two clocks ready to finish with router profiles

[mac1012]

heres a couple of clocks i started yesterday one maple and the other utile , cut on the hegner and routered recess for clock movement.

I am looking at putting a concaved radius the maple one and a grooved radius on the utile one.

i want a router table and another router to make profiling easier but budget wont allow at moment.

i think ive worked out how to do the concaved radius with a bearing guided cutter and the grove around the face of utile clock using the edge guide.

my concern is starting of on the edge of wood with bearing cutter and getting into position to connect with edge of wood when hand held any tips ??

 

[Gill]

I'm not sure I understand what you're trying to do, Mark. Could you post a picture showing whereabouts on the clocks you want to route?

A proper router table would certainly be useful but you don't need to buy something expensive to do what you want to do. Just look at these:

I'm surprised you haven't made a router jig to help cut the holes for your clock. All it would need would be an arc of wood rather like a router trammel with a pin at either end and a hole... hang on, I'll try to draw what I'm on about. In this case a picture will be worth a thousand words, even if it does take me a couple of hours to draw it .

 

[Gill]

I've attached a picture of my suggested trammel jig for the clock face. Drill a centre hole in your jig of equal diameter to the hole at the centre of the clock face. Then drill a hole at the radius length where you want one of the holes for your clock face 'numbers' to be. Next, drill a hole where you want the position of the next clock face 'number' to be. This hole should be large enough to accommodate the bush which was supplied with your router so that you can fit the bush to your router base, position the router in the jig hole, then plunge a cutter of appropriate size to cut the hole for your 'number'.

Plug the centre hole of the jig with a piece of dowel of equal diameter but protruding slightly so that it fits into the centre hole in the clock face. Glue this in place. Do the same for the corresponding hole at the edge of the jig but don't touch the hole that has been drilled to accommodate your router bush . On my diagram I have coloured the centre and one of the edge holes so as to illustrate this.

Now it should simply be a matter of drilling the centre hole in your clock plus one of the clock 'numbers'. You can then position your jig, route the hole for the next number, lift the jig and rotate it so the pin at the edge of the clock face drops into the hole you've justed routed, ready to route the next one.

I hope that makes sense !

Of course, you could also make a template for the whole clock face and simply position holes of the appropriate size to accommodate your router bush over the position of each 'number' - it would be simpler and work just as well although it might be rather large.

Making a template or jig might seem like a lot of trouble but if you're going to be making a lot of clocks (to sell at a craft fair, perhaps?) then it's trouble which will save you an enormous amount of time in the long run and make life a lot easier because you won't have so much measuring, marking and drilling to do.

 

[mac1012]

Hi gill i think i understand what you mean ! i have a template for the quartz movement the dials are mainly different size studs see othe posts with a very small diameter pin that i pilot hole the dial takes me about ten minutes to mark out now i have done a few.

i not sure what i would gain by using the method you have suggested or what kind of numbers you mean ?

as for my profiling i am doing the edge all around on one with a bearing cutter simple as that just to make a profile

as i said earlier not sure how to start at the edge using a bearing guided cutter handheld but i going in shed now to practice on some scrap.

yeah router tables look good mine would need a fence i going to look around for a small bench top one as i havent got room for a free standing table due to other machines and an allocated space for a chop saw

mark

 

[stevebuk]

its really not difficult routing around the edge mark using hand held router, i have done it loads of times on plinths i have made to mount my pens on, just start the router nice and steady move it up to the wood, pull the trigger all the way and slowly move the router along, as it has a bearing it cant really go anywhere else..

 

[mac1012]

i had a go yesterday steve mmmm mixed results really i was doing a concaved profile on the maple clock found it difficult at first engaging with the edge of wood as before bearing engages it was hard to know whether in right place got better with practice ! corners where a bit fiddly too main problems where any slight deviation of router tipping as it hanging over edge of wood made profile wonky whaen coming off end think i be loads better and quicker with small router table up to a fence seen one ax has got for 140 going to get it when budget allows