Routers: Woodworking’s Jack-Of-All-Trades
Whether you use a router made long before you were born, like the 1950s Stanley router at right, or one of the technologically advanced models built today, either machine can perform a range of essential woodworking tasks that can’t be bested by any other power tool. If you’re a woodworking novice, I’ll go so far as to say it should rank near the top of your “short list” of tools to buy first, even ahead of a table saw — routers are that useful. A router can help you turn sharp edges into decorative profiles of all sorts. It will machine dadoes and grooves, rabbets, dovetails, mortises, tenons, box joints and more. Need to duplicate a bunch of parts? That’s no problem for a router and a template. It can even surface plane, joint edges flat, carve lettering, cut circles and bore holes. The “can-do” list goes on and on.
Two Base Options
The reason a vintage router or a brand-new one work almost equally well has to do with the tool’s simplicity: strip away the advanced electronics and feature enhancements made over the past two or three decades, and all routers really boil down to a few basic parts. A universal motor points downward and is held in a base that typically has a couple of handles to help you steer it over a workpiece. A sharp bit attached to the end of the motor’s spindle does the cutting work.
Routers have two styles of bases. The “fixed” base has a large collar, a threaded rod or other height adjustment feature that enables you to move the motor up or down inside the base to change the cutting depth of the bit. Once you set and lock the motor where you want it, the base remains otherwise “fixed.”
“Plunge” bases
