RogerS
Established Member
This item is currently on a special offer from Protrade and at £89 or thereabouts is not bad for the two items. Assembly took about 30 minutes.
The table is an aluminium extrusion and as far as I could see by the eye was level and square. The legs are pressed steel but when bolted down onto a baseplate the whole assembly is reasonably solid.
The mitre guide is a very loose fit in its' guide track and I would have preferred a tighter fit.
The fence has an adjustable outfeed but is not deep enough (if that's the right word) to wrap around the router bit (see my separate post on safety).
The router is variable speed with numbered click stop settings although there is no guide as to what the actual rpm are for each setting. Searching for this on the web revealed a dead-end. The router itself seems no noisier than my small Makita. Both take 1/4" shanks and the Ryobi also takes 3/8 for what good that is as I've yet to find a source for router bits with this size shank.
The one problem that I have found is that after a couple of weeks use (light to medium) the clamp no longer holds the router in position firmly. You can set the height but then as you start to rout the vibration causes the router to inexorably slide down. Has anyone else experienced this? With the Ryobi? With other routers? Is there a common cause? Out of balance router bits? Or just a bad 'un.
To be fair to Protrade, customer service is very good and they did a next day swap out and so I will see how the new one fares.
Having used it I realise now how useful it is to have sitting there ready for use. Now all I need is a 1/2" handheld and I'm set!
The table is an aluminium extrusion and as far as I could see by the eye was level and square. The legs are pressed steel but when bolted down onto a baseplate the whole assembly is reasonably solid.
The mitre guide is a very loose fit in its' guide track and I would have preferred a tighter fit.
The fence has an adjustable outfeed but is not deep enough (if that's the right word) to wrap around the router bit (see my separate post on safety).
The router is variable speed with numbered click stop settings although there is no guide as to what the actual rpm are for each setting. Searching for this on the web revealed a dead-end. The router itself seems no noisier than my small Makita. Both take 1/4" shanks and the Ryobi also takes 3/8 for what good that is as I've yet to find a source for router bits with this size shank.
The one problem that I have found is that after a couple of weeks use (light to medium) the clamp no longer holds the router in position firmly. You can set the height but then as you start to rout the vibration causes the router to inexorably slide down. Has anyone else experienced this? With the Ryobi? With other routers? Is there a common cause? Out of balance router bits? Or just a bad 'un.
To be fair to Protrade, customer service is very good and they did a next day swap out and so I will see how the new one fares.
Having used it I realise now how useful it is to have sitting there ready for use. Now all I need is a 1/2" handheld and I'm set!
A centre punch applied to the edges of the mitre guide bar will effectively widen it where the metal is dimpled. Whack in dimples with your 'ammer until you achieve the required fit. Of course you shouldn't really have to know how to deal with this, but mitre gauges that actually fit their slots don't seem to be something manufacturers aspire to in my experience. :? 
