emember the commercial about theknife that sliced, diced and per-formed a myriad of other tasks, even

gliding through a tomato after cutting ametal pipe? Well, that’s what a router tableis like. You can cut stopped and throughgrooves, dadoes, rabbets and dovetailedslots. You can raise panels, cut sliding dove-tails, tenons and mortises. It’s no wonderthat many woodworkers can’t imagineworking wood without one.

But router tables can be expensive. In onewoodworking catalog, I saw a number of

packages selling for between $250 and$300. I’d rather spend my money on wood.That same money would buy some reallyspectacular fiddleback Oregon walnut.

I’ve been building furniture for years, andmy bare-bones router table has given meexcellent, accurate results. The router tablein the photo above is a variation that is inexpensive, simple to construct and ex-tremely versatile. It’s a simple, three-sidedbox made from a half-sheet of 3⁄4-in.-thickmelamine with the front left open for easyaccess to the router. I made mine with a top

that’s 24 in. deep by 32 in. wide, whichkeeps it light enough to move around yetbig enough to handle about anything I’duse a router table for. It’s 16 in. high, whichis a good height for placing it on boards onsawhorses or on a low assembly bench.

Biscuits and dadoes join partsWhen you buy the melamine, make surethe sheet is flat. And buy it in a color otherthan blinding white—it’s tough on the eyes.

The melamine I used had a particleboardcore. Biscuits are stronger than screws in

44 Fine Woodworking Photos: Vincent Laurence

No-Frills Router TableBuild it in an afternoon for about the cost of a good bit

by Gary Rogowski

R

particleboard, so I joined the two sides tothe top with #20 biscuits. To make the cutsin the underside of the top, I took a spacerblock 5 in. wide, aligned it with the end ofthe top and set my plate joiner against it forthe cuts. The width of the block deter-mined the overhang of the top. Marks onthe spacer block gave me my centers.

The biscuit joints probably would havebeen plenty strong by themselves, but Iwanted to add a little extra strength to thejoint. So I decided to dado the underside ofthe top for the sides. I couldn’t dado very

deeply, though, or the biscuits would havebottomed out. I settled on a 1 ⁄16-in.-deeppass centered over the biscuit slots (see thetop photo). Before cutting the dado, how-ever, I dry-fitted the sides and top with bis-cuits in place to check alignment. Then Iscored heavily around the edges of theside pieces with a marking knife and rout-ed the shallow dadoes.

Before gluing the sides to the top, I rab-beted the back edge of the two sides for a1⁄4-in. panel to strengthen the table and pre-vent it from racking. Then I glued the sides

to the top one at a time, using battens todistribute the clamping pressure. I madesure each side was square to the top andwaited for the glue to set up.

I used a router and rabbeting bit to cut astopped rabbet in the back edge of the top.Then I glued and screwed down the 1⁄4-in.medium-density fiberboard (MDF) backpanel (see the bottom photo). Hardboardor plywood would have worked as well.

I use a fixed-base router in my routertable because it’s lighter than most plungerouters and won’t cause the table to sag

March/April 1997 45

Shallow dado in-creases glue surface.To strengthen the jointsbetween the sides andtop, the author routs adado 1⁄16 in. deep in theunderside of the top di-rectly over biscuit slots.

Fiberboard back prevents racking. Al-though it’s only 1⁄4 in.thick, the fiberboardback greatly strength-ens the table. The fiber-board is glued andscrewed into a rabbetall around the back of the table.

over time. Also, it’s much easier to changebits. I just drop the router motor out of thebase, change bits, reinstall the router andI’m back to work.

I attached the router base to the under-side of the tabletop with machine screwsthat go down through the top into thetapped holes in the router base. To markthe location of the screw holes, I removedthe router subbase and made pencil markson the top. Then I drilled and countersunkholes into the tabletop.

With the base attached to the table, Imarked out where the bit hole should goand drilled a 3⁄4-in. hole into the table. I puta 21⁄8-in.-dia. chamfer bit in my router—thelargest bit I have. I started the tool andgradually moved the bit up and throughthe tabletop (see the photo above left).

To prevent workpieces from diving intothis hole when using small bits, I made aset of inserts that fit in a shallow recessaround the bit hole. Holes in the inserts ac-commodate bits of different sizes withminimal clearance. I routed out the rabbet-ed recesses for the inserts first, using aplunge router guided by a straightedge. Isquared the corners with a chisel.

I made the inserts of 1 ⁄4-in. temperedhardboard. Their square shape keeps themfrom spinning during use and makes themeasy to fit. I cut a bunch of them on the tablesaw and then sanded each to a perfectfit on a belt sander.

L-shaped fence provides dust collectionThe fence I’ve always used might be calledlow tech, but there’s really no tech to it atall. It’s simply a straight, wide, flat piece ofwood jointed so that one edge is square toa face. I clamp it to the router table wherev-er I need it. The fence doesn’t have to beparallel to a table edge to work. When a bitneeds to be partially hidden for a cut, I useanother board with a recess cut into its face.

The only thing my primitive fence lacksis dust collection. Hooking up a vacuum ora dust collector just won’t work in some sit-uations, such as when I plow a groove. Butwith other operations—raising a panel,rabbeting a drawer or box bottom, or cut-ting an edge profile—having a fence with adust port can really help clear the air.

The fence I built for this router table ismade of two pieces of 3 ⁄4-in.-thick MDFabout 41⁄2 in. wide and 49 in. long rabbetedtogether to form an L-shape (see the photoat left on the facing page). I cut a semi-circular hole at the center of each for dustcollection. This allows for better pickup. Ialso routed slots in the vertical part of thefence so I could attach auxiliary fences forspecific operations, such as raising panelsor rabbeting. Once these slots are routed,the two pieces of the fence can be gluedtogether. Make sure the fence clamps upsquare because virtually everything youuse the table for depends on it.

To create sidewalls for the dust-collectionhook-up, I added two triangular-shapedpieces of 3 ⁄4-in.-thick MDF to frame thedust-collection port (see the top right pho-to on the facing page). I glued these trian-gles in place on either side of the dustholes, just rubbing them in place and let-ting them set up without clamping. Afterthe glue had cured, I filed the trianglesflush with the fence, top and bottom.

To complete the dust-collection hook-up, I measured the diameter of the nozzleon my shop vacuum and cut a hole to accommodate it in a piece of 1 ⁄4-in. hard-board. I left the hardboard oversized,clamped it to the drill-press table and useda circle cutter on my drill press. Then I cutthe hardboard to size and glued andscrewed it to the two triangular walls.

Auxiliary fences solve specific prob-

lems—A two-piece auxiliary fence can beused to close up the area around the bitwhen routing profiles, rabbeting or per-forming similar operations. This way,there’s no chance of a small piece divinginto the gap between bit and fence. Andwith a smaller opening around the bit, thedust collector or vacuum will work moreefficiently. When the fence is situated backfrom the bit, such as when mortising, an-other set of auxiliary pieces can be used, sothere’s no gap between the two halves (seethe bottom photo on the facing page).

46 Fine Woodworking

A recess for interchangeable inserts—A plunge router and chisel make shortwork of a recess in the tabletop that accepts inserts for different-sized bits.

Cut the hole with a router bit. Withthe router base screwed to the undersideof the top, the author advances hislargest bit through the table. Go slowly.

I made the auxiliary fence from two morepieces of MDF. The auxiliary fence is drilledand countersunk for machine screws thatride in slots cut in the main fence. I usenuts and washers to tighten the two piecesin position.

When using the auxiliary fence, I closethe two halves around the moving bit toprovide a custom fence. When I’m donewith it, I can set the fence aside for futureuse or just cut it off square and use it again.Closing the fence into a bit with a diameterthat’s less than the thickness of the fencewill not open up the back of the fence tothe dust-collection port. In this situation, Ipivot the fence through the spinning bitbefore setting the fence for depth of cut.

Make sure that the outfeed side of thefence doesn’t stick out any farther than theinfeed side. If it does, it will prevent you

from feeding your work smoothly past thebit. If your work catches on the outfeedside of the fence, easing its leading edgewith a file or a chisel may help. If it doesn’t,you can always shim the infeed side withslips of paper.

Another router table problem I’ve foundis what to do with large upright pieces,such as panels cut with a vertical panel-raising bit. The solution is to screw a tallerauxiliary fence to the main fence. Thefence can be pivoted right into the bit, sothere’s no gap on either the infeed or out-feed side of the bit, yet there’s dust collec-tion behind the bit. �

Gary Rogowski has been building furni-

ture in Portland, Ore., since 1974 and

teaching woodworking since 1980. He is a

contributing editor to Fine Woodworking.

March/April 1997 47

Using a closed auxiliary fence—Routing away from the fence calls forauxiliary pieces butted tightly togetherto form a smooth, continuous surface.

Screw dust-collection port to fence(above). Smear a bead of glue along thetwo triangular sidewalls. Drill holes andscrew the hardboard back to them.

Clamp the fence square. Adjust theclamps (left) to get the two pieces squareover the entire length of the fence.