Spiral bits make a big difference. They significantly reduce tear-out, and I
highly recommend that you use one. Another thing that you should do is to
make a fresh backer board, so your first cut puts a hole in it exactly the
size of your router bit cut. With this backer board in place, all box joint
cuts with that router bit set at that height will have minimum tear-out. If
you change any settings, make a new backer board. The backer board holds the
wood fibers in place around the edge of the cut instead of letting the
router bit tear them out.

--
Charley


"Brian Hoyt" wrote in message
...
You may find that the spiral upcut bits help (but not eliminate) tearout.
They certainly perform better than 1 or 2 flute straight bits.

Something like

http://www.leevalley.com/wood/page.a...168,46171&ap=1


cheers ...

brian

foggytown wrote:
I'm going to do some experimentation. I can't see any reason why, with
the proper setup, I can't do reasonable finger/box joints on my router
table. Same as the way they're done on a TS except using a straight
bit. Right?

FoggyTown