Apologies for the newbie question, but there have to be best practices for changing the bits on the Makita router. I feel like I need two extra hands to get the collet tight enough to hold the smallish carving bits. The shaft lock does not hold tightly enough and still requires a third hand. (I’ve already snapped off one lock button.) Four bloody fingers later, I’m guessing there must be some best practices out there.
Thanks so much for this forum… a life saver in many ways.
My spindle is dewalt, and i’ve had the same one on there for at least 5 years with lots of hours and never had an issue. I never have to tighten it that tight. Are you sure the collet is the right size for your end mills?
Hey Patrick, the 1 hand wrench tightening method works great. You position the 2 wrenches so that they fit in the expanded palm of one hand face up, then hold the bit with the 2nd hand. Then squeeze the single hand and as the wrenches come together the collet nut is tightened.
Here’s an except from a video showing this method…
Thanks @SethCNC !! The hand-squeeze method is brilliant! Will take some practice… but Forum comes through again. Thanks!
Just got my Makita router after 10 years of using a DeWalt. There is a very nice pin that slides into a hole in the shaft of the Makita. If you depress that pin with your left hand and the wrench on the collet with your right it works really well. However You need to hand tighten the collet on the bit to the extreme before before you tighten with the wrench.
Do NOT use the button in conjunction with a wrench the button should only be used to assist with hand tightening to snug up the nut prior to using wrenches to apply torque to hold securely and to break the nut free.
Do NOT use the button to tighten or loosen the collet nut like that, unless you want to crack the housing.
The various cnc FaceBook groups that run this router are littered with photos like this one as a result of this action.
Looks like someone did not pull the button out when they turned the router on. That is the only thing that kind of torque required for the fault in the picture. Unless of course if you use a 2’ long cheater bar.
This topic was automatically closed 90 days after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.
