Milwaukeee Cordless Router

[Bushmiller]

Woodworking tools are not the first thought that comes to mind normally with the Milwaukee brand and I probably would not have considered this tool except that I have three cordless Milwaukee tools already. They are a drill, an impact driver and a 125mm angle grinder: All are 18V. When an advertisement came through on the emails I had a quick look through the Milwaukee line up to see if there was anything I didn't realise I needed.

Sure enough there was something I didn't need: A cordless router. It was being offered at a special price so I took the plunge.

Actually it is not a plunge router but a fixed base, although there is a plunge base available. I omitted to take just a straight shot of the router by itself but did take one with another laminate trimmer for comparison, primarily for size.


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I should point out that I purchased only the skin.

It comes with two collets, 6mm & 1/4". neither are marked as such and a little difficult to tell apart. As far as I know I only have bits with 1/4" shanks. Initially the bits would not fit into either collet but with a little more persuasion one of them did fit and I have had no trouble since so I will put that down to newness. It also comes with an additional larger platform base and a dust collection port:

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Initially I thought a screw was missing to attach the DC port, but it turns out that it is held, quite securely I might add, by just the one thumb screw. It comes with a fence also attached by a single thumbscrew (a larger one). Attachment is simple.

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So far I have used it with a small rounding over bit, a cove bit and a straight bit and all worked well. This is the job on which I used the cove bit and the straight bit:


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SWMBO had attended a function and everybody got a presentation cheese knife set with board. However the sponsor had engraved their logo on the top and it was my job to remove it. The middle dish shape is the bit I have removed. I am mentioning this because it did raise another issue: The fence. The fence has no holes drilled ready to attach a timber fence. I wanted to attach a curved fence to make the circular waste removal easier:


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I was completely unable to drill the fence to take screws. I should have realised that when two centre punches flattened out with only gentle provocation I was going to have trouble. I did not have a drill bit that made even the slightest impression. I ended up using the small cut out in the metal fence to follow the curve. I will try again at some point with the drilling when I am having a brave day.

Depth adjustment is by two means. The clip that locks the body is released and the square black button is depressed so the body of the router can be easily slid up and down. Fine adjustment is provided by the black cylindrical dial above the grey locking device. When the correct depth has been found the grey cam lock device clamps the setting firmly.

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The following comment is probably unfair given that this is essentially a trim or laminate router. The hole in this base plate is about 38mm diameter and ordinarily this would be more than ample for a machine this size. I put a slotting cutter in it, but the slotting cutter was too large to pass through the base plate. I did not really want to use this cutter, although I did. I should explain that I was looking for a single small bearing for my jigsaw project and as this bearing was not running smoothly I thought it could be sacrificed, but it was quite stiff and no amount of rotation by hand was freeing it. My solution was to give it a run, but it was only when I came to insert the bit that I realised this was beyond the design intention. One other thing that I thought was a little remiss and it was that there was no locking spanner for the collett. Luckily I have a small container full of such tools so no problem for me: Just saying.

I found it easiest to remove the base when changing cutters as the clear plastic shroud restricts access. However this is child's play and takes about five seconds.

Inserted from the underside it performed well and I routed a slot on four sides of a piece of timber in one hit. No sign of the machine wanting to slow or be overworked so although I would not recommend using a bit such as this, it was quite a good test of the machine's ability. It worked easily although I did dial down the speed a little. It worked well for the bearing too as it ran smoothly after that as if it was brand new! I had to go looking elsewhere for a bearing as I could not justify pirating the part.

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All in all it is a very tidy unit and very nicely made. Quite attractive in resplendent red and polished aluminium it has a speed range of 10,000 to 31,000rpm. With the battery inserted it is a little heavier than a corded equivalent, but a smaller capacity battery could be substituted if this was an issue. 5amp/hr is the smallest battery I have. Clearly this machine would be expensive if you did not already have the batteries and charger. In fact at $364 for the skin only it was not at all cheap.

I like it and it is convenient and will be perfect for my intended purpose.

Regards
Paul

[Bushmiller]

I had a little think about the abuse to which I placed this tool. No pix: Didn't happen.

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This was only in Cypress Pine but done in one pass. Quite acceptable for this style of machine to my mind and a lot more than I intend to subject it to.

Regards
Paul

[62woollybugger]

Thanks for the review, i've had my eye on those for a while, just got to work out how to sneak the funds past SWMBO. I've got a drill, impact driver & their ROS, which I should do a review on. What run time do you get from a battery?

[Simplicity]

Paul great write up,
I have a similar trim router being a Makita.
It is well worth it I feel getting the extra pieces tho I’m assuming (Hate that word) that Milwaukee sell similar pieces.
The extra kit took the Makita from being a great little trim router, too being a Tool I make excuses too use.

I’m surprised the Milwaukee fence was hard steel, I thought it would have been just a plated mild steel,
But Double sided tape is one of my workshops favourite, must have things.

Cheers Matt.
I had a laugh when SWIMBO wanted the offensive logo removed, I’m in her boat.

Cheers Matt.

[Bushmiller]

WoollyB

I don't know how long the batteries will run for and that is always difficult to really say as it depends very much on the demand exerted. I have several batteries. 5/ah and 6/ah in the Milwaukee brand and a 9/ah no name. I particularly bought the large battery for the angle grinder which I suspected would be a heavy user of battery life and that is true. The drill goes for a lot longer and the impact driver seems to go for ever. At this stage I just don't know about the router, but using a small round over bit, a flush trim bit or a narrow straight bit just for three likely examples I am anticipating a good amount of time: Hopefully I am not disappointed.

Regards
Paul

[Bushmiller]

Matt

The hard steel of the fence took me completely by surprise too. As you saw I had first cut the curved sub fence out not anticipating the slightest difficulty. I used the table mounted jigsaw by the way, but not with the guide bearing assembly. My next door neighbour also suggested double sided tape but I did not have any.

With this router I have over a long period of time managed to accumulate three small trim style machines. The others being the little Makita pictured at the start of this thread and a small DeWalt fixed base machine. Just so this extravagance doesn't seem too over the top it is so I can use two depths of top bearing flush trim bits and one bottom bearing flush trim bit when making up saw handles. In the superhard woods I persist in using it needs several bites at the cherry and this will save me swapping out the bits. With the table mounted jigsaw I am hoping to be able to cut closer to my template and that too will reduce the load on the router.

Method in the madness? Probably just madness, but I don't want to talk about it in case it drives me insane.

Regards
Paul