Will I Ruin a Good Router Table

[dusty]

if I install a miter track where one would be needed on this router table?

Am I flirty with disaster if I do this.

I have an extensive set of router bits and would not have to invest in finger joint or dado blades.

NOT to be used with router bit shown.

[Gene Howe]

JMO Dusty, but I wouldn't do it. But, I use a dado blade in the TS for the I Box.
In the 15 years of using the RT, there has never been an instance where an operation couldn't be completed because of the lack of a miter slot.
The OAR has a miter slot that is never used, either.

[mbcabinetmaker]

I don't think it would hurt your table but routing box joints creates a huge mess. At least with Dado blades you can contain a lot of it.

[algale]

In general what advantages, if any, does using a router table to create box joints offer over using a table saw?

[dusty]

Advantage? I don't know that there is one except that I have router bits and need to buy finger joint blades.

Does doing joints in more than one machines count as an advantage?

Cleanup! Boy did you hit home with that. You should see my shop right now. However, this mess is from "playing" with the I-Box with NO lower saw guard. Yes, cleanup. Much of it.

[robinson46176]

I'm hoping to build my new router table later this month while winter is still making me enjoy being inside. I keep building it in my head and think I am ready. Of course the instant I build it I will want to change it.
I personally have no intention to build it with any miter gauge slots, just not my thing. I have enough SS's and extra table-saws to make specialized set-ups and leave them at least basically sat up. But that is just for how I work.
In your case if that is what you want to do and it likely fits your shop and work pattern, go for it. We here all know that you are not in the habit of going off half cocked or hacking wildly into things without careful planning and proper caution. If you don't do it you will always wonder if you would be happier with it if you had done it.


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[dusty]

I'm hoping to build my new router table later this month while winter is still making me enjoy being inside. I keep building it in my head and think I am ready. Of course the instant I build it I will want to change it.
I personally have no intention to build it with any miter gauge slots, just not my thing. I have enough SS's and extra table-saws to make specialized set-ups and leave them at least basically sat up. But that is just for how I work.
In your case if that is what you want to do and it likely fits your shop and work pattern, go for it. We here all know that you are not in the habit of going off half cocked or hacking wildly into things without careful planning and proper caution. If you don't do it you will always wonder if you would be happier with it if you had done it.
.

Maybe there was a day but here lately a lot of what I do does not make muster.

I don't know why I was thinking about putting a miter slot in the Pro Router Table when the Shopsmith Router Table already has one.

Pro Router Table.jpg (90.08 KiB) Viewed 12211 times

Shopsmith Router Table.jpg (95.5 KiB) Viewed 12211 times

[dusty]

Francise, I owe you one. Thanks for this input. It made me think.

My original router table is stowed away somewhere in the shop and I need to locate it. I know it needs new edgebanding but that is a small factor.

Here are two of my sketchups, one superimposed over the other. The drawings are to scale. The I-Box is drawn with the miter bar located as I have it set for the Mark V in table saw mode. Some coincidence.

[algale]

Advantage? I don't know that there is one except that I have router bits and need to buy finger joint blades.

Why buy a finger joint blade? Won't a standard dado blade do the job?

[dusty]

Advantage? I don't know that there is one except that I have router bits and need to buy finger joint blades.

Why buy a finger joint blade? Won't a standard dado blade do the job?

A good one would but mine rose up out of the Civil War era. It is a Freud 6" stacking dado blade that cuts real nice dadoes with 'bat wings'.