Has anyone been able to make a router sled without using bricks? I thought I saw one someone made out of metal that did not have any bricks but can not find the picture anymore. Does anyone know how heavy it would need to be? Or type of metal/size or any other info if I were to give this a try?
A quick google search brings back a weight of 3.5kg (7.7lbs) per brick. I made up weights for my sled using 1 1/2" x 1/2" steel bar stock cut to 6" long lengths. I made up 6 of these weights and it is performing well. I bolted those to a piece of angle iron to give me a mounting flange. I don’t have any pictures readily available, but when I get home I should be able to post something. I do have video of my Maslow in action on my Youtube channel that shows the setup.
I should probably weigh them to get some actual numbers at some point.
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This is still a matter of experimentation, the stock sled with router is ~26
pounds, but we had a test that the accuracy could be improved by making it
heavier. look at the picture with the metal weights in
Metal Top Pantograph kit available for a
way to do it without bricks
you can use any online metal calculator to easily find the weight of a round steel sled
http://www.metalweightcalculator.com/
I made a 12" diameter sled 3/8" thickness and suggested Bar sell this as an option, laser cut in bulk would probably be around $12 each and they fit in a flat rate postal box and weigh 12 lbs.
if you wanted more weight a 1/2" sled comes to 16 lbs.
also made a 18" sled with 1/8" thick steel.
Personally the bricks seem like a poor solution to me, better to have low center of gravity and uniform weight iMHO.
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Thank you for the info. Did you make yours out of stainless steel or did you put a coating on mild steel? Any problems with hangups or anything?
Stainless would be crazy expensive juat prime and paint it
I havent build mine yet
any paint will rub off of the bottom, and probably stain the wood in the
process.
How about get a thin cutting board or a piece of 1/8" UHMW to cut a sled-sized shoe. Will help reduce friction as well.
Yes I put UMHW on the bottom of my sled, but honestly unless you are impatient and dont’ wait a week for the paint to really dry out, it will be fine. get it powder coated if you really are anal.
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you want it slick, powder coating isn’t as slick as you want it to be (most
paint isn’t that slick)
friction between the sled and the workpiece is bad for accuracy
true , which is why I use umhw plastic and paint it to prevent rust, cheap and effective.
Years ago I picked up some industrial graphite paint at FleetFarm. While it didn’t stand up inside the snowblower chute (abraided off the direct impact areas) it’s holding up well on the windrower platform and other heavy duty locations. It did let rust through in the gravity box, but that was a rush job and not prepped as well as it could have been. Could be good for a metal sled with a couple coats and adequate drying.
Don’t recall the brand (will check the empire of concrete dust, really should have slid the big door closed) but there’s several on Amazon and elsewhere from our googlian overlords
Finally got some decent pictures showing the weights I made for the machine:
I haven’t weighed them yet, and quite honestly I think my sled would benefit from a few more weights. I’ll have to keep playing around with it!
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That’s really cool. Is there too much weight that can be put on the sled because of the motors? Or can they pretty much handle anything your able to put on it?
The motors can handle a lot. Of you overload the, you won’t be able to reach the top center of the work area
Thanks! I know there was mention in another thread of someone having a 42 lb sled. The worm drive motors are pretty robust, so they can lift quite a bit.