other items you will need are the mounting bolts for the router as we would not have anything similar.
We have stock at the moment so I do not foresee us selling out before Easter but you never know. If you would like further information please do not hesitate to contact myself or my team at [email protected]

Cheers Peter