Fixing Festo of 2000E to underside of table

[Pierluigi]

HI - I was wondering if you can help. I have attached some photos of my Festo of 2000E router to this post for clarity. I am having some trouble working out the correct method to fix this to the underside of a table, which i am building.

The only visible fixing points i can see are the three threaded holes which are holding the flange in place. All the other screws appear too small for the job (only about 2mm deep)

Can anyone shed any light on the method for achieving this. P Lease ask for more information if i have not been clear.

Thank you

 

[Coen]

You have to clamp it in some way. Either how Festool does it with their CMS module, or using the guide rods.

 

[Pierluigi]

Thank you but could you provide a little more detail

 

[awil66]

Remove the black part of the base, trace it onto the underside of the board/ table you are going to use, and drill through. Chamfer the top side of the holes and then use appropriately longer screws from top down to secure the router. I would actually drill through the metal router base and secure with at least 3 bolts. That is a big router, you don't want it to move. Take your time and be careful.

 

[Coen]

Thank you but could you provide a little more detail

See how Festool does it;

 

[Peter_C]

Either buy a plate or make a plate to attach to the router, so it sits on top of the table. The "router plate" will need to be modified or made to allow the dust hood held down by three screws to work, and it makes a big difference. There are youtube video's for how to cut the table to accept the plate, but my photo below is pretty self explanatory.

Great router for table mounting as it has the dial adjust.

 

[Pierluigi]

Thank you for your suggestions and pictures, very useful but I was wondering whether the 3 threaded holes that hold the flange would be sufficient to fix the router in place without drilling any more holes, these would have to be fitted to the metal plate with counter sunk screws, having looked at your pictures I could not understand how you fixed the router to the table as the 3 theraded holes were clear of the metal plate. All the other screw holes are only there to hold the plastic cover and certainly not sufficiently deep enough to hold a heavy router.
Thank you for your time.

 

[hrrb]

Depending on the design of your homemade table maybe you can use the guide rods to fix the router to the tabletop.

See 1:00 in this video:  

Kind regards
Henrik

 

[RussellS]

I do not have the Festool router.  But I have an equal sized Porter Cable plunge router I use in the router table.  I removed the stock round base.  Attached an aftermarket rectangle base using the same screws that hold on the original base.  Used the original base to mark where to drill the new holes in the rectangle base.  I routed a hole in the table top to accept this rectangle base.  The rectangle base has more room on the corners than the original round base.  So I drilled and counter sunk four holes in the rectangle base and bolted it to the table.  Wingnuts and counter sunk screws.  When switching between the table and handheld routing I have to change the base on the router.  But screwing in and out 3 or 4 screws is not that cumbersome.

 

[Peter_C]

Thank you for your suggestions and pictures, very useful but I was wondering whether the 3 threaded holes that hold the flange would be sufficient to fix the router in place without drilling any more holes, these would have to be fitted to the metal plate with counter sunk screws, having looked at your pictures I could not understand how you fixed the router to the table as the 3 theraded holes were clear of the metal plate.

I would not recommend using the three screws near the middle for anything other than holding the attachments they were designed too. Especially since things like the dust hood are very useful. Plus I would question the strength with such a small area spreading of the load.

All the other screw holes are only there to hold the plastic cover and certainly not sufficiently deep enough to hold a heavy router.
Thank you for your time.

The "plastic cover" as you call it gets removed. The screws holding the plastic cover get replaced with longer ones in order to hold the approximately 3/8" thick router plate in place. 

BTW a Festool track makes an excellent fence for a router table. Two blocks of wood up against it allow it to function as a split fence, and you can rip one of the pieces of wood a little thinner if desired for an offset fence.

Also there are a few companies that can pre-drill a plate when you buy one. I believe Jess-em was one of them and I am sure there are others. The question is can they drill it for YOUR OF2000. Some might not know it is actually a Mafel router and they do have the pattern for it.

Another option is to buy something like a Titan router, that is easily set up for running in a router table.