Thread: Will a router clean this up?

A router could work ONLY, and I really stress ONLY...if the half lap joints are very tight and therefore the cross piece's "fingers" will support the grain from blowing out when the router exits. a pretty tight joint won't be good enough. Looking at the your photo, the piece 2nd from bottom clearly shows a gap between the two pieces. This gap is too much already. It won't give majorly bad blow out, but it will likely break off a few fibers below the surface leaving craters in the finished piece unless bogged up.

I would get them close with a saw (powered or handsaw) and then sand smooth.

If you could trim it back to about 1mm, 2mm max, I'd be happy to do it with a router. I would try clamp a sacrificial piece each end to stop blow out there though.

Originally Posted by Kuffy

A router could work ONLY, and I really stress ONLY...if the half lap joints are very tight and therefore the cross piece's "fingers" will support the grain from blowing out when the router exits. a pretty tight joint won't be good enough. Looking at the your photo, the piece 2nd from bottom clearly shows a gap between the two pieces. This gap is too much already. It won't give majorly bad blow out, but it will likely break off a few fibers below the surface leaving craters in the finished piece unless bogged up.

I would get them close with a saw (powered or handsaw) and then sand smooth.

Thanks Kuffy - the pieces aren't glued in yet but I'm confident the fit is good - the timber is on a bowed sheet for the purposes of a photo so it should all be good once assembled properly. Cheers

Alpine Ash is very prone to splitting on end grain, you only have to look at the sawn ends as they currently are to see that. You could pare them back a bit with a sharp crosscut handsaw, but I'd probably just go with the router taking two or three cuts to get to the final length. A few things to watch out for:
1. I assume you will be routing using the other side of the unit to run the router base on? It will need to be straight and square with no indentation or protrusion by the fingers.
2.You will need to ensure that you have good support for the router base, an auxiliary support so that both sides of the base are supported would be my recommendation. Must be at 90 degrees to the cutter.
3. To prevent tearout you will need to climb cut down to the finished level on the back side of each finger before you do any other cutting.

Apart from that I can't see anything else that can go wrong! Hopefully there will be some other contributors.

Personally I'd be chopping them almost flush with the mitre saw and then trimming after the glue up with a sharp low angle block plane. Another alternative would be to sand the ends flush with a belt sander.

If you do decide to go down the router path use a quality brand like Freud or CMT, preferably a shear cutting bit like these. Carbitool also list a shear cutting trim bit.

A straight bit will do it, but it won't be a pleasant experience; if you can get one with a shear angle or, better yet, a proper spiral you'll get a better finish. Personally, I'd be getting it within 1-2mm with a saw, then using a belt sander.