After spending a fair bit of time this week modifying my older, US made Bosch plunge router to take a Tr 8 trapezoid lead screw to drive the Z axis, (8mm per turn for quick travel), a visit to my local Aldi today sees they currently have a 1200w variable speed plunge router for $60. Its depth gauge comes straight out leaving a hole of about 11.2 mm which could easily be made to work with a trapezoid flange nut and screw, making modification very easy. Its actual depth gauge only seems to have a 5mm thread so direct drive of it would fail fairly quick, but also doesn’t give a lot of travel.
I have bought one and it seems a good machine especially for the price comes with extra colletts, all the usual accessories and even 2 cutters. The 8mm lead screw and nut I am using, I ordered from Banggood for under $6 delivered, so it could be a good option for the limited router choices we have here in Auz.
I saw them the other day. Its going to take about the same amount of work to modify any plunge router to get it to work but at $60 its a great option for a cheep router
This ones actually quite easy as the stop shaft comes straight off leaving a large hole to work with.
Wish I’d found it before modifying my Bosch last week. I’ve finished making most of the parts for my sled today. I’ve made it with top mount parallelagrams machined out of stainless flat bar. Looks pretty strong and accurate.
hey guys,
Mitre10 have a Makita plunge router with a 40mm travel Z depth, there’s a guy who’s already modified his with a 3D printed stay to hold the top of the router to the lead rod threading. I’m not sure if he has them for sale or it’s just his own tech demo of it, but you can find him on Youtube somewhere, sorry I don’t have the link handy.
I’ve just picked up some end mill bit’s (mostly because buying them locally was cheaper anyway) and am probably going start off using a cordless Ryobi trim router because it has a 6mm collet which suits the end mill bits fine. Will probably upgrade to something corded with a dust exhaust attachment once I get it fine tuned, also because at a guesstimate having worked with the router before, it will probably need more wattage for a longer toolpath and hardwood knotted materials. I’ve also never worked with ply like this before so it’s a bit of a steep learning curve.
This sounds like what @DWfab found at aldi. Xceed AU router
- comes with plunge base but should be easy enough to modify for Z-axis.
30000RPM AU Palm Router - looks like you could make a nice spindle clamp Z-axis for this one. might need a potentiometer to adjust the speed.
Those are the only 2 cheap (under$100) routers I could find for AU on amazon. I didn’t see rotozips but there were a bunch of bits and parts that ship to AU for them if you can get your hands on one. Good luck
Just be aware that a lot of people find the weight of the hose on the dust extractors messes with your accuracy.
OK not a cheep option but the Triton dual mode routers look like they will work with a Z axis easily. I just got one with a second hand Triton bench, when I get to setting it up on my Maslow I’ll let you know how it goes. You can find them on Ebay for about $180 fairly regularly
AEG is now supplying the MF1400KE router through Bunnings.