Router Table Session 2: Jointing

If you own a router table, you already own a jointer. What's cool about this is we're gonna get some attributes out of the router table you can't even get out of your jointer. I'm gonna talk about that. Here's what we need in the setup. The way a jointer works is that there's an infeed table and there's an outfeed table. And the outfeed table is perfectly even with the cutters. The infeed table is just slightly below. Let's look at how a router table fence works. In the case of a router table, the infeed fence and the outfeed fence are in plane. They're in line with each other. So this is not gonna work for us as it sits here right now, as a jointer. We have to create an offset. Some router table fences come with the capability to do that. And there's different approaches for this. For this fence, the way it works is that I take off the outfeed side, put this shim behind it, put the outfeed fence back on and that builds it out 1/32 of an inch. In other cases, there might be long metal bars that slip behind the fence when it's loose. In any case, what we're after here is some kind of an offset. So that's one way to do it, as a commercially made fence might create that for you. Let's talk about what if my fence doesn't do that. So let's let this fence go away. On this fence, we've got an offset built right into it. Here's the way that I made this. I built the entire fence out of melamine. Melamine is available at home centers. It's inexpensive. What's nice about it is that it's got a plasticized coating on it, so that makes it slippery. When I'm using this to feed material across, that's nice 'cause it helps the material move easily. After the entire fence was built dead straight, on this side only I glued a piece of plastic laminate on here. Plastic laminate is pretty darn close to 1/16 of an inch thick. So because I only have laminate from here to that end, I created an offset in my fence, automatically, on the outfeed side. This then, can be used for my fence when I want to do jointing on the router table. That's gonna work really well. Now, when we start talking about bits, we can start talking about why I would even want to do this. So first off, jointing in general, as a procedure in your woodworking, should provide for you an edge that is smooth, straight and square. So when we look at material as it comes into the shop, for instance, this piece of walnut, this edge is rough sawn. Well, we don't want it, probably don't want to incorporate that into our project. If this is gonna go to the table saw, before we can rip it, we need to get this edge cleaned up. That's the jointing process. Very, very important part of making sure that your parts come out square is starting with one good edge. So we need some way to joint our pieces. Now, why do it here on the router table? Even if you own a jointer, you're gonna want to master this approach because we get some advantages here. Let's look at our cutters and then we can talk about those advantages. We're gonna do our work with this bit. This is a flush trim bit. More specifically, It's a three-winged flush trim bit. So let's translate this into cuts per minute. Most jointers run at 6,000 RPM. If you have three knives in the cutterhead, then you're getting 18,000 cuts per minute. Most routers run at let's call it 20,000 RPM. Some are even higher. With this three-wing router bit, then, at 20,000 RPM, I'm getting 60,000 cuts per minute out of my router. So what does that translate to? It's possible that, as good a finish as I can get off a jointer, I can probably get an even better finish off of my router table. Now the other bit is sitting here, the spiral cutter, because helical cutters are all the rage today for jointers and planers. Why? Because, when we use that shearing angle on the cutter, we get better cut quality. A helical head for a jointer is pretty expensive. A helical router bit? Nowhere near as much as a spiral router bit. So the other advantage we can get out of this, like I said, even if you already own a jointer, if you're gonna joint something that's really squirrelly, like birdseye maple would be an example, quilted maple, some of the pieces of birch I've worked with, squirrelly meaning the grain pattern is just all over the place, it can be difficult to joint an edge on a jointer and not get tearout. Because we have more cuts per minute and the benefit of a helical cut, if we use a spiral cutter, we can get significantly better cut quality out of this. The other thing to look at here is these are both carbide cutters. In the case of this one, the flush trim bit, it's carbide tipped. In the case of spiral cutters, they are typically solid carbide. What's the benefit to that? Carbide lasts longer. It wears better. So, one of the rules for your jointer is that, if you have tool steel knives in the jointer, you shouldn't be jointing manmade materials like plywood, MDF, Plexiglas, solid surface countertop. All of those materials are very, very abrasive to tool steel knives. If we use carbide bits here in the router table, that opens up the door to be able to edge joint manmade materials that we couldn't edge joint on the jointer. So again, there are, have some advantages here that, even if you own a jointer, it's great to master jointing on the router table. Now let's put the bit in, and we don't have to have a flush trim router bit, but it's gonna make our lives easier, and I'll show you that. Let's leave that up high enough that we know it's gonna be high enough to cut our edge. The router, of course, is unplugged for all of this part of the process. Here's the deal with flush trim routers. The ball bearing on the cutter is exactly the same diameter as the cutter itself. One of the things that's really critical about this process is that the flutes, the cutters, have to be aligned with our outfeed face on the fence. I see I can have to lower my bit just a little bit here. There we go. Having this ball bearing on here makes that really easy because, instead of trying to align those flutes, the carbide cutters, with the fence, all I have to do is align the bearing with the fence. That's so much easier to do. Let's get a couple clamps on here, and we'll start locating this in the right spot. Easiest way to locate a router table fence is get one end in place, pivot the other end. That's so much easier than moving the entire fence at one time. What I'm looking for here is to bring the face of the fence even with that ball bearing there, and we'll do a test cut, and the test cut is really gonna tell us everything we need to know. Just snug for now until I double check. That looks good. Now we're ready to do an edge joint here. Now, when we do this edge joint, one of three things is gonna happen. Either this cut is gonna be absolutely perfect. That would be a wonderful thing. Or, as I'm cutting, maybe the leading edge, the first corner here, butts into that outfeed fence and doesn't let me continue forward. If that's the case, the fence is too close to me, it's too far forward, and I'm not taking enough material off. Or, I cut and possibly, when I get to the end of the cut, it kind of falls into the cutter. That's called sniping. That tells me the fence is too far back, I'm taking too much material off. So let's see which one of those three I'm gonna get. Hearing protection because routers are universal motor and very loud. I'm feeling at the end here for snipe, and a lot of times, it pays to feel for it because a lot of times, if it's subtle, you can feel what you can't see. I'm not feeling any snipe there at all, so that's great. The board did not bump into my outfeed fence and prevent me from moving forward, so that's great. That tells me that, with one setup, our fence is in the right position and good to continue doing our jointer work. Of course, there's no such thing as a free lunch, so what are the disadvantages to jointing on a router table? One of the things that we can do on a jointer is we can face joint material. We can pass boards flatways across the jointer in order to get faces nice and flat. Can't do that here on the router table. The other limitation I've found from doing this is in thickness of material that we can successfully edge joint. It works great for 3/4-inch stock. Works pretty darn well up to about an inch and a half. When we get beyond that, we can start to get a little bit of flutter in the bit high up that affects the quality of our cut. We don't want that. So, anything inch and a half and under, great candidate for jointing here on the router table. And of course, like I said, no face jointing. Big thing out of this is for you to make sure that the fence has an offset in it, that it's properly aligned. Flush trim bits are not a must have, but they sure do make it a whole lot easier to get that alignment taken care of, and as you saw here, get it right on the first try. Do the test cuts, look for those symptoms that I talked about, make sure the fence is in just the right spot, and you're gonna be jointing on your router table in no time at all.