Making a routing table on glowforge?

Has anyone ever tried or seen instructions on making a custom routing table on the glowforge? My hand router sucks as a stand-alone since I don’t have the plunger attachment. I’d like to try and make one but not sure if anyone has tried before or not

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@shogun, ever tried anything like this?

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Most router tables I have seen mount the plunge attachment, not the router motor. I am sure you could make one, but without knowing the router it might be hard to point you to the right information. Have you looked into getting the plunge attachment? It looks like the ones for the big three brands range between $75 and $130. That might be your better bet.

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I have an exsess of wood right now so was hoping to make it myself, my router is a blue Ryobi I don’t know if they make it anymore

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Alternatively, making my own universal baseplate might also be an option since we can cut acrylic

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Without a pic of the router you plan to use, it’s virtually impossible to suggest anything.

I built my first router table in the early 90’s and another for a Dremel also around that timeframe. Each was drastically different - and obviously did not use a Glowforge. :grinning:

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An interesting idea :slightly_smiling_face:
I have an old routing table and have been looking to put a router on it, but I don’t need one the size of the one that was rusted solid.

Thinking about it what I need is something that will hold a flex shaft handpiece square and stable. It is not like we are using 4/4 wood several feet long, or bigger. So chasing the funky routing table is probably a bad idea. There are a lot of Y-tube ideas on building your own

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When I built mine, I bought a router plate like this one:

and then I just built around that.

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Maybe you can pull the model number from your router and see what eBay has? That would also give others a chance to see what you are working with and give suggestions.

It looks like many of the older Ryobi have built-in plunge plates so a model number will be really helpful.

It’s going to be really hard to get good results from a router table without a plunge mechanism.

There is an instructable in how to make your own plunge fitting you can probably start from.

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What are you trying to accomplish with the router table? I use mine pretty much exclusively for edge work, either with the fence or free hand on a shape. If you want to do plunge cuts on a router table, it’s doable, but need the fence to effectively use it.

I’ve built many a jig with the GF, but I’m also wondering how you’d make a router table with the GF unless you’re cutting 1/8" to 1/4" ply and bonding them together.

There’s a million plans out there for building your own router table, but I’m curious as to what you want to do with it and how exactly you’d use the GF to do it.

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So Long story short, years ago I was given a routing table with one of those super old Craftsman routers on it. I also had a old blue Ryobi router but that one had variable speed In my zeal. I attempted to try and mount my Ryobi to the Craftsman table not only losing parts from the Craftsman router, but also finding out after it was too late that the Craftsman router had a different set of screw holes. Unfortunately, this also had the very horrible backstop that those older versions had, so I ended up having something that didn’t cut correctly and didn’t measure correctly. What I’d like to be able to do is rounding for my edges, however, at this point outside of getting or making a universal adapter, I’m looking at having to have a new table for what I currently have.

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So would you want a fence on it? Crafting a custom mounting plate would work - heavy acrylic or 2 pieces of acrylic would work for that, then it’s a matter of creating a template out of thin plywood to use with a cutting router bit with a collar to cut out the insert hole in something thick like 3/4 plywood. Then make another jig to rout out the relief for the acrylic plate you just made with the GF.

That wouldn’t have a fence, but if you’re just rounding edges, a router bit with a bearing sticking above the table works extremely well. I have the cast iron wing on my table saw with the built in router table. 99% of the time it’s just a flat surface, but the 1% when I need it it’s there.

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