Yesterday I was cutting clamping “cauls” out of 3/4" 4x4’ ply. Each cut was a straight cut on top and a cambered cut on the bottom. After each cut, I removed the cut away piece, manually moved the y-axis down 2.75", zero’d it and went again.
After a number of passes I noticed that result of my cuts was making deeper and deeper slots in my spoil board. As I said, I was careful to only zero the y-axis after each one.
Any ideas what could cause the z-axis to drift like this?
Should have mentioned that mine is an Elite Foreman.
Could your bit be slipping? Try checking zHeight of the bit after a run. If it is, cleaning out the colette, check the shaft of the bit…
Thanks so much for the suggestion. The bit I was using was the 1/4” Jenny compression with a .15” DOC so I suppose it could be the case that each time a new pass entered the stock the up-cut portion of the bit was resulting in pulling force on the bit and if it wasn’t tight enough, perhaps each pass it was getting moved a bit.
I saw a video where someone was warning against over tightening the bit in the router. Perhaps I over adjusted. I’ll try keeping the bit a little tighter.
Thanks.
Absent a torque wrench, the advice I was given is to grip both wrenches in one hand and squeeze. This gives enough force without over tightening that might happen with a two handed approach.
YMMV
