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Assembly was straight forward. Everything arrived as expected, no damage, etc. Table's "folding" nature is a bit of a misnomer - once you mount your fixed base to the metal plate and the metal plate to the table, the table's cross brace leg support can no longer pass back and forth under the center of the table (to allow the legs to fold) - so, folding is out unless you dismount the base from the plate, or remove the plate from the table. I have a Freud Router (VT1700), and went searching for a portable router table. Extended my search to non-Freud, and simply could not become comfortable with departing from a "factory fit" for the plate/router mounting. Took a chance that the more recent "it's been improved" reviews were accurate and bought this table. New metal mounting plate was easy to level and is flawless, as was the table surface itself (planar, no defects). It's compact enough "unfolded" that I will be able to find a spot for it in my very limited shop.
Found this model, but was dissuaded by the wide ranging reviews. Only thing missing from the box were the assembly instructions (included Spanish, not English). Trust the most recent reviews; if you need a simple, compact table, there's no reason to hesitate with regard to this solution. Found the English version quickly and easily on the Freud site.
I returned my new router and went out a purchased a Freud router. There is nothing out there like it. The table is great. The ability to make dual micro adjustments makes it a breeze to setup, even for a small run.Sadly, the aluminum insert plate is only configured for a Freud router. It works perfectly. If you have any other type of router you must manually drill three holes; granted they did provide etched concentric circles on the rear of the plate to help you align the holes you must manually drill.
Read the description on the box "New aluminium plate included $50 value".I love the fence system and the table is very sturdy and stable.It's easy to move around in my samll workshop and had no problem in making cabinet doors.Only bad thing is the new aluminum plate does not have pre-drilled mounting holes even for Freud routers.Other than this, this is a real good portable router table with excellent fence system. Freud replaced it with aluminum plate and all the problems are completely gone. Forget about all the previous reviews talking about sagging cheap plastic plate. It's easy to make the plate leveled with 8 screws.Assembly was fairly easy thanks to good instructions. I'll recommend this to anyone. It took less than an hour.Freud uses same box that shows black plastic plate but new aluminum plate has been included.
All these have vanished off the shelf during the Holiday sales season.I am wondering if anyone else has recently purchased one of these and found the improved aluminum insert, and if so, how does it perform. First let me say that I do not own this router table, but I am thinking of buying one.I too was drawn to the precision adjust fences, but turned off by the bad reviews given the plastic insert. My local LOWES has one of these on display, and it has the same black plastic insert. I am going to be hanging a Porter-Cable 694VK on mine. However there were some others still in the box that stated that they now had an ALUMINUM insert plate.
As others here have said, the fence is great, but the plate is horrible, especially when considering the high-precision purpose of the fence. And so for now, it's worth spending the extra time and money to make it work right. I've spent the last few hours trying to mount my router to the plate, but now have concluded that the plate must be replaced, if any precision work is to be done on it.As far as I know, this fence is the only game in town for precision adjustment, short of spending about LOT more for the Incra precision-adjustable model.
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