I spent a few hours over the last few days just playing with my CMS just to get comfortable. Yesterday I was experimenting with a vertical panel raising bit and came up with an issue that some here had come upon or thought about earlier. After I made my test cuts - how could I get thru the multiple route process and ensure that my ending panels matched the sample?
Well, today in the shop while thinking about it I had one of those moments where I slapped myself and laughed. For those of you who have the full blown CMS setup you will only need to order two Festool parts, but you will lose the use of your cord holder.
What did I do? I mounted the sliding table assembly on the REAR of the table. All you need to do is remove the cord holders and install new plastic pieces (those that allow the sliding table mechanism to mount to the front) in the same places on the rear.
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Yesterday: My first attempt at raising panels worked great, but I was going to have to rely on pencil marks for setting the fence including the final cut. Please note that first cut mark is the zeroing alignment with the cutting edge of the bit flush to face of the router table fence.
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Today. After mounting the sliding table assembly on the rear I discovered that I needed a thin spacer to get under the vacuum hose and space the protractor head far enough away so that the vac hose wouldn't be an issue.
[attachimg=#]
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Now I could move the sliding table fence to allow me to align and get it in the correct position for the final cut. In this example for clarity I used pencil marks, but you could also use gauge blocks. Just remember that if you use gauge blocks they will represent the total amount of material to be removed - not remaining.
I didn't want to rely on that final pencil line so I decided to make a stop block. Easy!
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Now I could use the spacer blocks to move the fence to the original location and start the routing with assurance that my final route would be in the correct position.
Some might miss their cord holders, but honestly I would trade this for those.
Just food for thought.
Peter
EDIT: Before anyone says anything, I just realized that you can do exactly the same thing from the front of the table and not have to lose the cord holders with the exception of the stop block. [doh] [doh] [doh] [doh]
Well, today in the shop while thinking about it I had one of those moments where I slapped myself and laughed. For those of you who have the full blown CMS setup you will only need to order two Festool parts, but you will lose the use of your cord holder.
What did I do? I mounted the sliding table assembly on the REAR of the table. All you need to do is remove the cord holders and install new plastic pieces (those that allow the sliding table mechanism to mount to the front) in the same places on the rear.
[attachimg=#]
Yesterday: My first attempt at raising panels worked great, but I was going to have to rely on pencil marks for setting the fence including the final cut. Please note that first cut mark is the zeroing alignment with the cutting edge of the bit flush to face of the router table fence.
[attachimg=#]
Today. After mounting the sliding table assembly on the rear I discovered that I needed a thin spacer to get under the vacuum hose and space the protractor head far enough away so that the vac hose wouldn't be an issue.
[attachimg=#]
[attachimg=#]
Now I could move the sliding table fence to allow me to align and get it in the correct position for the final cut. In this example for clarity I used pencil marks, but you could also use gauge blocks. Just remember that if you use gauge blocks they will represent the total amount of material to be removed - not remaining.
I didn't want to rely on that final pencil line so I decided to make a stop block. Easy!
[attachimg=#]
[attachimg=#]
Now I could use the spacer blocks to move the fence to the original location and start the routing with assurance that my final route would be in the correct position.
Some might miss their cord holders, but honestly I would trade this for those.
Just food for thought.
Peter
EDIT: Before anyone says anything, I just realized that you can do exactly the same thing from the front of the table and not have to lose the cord holders with the exception of the stop block. [doh] [doh] [doh] [doh]
