Alignment Problems: Veritas Router Base Plate / Table Insert

Jay Pique wrote:
> I just finished installing the plate on a PC690 and it was off-center
> by just enough to make the 1/4" insert not fit around my 1/4" straight
> router bit. Poor eyesight and shaky hands played a large role, I'm
> sure.
> What if I somehow clamped the plate and the
> 1/4" insert to the bottom of the router and then lowered a chamfering
> bit into it to pull things into alignment and then (somehow) was able
> to mark the base plate through the existing screw holes in the router
> base itself?

Well I went ahead and drilled a second set of holes in the same plate
today and it's now fully functional. These are the steps I took...

1. Put the 1/4" insert into the stock Veritas base plate.
2. Put a piece of clear packing tape roughly over the areas where the
holes to my router would be drilled, the idea being that it would be
easier to pierce a piece of tape than it would be to mark the base
plate itself.
2. Put a 1/4" straight cutting bit upside down into the router, such
the entire cutter and part of the shank was inserted into the collet.
3. Taped a single wrapping of celophane tap around the 1/4" shank to
provide a snug fit.
4. Placed base plate flat on two 3/4" supports and then put the router
body onto the plate and the bit through the 1/4" insert. (I had to be
careful not to let the insert push down the tape on the shank of the
router bit.)
5. Took a drill bit just small enough to fit in the threaded holes of
the router and spun it by hand to pierce the packing tape that had been
put there in step 2, being careful not to spun the router relative to
the base plate. (I suppose I could have clamped it, but I was worried
about deflection.)
6. I used a sharp punch to enlargen the pin pricks in the packing tape
and to make a mark in the base plate itself to keep the drill bit from
skipping.
7. Drilled the holes the appropriate size for the machine screws.
8. Countersunk them.
9. Attached base plate to router.
10. Celebrated!

This method seems to have worked, and it honestly didn't take much
longer than the method that Lee Valley proposes. If I were extremely
anal I might have chucked a few pieces of appropriately sized threaded
rod into a metal lathe and ground accurately centered points on the
end. At that point I could have simply threaded them into the holes of
the router and slid the base plate with an insert in it onto the router
with an appropriately sized piece of round steel. That would be
extremely simple, and very accurate.

I wrote:
> If I were extremely
> anal I might have chucked a few pieces of appropriately sized threaded
> rod into a metal lathe and ground accurately centered points on the
> end. At that point I could have simply threaded them into the holes of
> the router and slid the base plate with an insert in it onto the router
> with an appropriately sized piece of round steel. That would be
> extremely simple, and very accurate.

The more I think about this, the more I believe this could be a very
simple upgrade to the base plate package itself. Rather than fit and
mark a (flexible) mylar sheet and then transfer it to the plate itself,
you could directly mark the plate itself. There would be just a couple
of changes. First, you would substitute a centering device sized to
fit the opening in the base plate itself, rather than the hole in the
mylar sheet.
Second, you would include three pieces (for a PC690) of threaded rod
with a point on the end, and eliminate the mylar sheet.

The cost differential to produce them couldn't be much and it would be
a much simpler and far more accurate method.

Someone please play devil's advocate for me...

JP
*************
Lonely.

In retrospect I would have simply used the 1/2" brass insert I
purchased, plus the included 1/2" "bit" that LV included with the base
plate.

The new plate did arrive so perhaps I'll give it a go this weekend.

JP
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