Thread: How to make a Bullnose stair tread?

Use a roundover bit and a fence (hand-held or router table). If you try to use a bearing-guided cutter, you'll have nothing for the bearing to ride against when you turn the tread over.

Ray

Please forgive me I have no experience when it come to woodwork.
What is this hand-held fence you talk about. what part of the wood do it sit on to guid the router.

Here is a picture of one brand of router with its fence attached:



This set-up is used hand-held and the router is moved along the edge of the wood to be profiled, from left to right.

Here is a picture of a router table, with its own fence.



The router is mounted beneath the table and the bit protrudes through it. The wood is passed from right to left. The fence is used to set the amount of cut - the further the fence is back from the bit, the more it will remove. Small amounts is the norm, to avoid overloading the router.

Click here to see a picture of a bearing-guided roundover bit. This can be used either hand-held or in a table, but because the workpiece will need to be profiled twice (once for the top edge of the tread, then again for the bottom edge), depending upon the amount of radius bit chosen, there might not be enough for the bearing to ride against when the tread is turned over. For this reason, a fence is required to set the amount of cut. HTH

Ray