Use Your Router Table as a Jointer
George VondriskaThe starting point for most projects is creating a perfectly straight, smooth and square edge on your boards. This is especially true when you’re gluing boards edge to edge. Want a seamless glue joint? You need to start with a good edge. If you have a router table, you also have a jointer, the perfect tool for straight edges.
Why a router table?
Router tables are very versatile. In addition to all the stuff you can do on the router table you can take the router out and use it hand-held. Thanks to the high rpm of the bit you’ll get a GREAT surface when jointing. With carbide router bits you can joint nearly anything, even man-made materials, something you shouldn’t do on a jointer with tool steel knives. And, using the router table as a jointer serves your needs, you don’t need to buy a jointer.
What you need
Any straight bit can be used for jointing. A ¾” diameter bit works great. You need to be able to shim the outfeed face of the fence to create an offset between the two halves of the fence, just like the tables on a jointer. The Kreg router table comes with shims for this purpose. With two different positions for the shims you can control your stock removal.
Set up
Setting up to use your router table as a jointer is fairly straight forward. Use a straight edge to align the outfeed fence with the bit, make test cuts, adjust as necessary.
More on the router table
Router tables are great for joinery, including tricky joints like drawer lock bits. There’s virtually no end to what you can do on a router table.
More info
For more information on Kreg products visit the company's website or call (800) 447-8638.
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8 Responses to “Use Your Router Table as a Jointer”
When people ask me about tools to get for their shop when they're gettin' rollin', router table for me is really, really high on the list. It's such a versatile addition to the shop 'cause there's all sorts of stuff we can do on the router table. Of course, the router can come off the router table, be used handheld. And in the world of versatility, one of the things that not everybody knows is we can use the router table as a jointer. So let's talk a little bit about attributes of a joiner.
On a jointer, there's an infeed table, a cutter and an outfeed table. The infeed table is slightly below the cutter. The outfeed table is offset and it's even with the cutter. So on a router table, here's what you gotta have. There needs to be a way to offset our outfeed fence.
So the outfeed fence is the one on this side. The reason I'm pointing this out is this is a really cool setup with this Kreg table. This rod will store here and there's another one just like it on the other side of the fence. Then when we don't use these, the fence halves are coplanar. When we want a joint on the router table, then we can slip this in and there are spots available there.
The spots to put it into are different sizes. The different size slot controls how much offset you're creating, so you can take off more or less per pass depending on which slot you use. What that rod is doing is shimming the fence out consistently. Now there are a couple things I like about this. One is if you've got a limited budget and you're not ready to buy a jointer yet, this solves that problem.
We can edge joint here on the router table. Even if you already have a jointer, sometimes I joint on the router table because router bits, currently unplugged, spin at a very high RPM, two flutes on the router bit. So we're getting somewhere in the neighborhood of 40, 44,000 cuts per minute from this cutter. That really high cuts per minute number is something that'll give us a really good surface finish even in materials like curly maple, which can have a tendency to chip when you're jointing them. Also because the router bit is carbide tipped, we can edge joint pretty much anything.
Manmade materials, plexiglass. If you have tool steel knives and a jointer, you shouldn't be using your jointer for manmade materials. To get this to work what we need to do is get the outfeed fence, the one that we shimmed out, in line with the router bit. So I'm gonna do that using a straight edge, put that on the fence, and what I'm looking for is when that bit is top dead center, the cutter is at its maximum point in this direction. Align the fence.
And I'm gonna lock it and then I'm gonna spin the cutter. And what I'm looking for is right there, it's dragging on that ruler just a little bit, so I think my fence might be a little too far back. Micro adjust. Hand spin. It's just kissing it right there.
Might be the perfect spot. Let's get some dust collection, some power, some hearing protection, and then we'll be ready for a test cut. You gotta love it when the cut quality is so good on that jointed edge that it's got a little sheen to it and you can really see the cool, cool curl. You can really see the curl in that curly maple. Now let's talk about that cut.
When you set this up, one of three things are gonna happen. This cut cut perfectly on the first try. That doesn't always happen for me. One scenario would be I'm cutting, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, and the board hits the outfeed side. It bumps into it and it can't continue.
That tells you you're not taking enough material off. The fence is too far forward. Alternatively, it cuts, and when you get to the bit, it snipes. So what that tells you is the fence is too far back and it's taken too much material off. So let's just for the sake of you understanding what this part is, I'm gonna bring the fence a little bit forward.
See if we can simulate our two setups here. Right there it made a cut, but it can't continue. The fence is too far forward. Let's go the other way. Well, you heard it.
At the end of the cut, the board kind of fell into the cutter. Snipe is that little overcut right there. That tells us the fence is too far back. So a good idea is when you're first set up, grab a piece of scrap and do some test cuts and symptomatically, after the straight edge set up, you can tell if this is cutting right or not and you can adjust accordingly. End of the day, edge jointing stock like this, the router table makes a great jointer and it's a great workaround if you don't have a joiner, and it's a great technique to know about even if you do own a joiner.
My router is mounted on my table saw and I use the saw fence as the fence for the router. I used two pieces of hard maple to make a permanent auxiliary fence for the router. I sandwiched 3x5 note cards between the auxiliary fence and the actual saw fence. When I need to use my router for jointing, I simply adjust the fence to the router bit and then remove the 3x5 card(s) from the infeed fence. Perfect! By the way, I am not the same Blake Dozier who replied to a previous question. Cousins?
Thank you. I had forgotten about jointing this way. My router table came with shims just for this purpose.
This will work in theory. Your work piece is fed from the right to the left on a router table, just as you would if using a real jointer-planer. Let's say that you want to take off 1/16" of width. The router bit would need to protrude exactly that amount relative to the in-feed fence on the right. But the left, out-feed fence needs to be moved out (towards the operator) by exactly 1/16" so that the milled piece will be flat against it as it leaves the bit. Both fences need to be parallel to each other at the same time and not move as you apply pressure to them. Maybe your fences are perfect, but mine aren't and real wood moves. Will your shim be wood or metal? You probably wouldn't want to just use washers because the fence needs to be held flat against its support and not wiggle (and are the washers 1/16" thick?). Metal shims need to be above and below the supporting bracket's T-track. If you have to cut or drill the metal shim, it will no longer be flat. A wood shim 1/16" is very difficult to cut straight and flat. A piece that thin will be too flexible and a planer might destroy it. A drum sander might work. A thicker shim would be easier to make, but then you're losing a lot of wood with each router pass. Why couldn't you just use your table saw? Hah! Good luck with that. See those saw marks on the edge - that means the edge isn't straight enough. An easier solution is to use a good straight edge clamped to your work piece and a hand router with a flush-trim bit. The bearing just follows the straight edge (assuming it is really straight) and you can also position it to avoid defects in the wood. For example, let's say the requirement for the work piece is a trapezoid with width of 7" on one end and 8" on the other. total length down the middle of 18". You would draw your lines, then cut close (1/16" away) to the line with your band saw or jig saw. (You could try trimming it with a jointer/planer but chances are you won't be able to get it trimmed to line edges uniformly.) Then, you would place the straight edge along the lines, cognizant of the grain (you will want to go "down hill" if possible in order to avoid tear-out) and with your bit's bearing aligned against the straight edge, trim the work piece to size. In either case, limiting factors are bit sharpness, tear-out (due to grain orientation and bit sharpness), a steady rate of feed to avoid bit burning and a hand steadiness. The easiest and fastest way is with a jointer/planer. Some people say that you don't need one. Well, if that's true, it should be really easy for your friend to give you his!
A jointer gets two faces flat and square to one another in two seperate operations. If you wanted to use your router table for this move the first step would need to be to insure that the wider face is flat. I would assume planing that face before using the router table and then keeping that face against the router table is the best approach. Am I missing anything?
I’m trying to pull up this video now, without any luck. In the circle where normally there is an arrow to push to start play, I have a square instead of the arrow
Someone might let George know his web site has been compromised. vondriskawoodworks.com resolves to what appears to be a Chinese gambling site. Wayne
Do I need to shift the pressure with which I am holding the stock to the fence as I move through the cut? Or focus only on holding the piece square against the outfeed fence for the entire cut? When setting the fence position, do I set the *outfeed* fence to the cutter, or split the difference between the two fence halves? BTW, I think washers on the fence fasteners can work well as shims.
If you did not have an adjustable outfeed fence, you could put 2 shims behind the outfeed fence to move it out. EEE