Pondering acquiring a tracksaw

[Greg R Bradley]

You should shop at Amazon. The Dewalt products are considerably cheaper than what you are quoting and the shipping cost is zero. My experience has been that Amazon typically ships faster than places like Woodcraft or Rockler.

Amazon is about the same on that than where he was looking. $467.89 vs the $460 he found. That one looks like it includes freight but that changes as Amazon has various vendors on the same item. Some will also include sales tax. I find Amazon has the best price about 20% of the time on what I buy.
Example, I just bought 4 sheet goods racks from three different manufacturers: Jamco, Fairbanks, Little Giant. Amazon was the highest of the 4 vendors. I've bought a bunch of Durham hardware storage racks and ended up buying the rack from Zoro and the bins from Amazon.

[Anthony Whitesell]

It appears the Makita, Dewalt, and Festool offer a router adapter. Do any others? Have I missed it?

Do any of the track saw router adapters fit a Bosch 1617EVS?

[Ken Kortge]

It appears the Makita, Dewalt, and Festool offer a router adapter. Do any others? Have I missed it?

Do any of the track saw router adapters fit a Bosch 1617EVS?

Anthony,

Eurekazone a very nice "Super Smart Router Kit" (SSRK) for their track saw system. I actually bought an extra Bosch 1617EVS plunge router base (RA1166) that I installed on the SSRK so I can easily (quickly) use the router both off track and on track.

Details here: http://www.eurekazone.com/category_s/2033.htm

Base installation video here (actually using the 1617 plunge base): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EvoV66awAxE

Using the SSRK video here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f-HscM_vnCk and
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=su88uvZN_Ac

In the second video showing how to use it to create dados and rabbets he really doesn't go too much into the detail of how he created the pieces of wood he uses to adjust the "limit stops" so it cuts the dado/rabbet width to perfectly match the target T-track or wood.

For dados: The basic idea is that you use the limit stops to define the dado width, but then you have to reduce that distance by the width of the router bit. Eurekazone says they like to use 1/2 bits for 3/4" plywood dados - cut to perfect width in two passes.

1. You place the router bit on the inner edge of where the dado will be, slide the limit stop on the other side of the traveler bridge (the part that touches the track) so it touches the bridge, and lock the limit stop. This defines the dado cut width on that side.

2. You place a dado-width piece of wood on the other side of the traveler bridge and slide the other limit stop toward the traveler bridge so the wood is trapped between the traveler bridge and the unlocked limit stop. Lock that limit stop. At point, if you remove the wood and slide the traveler bridge and router side-to-side you'll see that the dado cut width will be too wide. That is because you need to remove the width of the router bit from the travel width.

3. To do this, Place the router bit (or a spacer of the exact same width) up against the limit stop (where the wood was). Slide the traveler bridge until it touches the bit/spacer. Lock down the traveler bit so it stays in place for the next step.

4. Remove the bit/spacer, unlock the limit stop it was touching, and slide the stop until it touches the traveler bridge. You've now removed the exact width of the router bit from the dado cut width.

5. Unlock the traveler bridge and slide it side-to-side. You'll see that the dado cut width is perfect.

I recommend locking down the traveler bridge while cutting the dado. So you unlock the bridge, slide it to one side, cut the dado, unlock the bridge, slide it to the other side, and then cut again. If you need to clear the inner area of the dado then slide the bridge to suit. lock the bridge, and cut. You can carefully adjust one of the limit stops to "dial in" the width if you want the dado tighter or looser.

So those little wood pieces in the video are the width of the wood (or the T-track) minus the width of the router bit - so he can set the limit stops quicker.

Rabbets are slightly different. You can align the router bit on the OUTSIDE edge wood, set and lock the limit stop on the opposite side of the traveler bridge, put a rabbet-width piece of wood on the other side of the traveler bridge, slide that limit stop until it traps the wood, lock the limit stop. That is it. You don't need to adjust for the width of the router bit because it started outside of the cut area.

You can also buy parallel stops that you place on the track to create grooves (I'm not sure if that's the right term -- dados that stop in in mid-wood) or stopped rabbets (I made up that term).

[Anthony Whitesell]

Yep. I missed that one. EurekaZone does have one that will work with any router. Are there any others that work with the Bosch router?

I'm leaning away from the EZsmart due to the lack of dust collection on the circular saw. Due to pricing, I'm leaning towards the Dewalt or the Makita, more towards the Dewalt due to popularity/availabilty. Leaning away from the Festool due to the higher price (though it isn't much more expensive, it is the highest price).

[David Bassett]

.... Are there any others that work with the Bosch router? ....

I *THINK* I have read Bosch & DeWalt routers have the same design (hole size, spacing, etc.) for attachments. Hopefully someone can confirm or deny for you. You do need to confirm it before the rest of this applies.

I can confirm the Makita track router guide fits a DeWalt #611 router.

To me, this suggests the DeWalt track router guide would fit (at least some) Makita routers, but I can't confirm that either. Since the Makita & DeWalt tracks have different cross sections using the appropriate guide and adapting it to your router seems important, but there seems to be good compatibility in this respect.

Another note, I've never looked at the EurekaZone guide, it sounds like it may have more features than the Makita guide.

[Jim Dwight]

It appears the Makita, Dewalt, and Festool offer a router adapter. Do any others? Have I missed it?

Do any of the track saw router adapters fit a Bosch 1617EVS?

There is a customer review on Amazon that says the DeWalt fits the Bosch 1617 with no modifications. I haven't used mine yet but it appears to attach where the edge guide would so if the hole spacing is the same as a DeWalt or PC, it would work. Apparently it does.

[Rich Riddle]

I have nothing but good things to say about my Festool track saw. That said, I didn't drink their kool-aid. Only have the track saw and one sander someone gave me. Just remember to make sure your track is long enough or there could be "kick back" issues. I much prefer the track saw to table saw for breaking down large pieces of plywood. It also trims doors very well if the get the TS-75. It's a bit larger.