What did I do wrong??

[pwatt01]

Hello all!

Over the weekend, I needed to create 16mm wide, 9mm deep grooves in some chipboard panels for some sliding drawers/shelves. I thought "Hey, i have a router and a Triton table, lets use my this and create my grooves"... and I not quite sure what I did wrong from there, but by the first maybe 2m the bit was jamming and not cutting any more. I now believe that i have a very blunt router bit. I had the speed set to that i was cutting freely but not burning the wood before it stopped

Now I am thinking that i did one of the following wrong

• Used a cheap bit
• Tried to route the 9mm in 1 go, instead of 2/3/4mm at a time
• Was using chipboard
• Had the speed wrong
• I should have done it on the saw bench to begin with and never tried with the router table
• ...

Can any one give some pointers to what to do next time?

Thanks

[NCArcher]

I think you have worked out what went wrong.
Smaller cuts, I would have done 5 and 4. Ensure the bit is sharp and not coated with resin.
Keep the speed up. Slow enough to not burn may be too slow, especially in chip board which is fairly harsh on bits and blades.
If you are doing trenches that go from one side to the other, use the table saw to remove the bulk of the material and then just use the router for the final dimensioning and clean up. If you are using a 16mm bit make sure your router has enough grunt as well. If it struggles with a bigger bit, make two passes with a smaller diameter bit.

[pwatt01]

Thanks for that. I will use those tips and do things differently next time!