Pattern templates for the router. Accessories for a hand router: what you can make with your own hands or buy. Device for processing balusters, pillars and other bodies of rotation

Template for a manual router installed in a “table”.
More precisely, this is a homemade stop that can be used with a whole set of templates. The workpiece is installed into this stop along with the required template and clamped with cam eccentrics.

As we usually use a hand router when copying parts according to a template. The template is made from durable sheet material, such as MDF. The template is attached to the workpiece with self-tapping screws and the part is passed through with a router using a cutter with a support bearing, or a special copier ring, which is included in the standard set of accessories and is attached to the platform of the router itself.

Top to bottom, cam clamp, template, workpiece.

The device is assembled.

Such options have their advantages; you don’t need a table for a router. But with a large number of parts to be processed, it gets boring to twist the template every time. This method is convenient because the device you make can be used for a long time. And if you also make a set of the most popular templates for it, then time and labor costs will be significantly reduced. An unusual way of working.

The material for the base should be quite rigid; you can probably use plywood with a thickness of 10-12 mm. , but I think a 6-8 mm thick MDF board would be better. . The vertical wall and eccentrics are made of dense wood, oak, beech, or, in extreme cases, birch.

In fact, all parts except the base area can be made from 20 mm thick plywood. , but I think eccentrics made of plywood will be worse than those made of oak.

Holes are drilled on the vertical part for the bolt that secures the cams. The holes are made in vertical rows so that the eccentrics can be rearranged in height, depending on the thickness of the part and the template. The hole markings are in the figure. The thickness of the vertical oak part is 16-25 mm. .

When assembling, the parts are twisted with self-tapping screws, you can coat the joints with glue and the caps must be recessed. Here you need to keep in mind that during operation the base area may fall under the cutter, and sooner or later it will have to be changed. As for the vertical part, handles and eccentrics, they should last a long time. The cams are mounted on bolts with a diameter of 5 mm. . Instead of nuts, it is better to use wings so that they can be easily tightened by hand.

The handles hold the platform and the vertical part together; in addition, you use them to hold the device in use. Make such classic curly ones, or use a simpler option, it’s your choice.

UPDATE 2017: the post is brutally outdated, order CNC templates.

Absolutely nothing remarkable: I make a template from a sheet of acrylic for a groove under the fingerboard for a cutter with an upper bearing. But there are a number of nuances, and for some reason it was personally difficult for me to come to the conclusion that the templates should be made independently, and not ordered from Stuvmak or from special people. So I’m writing in detail, even if the procedure itself is boring.

Actually acrylic (I don’t remember the thickness, in my opinion it’s something like 4-5 mm):

I apply the heel of the neck, trace it with a marker without much precision, because at this stage there is no need for it, and moreover, there is a danger of cutting off something unnecessary with a rough tool. So I make a small margin in all measurements.

By the way, the groove in the template will be significantly longer than the heel of the neck- at least a couple of centimeters. This is necessary in order to work calmly with the router and have support for it even when processing the edge of the body.

I fix the template on the workbench and start sawing the acrylic with my Japanese wood hacksaw. This does not spoil the canvas, but I still add a little oil, primarily to reduce the heat.

Yes, Before sawing, you should outline the marker lines with a sharp awl, drawing a deep groove along them. This will make your work much easier, because the marker can be accidentally erased, and most importantly, it is highly reflective and difficult to see from some angles. Scratches are always clearly visible.

When the reach of the saw ends (or it reaches the corner, it all depends on the design of the saw), you need to switch to a jigsaw with a larger reach.

The cutting line of the jigsaw MUST be moistened with oil., because it heats up the acrylic very much: while the file is moving, everything is fine and without lubrication, but if the jigsaw stops even for a moment, the melted plastic will immediately harden around the file and bite it. The first time I sawed a pattern like this, I broke five files in a row before I realized I needed to add oil.

When the cutting is finished, a magical oscillating spindle-grinding machine comes into play, reminiscent of some kind of creepy device for torturing witches.

This machine removes large irregularities and deviations. The diameter of the drum gradually decreases. At this stage, you need to regularly pin the heel of the bar to the template and see how things go. On all subsequent ones this is done constantly, the minced meat does not turn back!
(almost. In principle, small holes can be filled with at least the same superglue (thick), and then sanded out again. But it’s better not to let things get to that point)

Since even the smallest sanding drum does not fit into the corners of the template, I remove the machine and level them with a regular round file:

And the sides of the groove can be sanded with a flat file, if necessary.

I attach the template to the fingerboard. I see from below, at the edge of the heel, an awesome gap. This means that the corners of the groove need to be filed harder.

Using a file there is long and boring, so I take a drill with a grinding roller. Glasses are a MUST, guys! Even better would be a protective mask-shield made of transparent plastic. Otherwise, the whole face will end up covered in plastic crumbs.

Another twenty minutes of fine adjustment - and you're done.

Using a long ruler and an awl, I draw three lines: the edges and the center of the neck.

Now you can, without rushing, mill just such a miracle jolana with an implanted stool in the center of the body and a edging made of marijuana mixed in epoxy.

True, in this photo the template is a little crooked - it doesn’t matter, I’ll fix that later.

Nowadays it is very difficult to imagine any plumbing activity without using a router. But not so long ago, people made grooves, made three-dimensional figures using a plane, chisel and hacksaw. In modern times, various milling devices, including those made independently, are becoming increasingly popular. Do-it-yourself templates for a router make it easier to control the mechanism and help process surfaces as accurately and accurately as possible.

Such a device is necessary where you need to make a hole, smooth the edge of a product, or cut out a three-dimensional shape. Milling is used when cutting out ornaments, patterns, and preparing niches for installing corners, locking mechanisms, and hinges. This tool allows you to remove a chamfer and round the edge of any part. According to its characteristics, the router resembles the actions of a plane.

This processing device works with wood, plastic and aluminum. However, each case requires the installation of specified speed limits and appropriate equipment. Despite the active use of a router, such attributes of construction significance as a chisel, hacksaw, and cutter are still used in work. The use of templates for these installations is often associated with furniture making.

Making a homemade furniture template

Any employee of a furniture organization knows perfectly well how difficult it is to make a corner kitchen. Installing the countertop requires precise joints, rounding the leading edge and flattening other parts. It is known that a flat edge, placed in the form of a rounded beginning, will acquire an unattractive appearance with a noticeable rough seam. To ensure that the cutting is carried out correctly and accurately, a milling device and a specially made template for furniture are used. Creating such samples yourself is not so difficult.

The main devices, without which installation will be impossible, will be:

• fiberboard sheet;
• manual milling mechanism;
• blueprints.

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Step-by-step production of a template for furniture

Furniture parts cut according to a template have the same shape and size.

1. Such a template, made by yourself, will perform its functions no worse than one purchased in a store. To create it, you need to prepare a drawing and a cover for the processing machine. Then a test homemade product is made from a fiberboard sheet; its thickness is equal to 8 mm.
2. Next, the diameter of the cutter and the machine itself is measured. Then 2 intersecting lines are drawn, the angle of which is 135°. To smooth out these indicators, an arc is taken. To calculate its radius, you should find out similar readings for the cutter and rings. The resulting difference in the radii of the rings and cutters should be subtracted from the value of the first device.
3. This creates an internal arc. The flat end of the postforming is milled along its base. As the ring moves along a given radius, the cutter describes an arc whose diameter is equal to its own.
4. From the drawn segment, 2 lines are laid parallel to each other. The distance between these points is equal to the diameter of the ring of the router used. 5 mm is added to these readings. The line starts from the middle of the previous arc.
5. The connection point of the segments is smoothed using an arc. Its radius corresponds to similar readings of the device’s thrust ring. During movement, the cutter will no longer be able to perform arcuate movements.
6. You need to draw 2 equal rectangles that imitate the contours of the tabletop. An angle is applied to them, after which it is extended to a certain distance.
7. Marking the template will make your work much easier. The arcs of the top and bottom rows will not overlap. Therefore, it is necessary to carry out verification for each detail by slightly shifting these boundaries.

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Templates for a hand router

1. The first step is to make a template from hardboard, the thickness of which is 6 mm. The height of the MDF stencil is 12 mm. These materials are very easy to process and are in no way inferior to wood. However, their corners easily bend from accidental impacts or falls. In order for the templates to serve for a long time, it is necessary to take high quality birch. Despite its high cost, unlike MDF, it has greater strength and consistency of characteristics.

The boundaries of the parts are drawn on the surface of the template in compliance with natural proportions. Then the starting grooves are drilled, the unnecessary material is cut with a jigsaw, keeping an indent of 1 mm near the contour line. The edges of the edge are carefully sanded, the paper stencil is removed.

1. Using a template, a specified number of parts are created. Then this element is placed on the product and outlined with a pencil. Unnecessary material is cut out, moving 1.5 mm away from the contour. Similar actions are carried out with other workpieces.
2. Using fabric-based double-sided tape, the template is fixed to one of the products. In order for the work to proceed as quickly as possible, you should insert a cutter with a bearing on the shank into the machine collet. This part rolls along the edge of the stencil.
3. Then you need to select the type of cutter. All varieties with bearings are used for milling according to templates; the device is held in the hand and installed on the surface. Using a copying cutter, the operation of the machine is monitored at the moment when the part moves along the table, the template is located on top.
4. The space between the tip and the shank does not need to be machined with a bearing cutter in one pass. This can be done in 2-3 times using a cheaper version of the cutter. Milling is carried out by aligning the bearing with the middle part of the stencil thickness.
5. A thrust rod device is placed close to the cutter. The machine turns on, the part is pressed against this part and gradually moves towards the rotating cutter until the bearing comes into contact with the template. Milling of external contours is carried out counterclockwise, internal contours - in the opposite direction. At the moment the cutter bearing comes into contact with the template, the part is removed from the rod stop device.

The copying device at the shank functions similarly, however, you need to rotate the part so that the stencil faces the table surface. Milling is carried out similarly to a table. During the manipulation process, it is important to monitor the integrity of the base of the workbench.

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Wedge templates for hand router

You can make a template in the form of spikes or wedges on your own. This compound is elegant and is most often used in furniture production. And there, as you know, high build quality is required. Using such primitive devices as a saw and a chisel in work, one cannot do without some experience in the construction industry, which cannot be said about a hand router. It allows even beginners to carry out the given work.

How to connect templates for a router so that it clearly marks the wedges on all workpieces? To do this, you can use a manual machine with decent characteristics. The ring must be the right size for the machine, otherwise it must be purchased.

A partially hidden wedge-shaped device can be seen on one side. The end-to-end connection can be traced from both points. To combine the two parts, the light element is installed strictly vertically. Periodically, the interdental space of the template is cleaned of sawdust. Upon completion of the work, existing roughness must be treated with emery cloth.

There is probably no furniture maker who has not made a corner kitchen. Therefore, it’s not news to anyone that you can’t just connect two tabletops end-to-end. The fact is that the kitchen worktop - postforming - has a rounded front edge, and the rest are flat. If you attach a flat edge to a rounded one, you will get a fairly wide and deep seam.

There are special aluminum connecting strips for connecting tabletops. This strip has one side concave and the other flat, which ensures a tight fit to the postforming. All inexpensive kitchens use this type of connection. It is quite reliable, easy to install and inexpensive. But it is not without its drawbacks, namely:

• The length of the bar is limited.
• A raised edge is formed on the tabletop.
• The aesthetic appearance leaves much to be desired.

That is, if we are making an “above average” kitchen, then an aluminum connecting strip will not be entirely useful. In this case, it is better to connect countertops without a strip. Any reputable store offers countertops with just such a connection. But in order to connect them, you will have to cut at an angle of 45 degrees so that the front edge meets, and this is also not very convenient for the following reasons:

• A sink can often be planned in a corner, requiring a single piece of slab.
• There is a clear overconsumption of material by as much as 600 mm (after all, two parts need to be cut, up to the corner).

To avoid cutting parts along the entire bisector of the angle, you can (and should) use the following trick: start cutting at an angle of 45 degrees, and after passing the convexity, turn it at a right angle. This can be done on a saw by fitting one part to the second, but it is more convenient to use a hand router and a special template.

Such templates are sold in hardware and tool stores and cost approximately 230 USD (for example, a furniture template for Virutex PFE60 countertops). A little expensive for such a simple device. Therefore, we decided to try to create this furniture template with our own hands. A drawing and file for the CNC machine were prepared. Then a test sample was made from MDF, 8 mm thick, using a CNC router. What came of it - watch the video.

Overall, although not on the first try, I was more than satisfied. For 7 USD we got a furniture template that allows us to trim tabletops no worse than a company template for 230 USD! At the moment, we took into account the shortcomings that were discovered, and a new drawing was made taking them into account.

If you liked the template and would like to make something similar for yourself, I’ll explain how to do it.

1. We measure the diameter of the ring on the router and the diameter of the cutter.
2. Draw two lines intersecting at an angle of 135 degrees. We smooth the angle with an arc. The arc must have the radius of the cutter minus the difference between the radii of the ring and the cutter. That is, R1 = Rф-(Rк-Rф), where
   Rf - cutter radius;
   Rк - radius of the router ring.
   This will be the internal arc along which we mill the straight end of the postforming. When the ring passes along such a radius, the cutter, in turn, will describe an arc equal to its diameter.
3. From the lines we lay two parallel lines, at distances equal to the diameter of the router ring plus 5 millimeters (no matter how many, but slightly larger than the diameter), in the direction from the center of the previous arc, that is, outward, as it were.
4. The intersection of the created lines is smoothed with an arc with a radius equal to the radius of the router's thrust ring. Moving along this contour, the cutter will no longer describe any arc. But since the contour will now be on the other side, and the cutter will be inside the corner, then in the place where it changes the trajectory, an arc will remain with a radius equal to the radius of the cutter, that is, this contour will repeat the contour from point 2.
5. The main part - the coincidence of radii and angle - exists. Now you can draw two rectangles, symbolizing the tabletops, and put them on this corner, and extend the lines as much as necessary. It should be taken into account that the router ring is larger than the cutter, so the groove should extend well beyond the countertops.
6. You can put marks on the template so as not to have to worry about using a tape measure. Please note that the beginning of the upper and lower arcs of the contour do not coincide, so the marks for each part should be applied offset.
7. The depth of insertion of the contour into the tabletop is 20 mm.

Well, this is a general principle that allows you to create a furniture template for milling tabletops. Please note that there is play between the support ridge and the contours, so when milling you need to press the router to the desired contour. We recommend milling in two passes, half the depth.

If you don’t want to develop a furniture template yourself, we suggest downloading ready-made drawings. These furniture template drawings are designed for a cutter with a diameter of 15.4 mm and a thrust ring with a diameter of 23 mm. Unfortunately, this drawing will not fit other sizes, but if necessary, you can use it as a basis. So, we offer the following template files:

1. Furniture template drawing in PDF format.
2. Furniture vector template in CDR.
3. Model of the template in T-Flex. By the way, in T-Flex the main dimensions - radii and some dimensions - are specified through variables. Therefore, anyone who works in this program can easily customize the furniture template to suit themselves by changing just two radius values ​​in the table of variables.

By the way, the drawings and files were submitted without taking into account the diameter of the cutter that will make the template for the countertops. But the machine operator himself will make all the corrections.

You can download drawings and furniture template files for countertops using the link at the top of the page, available to registered users.

Quite a lot of people who are currently working with wood dream of purchasing a factory perfect attachment for a router for cutting tenons, or a so-called template. It is ideal for cutting dovetail joints or straight tenons. Milling patterns will come in handy if you need to complete a large number of parts in a short period of time. Very often, the manufacturer completes its products with the necessary devices to make work easier. However, this condition is not always met if you buy manufacturer's products in the lowest price category. Therefore, a woodworker often makes the required element himself in a garage. Moreover, it is not difficult to do this in modern conditions. Often, no drawing is required to make a template; all necessary manipulations can be performed using a figured ruler and pencil. By spending a little time making a template, you will save a lot of time in the future when routinely cutting out shapes.

How to make a template for a router

Solid hardboard 6 mm thick or MDF sheets 12 mm thick are suitable as patterns for the router. The advantage of these materials is that they are easy to process compared to wood sheets. Their only drawback is that the corners of the material and complex contours easily wrinkle and lose shape when dropped or hit. Birch plywood is required to make a high quality, durable template. The disadvantage of this material is its higher price.
The pattern is made on a scale of 1:1 to the part. First, holes are drilled to cut out the template, then the template is cut out along the contour using a jigsaw. The distance from the cut line is about 1 mm. The edges of the sample are ground with abrasive. In this way, the required number of templates is cut out. The template is fixed to the working material using double-sided tape. Simplification of work is possible by inserting a cutter with a bearing into the collet of the machine, which will roll along the edge of the stencil.

Flexible routing template

A flexible template is a strip of flexible material (usually rubber or plastic), which is attached to the work surface using self-tapping screws. To make a flexible pattern for milling, you will need a 25x3 mm steel strip. At the back of the strip it is necessary to screw the corners for fastening to the workpiece. You can use a motorcycle chain, first dividing it into segments and securing it on top through spacers using clamps. The sole should be round, the protrusion beyond the main diameter should be no more than two to three centimeters. On the market of materials for milling, patterns from the company SMT are quite popular products. Such templates are used for milling on a manual router with end mills or for working on a stationary manual machine with manual feed. The smaller the cross-section of your template, the smaller its bending radius will be.

Template for dovetail router

The template itself is called a “comb” or tenon cutter, since its shape is very similar to this element of a woman’s wardrobe. The pattern must be made of aluminum; a strip 6 mm thick will be required. The depth of the sheet slot will be 26 mm, the width of the “ridge” will be 18 mm, and the distance between the ridges will be 18 mm. The width of the aluminum plate can be from 140 mm or more. This parameter will depend on the type of router you have. For this design, the cutter parameters will be as follows: D=12.7; B=12.7; angle = 14 degrees. Both the groove and the bridge must have ideal rounding radii. The ring of the router attachment should have an outer diameter of 16 or 17 mm, its thickness should be 1 mm less than the thickness of the comb.
The comb should be attached to the table at corners that can move freely up and down. This property is needed to adjust the template to the thickness of the part. This design has adjusting rings for precise installation of workpieces. There are two stops in front and on top of the milling template, spaced apart to ensure that the teeth of the workpiece align exactly during operation. To fix the part, eccentrics are used, which press on a spring-loaded metal plate that has a bolt at the back to adjust the thickness of the part. When preparing for work, the part must be inserted and fixed against the stop, then clamped with an eccentric. After this, you can safely mill it.
Of course, today the easiest way is to pay and purchase the necessary templates for full-fledged work. However, if you are not satisfied with factory production, you like to make things with your own hands, then you will enjoy working on patterns made by yourself.