I'm just a hobbyist woodworker who does a little carpentry around the house.
I want to be able to create some crown molding at home using a router on the
router table I am about to build. This will allow to create crown molding
for the home and some other projects that I have in mind.

I've already purchased the router bit for the crown molding:
http://www.mlcswoodworking.com/order.../bt_mold2.html

I've done my research and narried my router purchase down to 2 models:

The Porter Cable 7518 (3 1/4 hp)
The Poter Cable 895PN 2 1/4 HP Mult-Base Router Kit


Essentially, if the 2 1/4 horse power can handle the crown modling bit, I
would perfer to purchase the 895. If it can't, then the 7518 will have to
do. More power, sigh. I don't ANTICIPATE having to do anything more
strenuous with the router than creating the crown molding.


--
L Anthony Johnson

"L Anthony Johnson" wrote in
t:

snip

Essentially, if the 2 1/4 horse power can handle the crown modling
bit, I would perfer to purchase the 895. If it can't, then the 7518
will have to do. More power, sigh. I don't ANTICIPATE having to do
anything more strenuous with the router than creating the crown
molding.


How much of this do you want to do?

What wood?

Do you have a table saw, with dado stack, to 'hog out' any portion of the
profile, before taking it to the router table?

If it were me, I'd go with the bigger router, for a couple of reasons:

* The 7518 has more horsepower, even if you are considering 'router
horses' here.

* The 7518 has been in production for a lot longer.

* The 7518 uses more metal in its important parts.

* The 89x series has been reported to have bearing heating issues, for
what may be good and valid engineering reasons.

* You are going to be asking a router to do what, in production runs,
would almost certainly be done on a molding cutter, such as a W&H, or,
perhaps, a shaper, with an induction motor (bigger 'horses', higher
expected duty cycle). Get the biggest router you can, and try not to over
stress it.

What's special about these mouldings that you want to do them yourself?

Patriarch

snip

Essentially, if the 2 1/4 horse power can handle the crown modling
bit, I would perfer to purchase the 895. If it can't, then the 7518
will have to do. More power, sigh. I don't ANTICIPATE having to do
anything more strenuous with the router than creating the crown
molding.


How much of this do you want to do?

What wood?

For the crown molding I"ll be using PINE. Later, when I re-do my closets, I
may be using Oak or Cherry.



Do you have a table saw, with dado stack, to 'hog out' any portion of the
profile, before taking it to the router table?

I don't have a dado stack, but I do have a table saw jig that cuts cove
molding.


If it were me, I'd go with the bigger router, for a couple of reasons:

* The 7518 has more horsepower, even if you are considering 'router
horses' here.

* The 7518 has been in production for a lot longer.

* The 7518 uses more metal in its important parts.

* The 89x series has been reported to have bearing heating issues, for
what may be good and valid engineering reasons.

I have read this somewhere else, too.


* You are going to be asking a router to do what, in production runs,
would almost certainly be done on a molding cutter, such as a W&H, or,
perhaps, a shaper, with an induction motor (bigger 'horses', higher
expected duty cycle). Get the biggest router you can, and try not to over
stress it.

I may not have been clear before, but I am only a *hobbyist*. This router
will only be used on the weekends and special projects for things I build
for the home.


What's special about these mouldings that you want to do them yourself?

Self-Gratification.

I just took up woodworking a little over a year ago and would like to be
able to create moldings, if needed. I created some crown molding shelves
(Oct or Nov 2003 Wood Magazine) sometime ago, that required popular crown
molding. Needless to say, I couldn't find any. That led me to build the
cove molding jig I saw in another Wood magazine. THe Moldings turned out
okay, but required a lot of sanding and scraping.

This is all a part of my learning process.

If I weren't a hobbyist and time was of the essence, then I probably would
be asking about a millwork company.

L Anthony Johnson

"L Anthony Johnson" wrote in
:


snip

Essentially, if the 2 1/4 horse power can handle the crown modling
bit, I would perfer to purchase the 895. If it can't, then the
7518 will have to do. More power, sigh. I don't ANTICIPATE having
to do anything more strenuous with the router than creating the
crown molding.


How much of this do you want to do?

What wood?

For the crown molding I"ll be using PINE. Later, when I re-do my
closets, I may be using Oak or Cherry.

I suspect that, for pine or cherry, the smaller HP router would be fine.
Oak may be another story.

The PC 693 router my wife got me for Christmas a couple of years ago has
plenty of power for medium-sized bits, taking reasonable depth cuts, in all
but the hardest woods, for the work I do.




Do you have a table saw, with dado stack, to 'hog out' any portion of
the profile, before taking it to the router table?

I don't have a dado stack, but I do have a table saw jig that cuts
cove molding.


If it were me, I'd go with the bigger router, for a couple of
reasons:

* The 7518 has more horsepower, even if you are considering 'router
horses' here.

* The 7518 has been in production for a lot longer.

* The 7518 uses more metal in its important parts.

* The 89x series has been reported to have bearing heating issues,
for what may be good and valid engineering reasons.

I have read this somewhere else, too.


* You are going to be asking a router to do what, in production
runs, would almost certainly be done on a molding cutter, such as a
W&H, or, perhaps, a shaper, with an induction motor (bigger 'horses',
higher expected duty cycle). Get the biggest router you can, and try
not to over stress it.

I may not have been clear before, but I am only a *hobbyist*. This
router will only be used on the weekends and special projects for
things I build for the home.


What's special about these mouldings that you want to do them
yourself?

Self-Gratification.

I just took up woodworking a little over a year ago and would like to
be able to create moldings, if needed. I created some crown molding
shelves (Oct or Nov 2003 Wood Magazine) sometime ago, that required
popular crown molding. Needless to say, I couldn't find any. That
led me to build the cove molding jig I saw in another Wood magazine.
THe Moldings turned out okay, but required a lot of sanding and
scraping.

This is all a part of my learning process.

If I weren't a hobbyist and time was of the essence, then I probably
would be asking about a millwork company.


Consider getting the 690 series router, rather than the 75xx series.
Various iterations are available with a PC supplied rebate, and they are
both rock-solid and well supported with add-on gear. You give up some of
the potential slick feature set of the 89x series, but you will be highly
unlikely to have a failure with the 690.

Patriarch,
also a hobbyist, but sliding towards the edge of fanaticism...

On Thu, 14 Oct 2004 14:07:25 -0400, "L Anthony Johnson"
wrote:



I may not have been clear before, but I am only a *hobbyist*. This router
will only be used on the weekends and special projects for things I build
for the home.


Then this is a "tuffie"... You'll be able to move faster with the
bigger machine. You'd have to take lighter bites with the smaller
router.

Once you're done with the moldings in the house - then personally, I'd
rather have the smaller router around - if I had a small stable of
routers.

On the other hand - if you've got the money, then an approach could be
to buy the big dog, for the moldings; when done hang it upsidedown in
a router table and buy a smaller PC 690'ish or DeWalt 621'ish one for
other tasks.

Me? (1) I'd not make the molding myself (2) if I was going to try it,
I'd buy the smaller one (actually, I'd use my 690) and take real light
cuts and see how it goes before popping for the big 3 HP one.

L Anthony Johnson wrote:
I don't ANTICIPATE having to do anything more
strenuous with the router than creating the crown molding.


Don't be fooled by thinking the bigger router will go to
waste. It's actually the opposite, or at least that's the
way I've found it to be true.

UA100

If you gotta have a heavy router for a specific application then that's that.
The 7518 is the standard for table use and the design has served well for many
years. Can't go wrong. As a first router for an up and coming carpenter like
yourself you'll kinda hate it for hand work, which is why you'll want a smaller
one as well. My favs are the 693's and the old PC/Rockwell mod 100s, the bodys
and bases interchange.

David


In article , L Anthony Johnson
says...

I'm just a hobbyist woodworker who does a little carpentry around the house.
I want to be able to create some crown molding at home using a router on the
router table I am about to build. This will allow to create crown molding
for the home and some other projects that I have in mind.

I've already purchased the router bit for the crown molding:
http://www.mlcswoodworking.com/order.../bt_mold2.html

I've done my research and narried my router purchase down to 2 models:

The Porter Cable 7518 (3 1/4 hp)
The Poter Cable 895PN 2 1/4 HP Mult-Base Router Kit


Essentially, if the 2 1/4 horse power can handle the crown modling bit, I
would perfer to purchase the 895. If it can't, then the 7518 will have to
do. More power, sigh. I don't ANTICIPATE having to do anything more
strenuous with the router than creating the crown molding.

I currently own 3 PC routers. I started with the 1.5 HP 693
series and did an entire kitchen with it. It a very good router for
hand work, but for some jobs, the extra power of the 3 HP 7518 is very
nice to have in the table. You can push nearly anything you want by it!
By having the two, I no longer need to keep mounting and dismounting the
693 from the table.

The 3rd router is a 8529 2HP plunge router. I got it when Home
Depot gave them away for $100. You can plunge route with a fixed base
router like the 693 or 7518, but its a bit tricky. The plunge router
fills that gap.

Multiple routers are a big benefit when working on a complex
project with many parts. You can set up each router with a different
bit and leave it that way for the duration of the project. Helps with
accuracy and repeatability.

Len
-----------

L Anthony Johnson wrote:
I'm just a hobbyist woodworker who does a little carpentry around the house.
I want to be able to create some crown molding at home using a router on the
router table I am about to build. This will allow to create crown molding
for the home and some other projects that I have in mind.

I've already purchased the router bit for the crown molding:
http://www.mlcswoodworking.com/order.../bt_mold2.html

I've done my research and narried my router purchase down to 2 models:

The Porter Cable 7518 (3 1/4 hp)
The Poter Cable 895PN 2 1/4 HP Mult-Base Router Kit


Essentially, if the 2 1/4 horse power can handle the crown modling bit, I
would perfer to purchase the 895. If it can't, then the 7518 will have to
do. More power, sigh. I don't ANTICIPATE having to do anything more
strenuous with the router than creating the crown molding.