Thread: Powerful enough to rout out hinge mortises?

I would imagine so as the depth you require for a hinge is generally 2-3mm.
What I find is difficult when using a router is staying in the area to be mortised as visibility is restricted.

You will still need to square the corners though.

It might be viable if you need to work away from mains power or already have a few high power compatible batteries in good condition and don't need to buy them. But since there is no spec from Ryobi as to available power output, and the batteries are max 72WH (18V x 4AH), they are probably more toy than tool. Personally routers have always been one of the things where I believe that there is no real substitute for mains power, even with trim routers.

In case you are locked to in Bunnings with gift vouchers or similar, I think that their 370W Ryobi trim router at $99 or the 850W Ozito trim router at $59 would be better options, but there are also a lot of other options available from other stores as well.

I can send you construction article/plans for a versatile hinge mortice jig than can be directly set for any size butt hinge to about 80mm if you want. Same concept cn be used for larger hinges with a bit of enlarging. PM if interested.

Thanks Mal, I have some other Ryobi one plus tools so I thought for $60 it's not too bad an outlay and was more for convenience than anything else. It's a small unit and it fits neatly into my toolbox but I do have doubts about its power, sadly at Bunnings no-one could tell me whether it could do the mortising so at this stage I'll leave it pending further information.