ROUTER CUTTERS - CARE
 Cutter
cleaning
A clean cutter is halfway to a sharp cutter. Cleaning is a simple
process:
Remove bearing
if present. Brush off loose dust etc. with an old toothbrush or
similar.
Remove resinous
deposits with a solvent. Far and away the best solvent I have come
across is contact adhesive remover. Use in well ventilated
conditions.
After cleaning,
spray with any handy spray e.g. WD40, Silicone etc. then replace the
bearing. Lubricate the bearing with spay oil, never use WD40
on bearings.
 Removing
Bearings
The first time you remove a bearing from a
bearing-guided cutter you are likely to find that the Allen screw is
really tight. It is easy to remove a lump of your finger if you are
not careful. I keep an old gardening glove in the workshop and put it
on to hold the cutter if the bearing is tight.
Cutter
honing
Keeping cutters sharp with a diamond hone will
improve your work, increase cutter life, and extend the periods
between re-sharpening.
 Use
a thin diamond hone of ‘Fine’ or ‘Superfine’
grade. Keep the hone well wetted, and rub the flats of the blade back
and forth. Heavy pressure is not needed – let the diamond do
the work. Give the same number of strokes to each edge to preserve
the balance of the cutter. Try about ten strokes to each edge to
start with. Experience will teach you how many for a given cutter.
Remember it is a
honing operation not a grinding one. A good analogy is the
old-fashioned barber and his razor.
If honing
immediately after cleaning do not spray until honing is completed.
Narrow
cutters
Cutters with shanks bigger in diameter than the
cut diameter cannot be easily honed. The most common examples are
1/4in and 3/8in cutters on 1/2in shanks. If you have a 1/2in router
it pays to have at least one each of the smaller diameter cutters on
a 1/4in shank, so that you will be able to keep them sharp with your
hone.
Cutter
storage
 Having
cleaned and honed your cutters, do not spoil things by throwing them
loose into and old box or tin. If the original packaging is lost or
inadequate, keep cutters in blocks of wood drilled to take their
shanks. Use softwood or well-seasoned mild hardwood (not oak) to
avoid corroding the shanks, and drill a clearance size hole to
prevent the shanks jamming in the block. For 1/4in cutters I use a
17/64in twist drill, for 8mm cutters a 21/64in drill and for 1/2in
cutters a 13mm drill.
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