Shopsmith Forums

I spent about 2 hours with my son today installing a new Router Raizer lift on the Dewalt 625 in my router table. After several times going through the instructions the night before, we were able to disassemble the router and put all the new parts in before dinner time. I must say that it works like a champ. I was torn between the high dollar lifts and this one, which costs less than $100, but was surprised at how well it works. I also bought a router bit extension but now I can't find my 1/2" collet for the router. Seems like my memory is not what it used to be.

What router bit extension did you end up buying? I know I need one so I am looking for recommendations from anybody who has one.

Very interesting! This is my first exposure to a Router Raizer, but they seem to get excellent reviews. I bought a Triton TRA001 router to go under-table on my stand-alone Shopsmith overarm pin router, and as near as I can tell it has the equivalent of a Router Raiser already built into it. It works great for me.

I bought this router extension from Amazon:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07RH ... UTF8&psc=1

The one made by the company was very nice but the router bit was tightened with a set screw and didn't have collets. With this one I got both a 1/2" and 1/4" collet for about 1/5 the price. We will see how well it works. I did have to buy a special wrench to fit the odd-ball nut they have on it.

Wow, what a great find. This is a ER-20 holder and two collets for just $17. You will be able to add additional collets of any size - 1/8", 3/8", 5/16" just to name a few and all the metric sizes as well. If you have a PowerPro you can use the standard 1/2" router bit chuck to mount this extension. The advantage there is you will be able to use inexpensive 4 flute instead of 2 flute 3/8" end mills to compensate for the lower RPM of the PowerPro. That gives you a great mortising capability. That is what I have done with a similar extender I purchased a couple of years ago. Only difference was it cost me over $100 and I had to shorten the shaft so it would fit into the Shopsmith router chuck.

I kept going between the two extensions and finally settled on the cheaper one. It had great reviews and after it arrived I was quite impressed. It looks like a quality piece of tooling. The collets that came with it look very similar to the collet on my Dewalt Router. As long as it's balanced well I don't expect any issues. I will post an update if I run into issues with it.

I have the router raizer on one of my routers. It works well. It was a pain taking the springs in and out of the router.....

The other issue I had was sawdust clogging things up. Here is a thread were I addressed this:

https://www.shopsmith.com/ss_forum/view ... izer#p9479

I have no idea if STP is in the current instructions???

I have since gone to using the Triton router for most of this work but still have the other setup to use as needed.

For the few times I needed an extension I first went to a chuck that had a locking method that ended up scoring the router bit shaft so I returned it and went with the set from MLCS. Here is a very short review from their site:

https://www.mlcswoodworking.com/shopsit ... sion+chuck

And where you can buy them:

https://www.mlcswoodworking.com/shopsit ... sion+chuck

I have been very happy with them. They do cost more so if the cheaper one works then great other wise you can always look to these. Vibrations are the big issue for these things, either something they cause or an extension of what the router already has but worse.....

I do like the idea of the one you posted about and may get one. What did you do for the wrench and did you find some other collets for other bit sizes? 8mm, and 3/8" would be good additions.

Ed

I found the wrenches on Amazon, too. It came with both ER16 and ER20 wrenches for less than $10.00
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B083X ... UTF8&psc=1

I tried it out last night and I noticed no noticeable vibrations at all. I only routed a piece of pine but it worked great. The only issue I have is the distance you place the router bit into the extension. Because the wrench must slip in between the router bit and the collet nut, the router bit cannot be seated as far down in the collet as I normally would. I would think the distance required for the wrench is close to 3/8" or so. I will check later if anyone wants specifics.

I don't think I will be able to lower some of my taller bits with bearings attached to the top far enough to use the extension exclusively, which I was hoping for. More time playing with it will be required.

If I decide on using an extension exclusively, I will definitely check out the MLCS version, but for now I want to get more time in on this one. I like the idea of using a standard wrench on the collet nut, like yours has. That change alone could probably make the taller bits work.

It might be possible to shorten the 1/2" shaft to some degree on the ER-20 holder to give you a more useful range. That is what I did for a similar holder for use on the Shopsmith.