Adjustable Shaper Fence??

Re: Adjustable Shaper Fence??

John McGaw

No plans but I do have a fence that I made. It is simple enough than plans would be redundant since it would need to be scaled for the machine. This was whipped up on the spur of the moment from laminated MDF. My Robland X31 has a shaper fence but I found it bothersome for the work I was doing. The replacement is held down by screw-knobs, not shown, into the threaded table holes that the original fence uses.

Re: Adjustable Shaper Fence??

John McGaw

I guess I should clarify a bit but since I don't seem to be able to edit the original I'll do it here:

I don't actually use the homemade fence exactly as shown -- I clamp a piece of hardboard or thin plywood scrap to the face and push the big fence back let the spinning blade poke through to effectively make a zero-clearance fence. This makes, to my mind at least, a bit safer and less scary as the feed is smooth and uninterrupted.

Adjustable router (shaper) fence.......

roger lance

Here are a few views of a fence I made years ago for my router table (hardly a shaper). There maybe some ideas here that you'll be able to use.....

This fence has dust collection, adjustable port opening, accommodation for attaching finger jigs/hold-downs, and is surfaced with laminate for easy stock movement.

Re:  Adjustable router (shaper) fence.......

Tom Norton

Sorry U failed to mention that I want a split fence with both sides being adjustable.

Re:  Adjustable router (shaper) fence.......

William Duffield

Adjustable in how many directions?

Do they need to remain coplanar? Do they need to remain parallel? Do they need to be adjustable out of vertical?Different degrees of freedom require different mechanical designs.

You want the infeed to be set back?

Keith Newton

While I have a couple of factory made fences on two of my shapers, I have a simpler shop made fence for my main router table which is in the solid cast wing of my 12" PM TS. I really like what Roger has done, but if you want the infeed to set back so it acts more or less like a jointer bed, I think it would be pretty easy to just go ahead and make a couple of more fence parts of various thickness to just change out. I suppose they would just slide off the end of the T Slots.

However back to mine. What I do, is to run a flat board half way across on the jointer taking 1/16" to 1/8" for the infeed side then attach it to the face of my straight fence. Cut a little mouse door for whatever size cutter you need, and drill a hole in one end to hang it on a nail somewhere that you can find it again next time you need it. This is quick and easy and doesn't take a lot of storage space if you already have a straight fence.

or the outfeed fence can be set forward.....

roger lance

a couple of shims can be placed behind the outfeed fence to set it out the desired amount.

In all this time, I've never had a need to do this.....but, it can be done.....it can be accommodated.

Re: Adjustable Shaper Fence??

Derek Cohen (in Perth, Australia)

Tom, this is the fence I built for my router table (in outfeed to my Hammer K3).

This is built around an aluminium section with hardwood (adjustable) faces ...

There is dust control at the rear ...

From inside ...

Obviously, the subfences faces moves laterally with hex bolts. If I wanted to offset one face, I would add a shim from behind. In the past I made these from plastic/vinyl film. Simply cut a slot for the bolts, and drop one on. Add another if the depth of cut is to be greater.

Regards from Prague

Derek

Re: Adjustable Shaper Fence??

Tom Norton

Thanks for your replies!

I was looking around in my shop and found some 80/29 extrusions and fittings. I think I might be on to something!

Re: You want the infeed to be set back?

William Duffield

If you already have a jointer to make the fence, why do you need the fence to make your shaper act like a jointer?

Maybe, I'll try to partially answer my own rhetorical question: While your concept is ingenious, it is so easy, you wouldn't need a really good reason to do the setup. Of course, you might be producing several parts the same, and your jointer needs to be set up at the same time to do another operation on all the parts.

There are a number of good reasons

Keith Newton

First is that if you were running some shaped profile that was taking off quite a bit of material that may cause a little tearout or chatter, then running another pass would be taking off a light cut that should smooth everything out.

Plus, you could start with an edge right off the saw that may not be perfectly straight, yet part of the vertical face isn't shaped, this would act like a jointer while also shaping another portion.

Some materials like acrylics can take a nice edge and are easier to handle on a router table than on a big jointer with a big gap.

Re: Adjustable Shaper Fence??

AZ in Colorado Springs

The Freud router table has a fence exactly as you describe. For a router table it stinks. The router is great, but the fence is very fiddly. Hard to align the faces on either side of the cutter to the same plane.

Good luck.