Tend lock jigs?
- Thread starter kaseryn
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I presume you mean Trend lock jigs
Neither? I have had the older ones. Steel, heavy and bulky. Very durable, though. You need two steel templates for every lock (one for the lock body, the other for the face plate) which can get kind of expensive - after you got 8 or 10 lock body templates that should cover it, but every project I used them on seemed to require yet another face plate template.... Anorher downside is that they do not self centre so you need to set them up to centre at the start of the job and che k them periodically as the location plate can slip.if not sufficiently tightened. Depth of cut is limited, too, as the biggest pocket hole cutters will only to about 70 to 80mm depth of cut into the door (depending on the plunge range of your router) meaning that the bottom of the lock mortise needs to be drilled out with a spade bit or auger bit and cleaned out with a chisel to get sufficient depth to take the lock body. For speed you actually need two 1/2in plunge routers - one to make the initial plunge cut down to 40mm and the next to make a cut to full.deprh (providing you can live with a part of the longer cutter hanging out of the bottom of the router as it is too long to retract up above the base).
Frankly for small to.medium size runs the Souber DBB is probably a better bet. At least it self centres, although it does need a corded power drill (no router, however) and the cutters don't cut as cleanly as router cutters in a router do
Neither? I have had the older ones. Steel, heavy and bulky. Very durable, though. You need two steel templates for every lock (one for the lock body, the other for the face plate) which can get kind of expensive - after you got 8 or 10 lock body templates that should cover it, but every project I used them on seemed to require yet another face plate template.... Anorher downside is that they do not self centre so you need to set them up to centre at the start of the job and che k them periodically as the location plate can slip.if not sufficiently tightened. Depth of cut is limited, too, as the biggest pocket hole cutters will only to about 70 to 80mm depth of cut into the door (depending on the plunge range of your router) meaning that the bottom of the lock mortise needs to be drilled out with a spade bit or auger bit and cleaned out with a chisel to get sufficient depth to take the lock body. For speed you actually need two 1/2in plunge routers - one to make the initial plunge cut down to 40mm and the next to make a cut to full.deprh (providing you can live with a part of the longer cutter hanging out of the bottom of the router as it is too long to retract up above the base).
Frankly for small to.medium size runs the Souber DBB is probably a better bet. At least it self centres, although it does need a corded power drill (no router, however) and the cutters don't cut as cleanly as router cutters in a router do
Right.. thanks for the reply to this and my other trend query. Sounds a pain with all the face plates and i can imagine often finding yourself short of the one you need. A guy on this job uses the older model and swears by it but says is a bit of a pain to setup. With all the setting up and having to still drill down for full depth maybe i'm just as well to get good at doing it manually. It's not an area that seems i'd be losing as much time as compared with chopping all my hinge in by hand wich has been the case to start. I'll see how next week goes..
I've got both the jigs but not too sure which way to go routerwise. I've already got a trimmer and 1/4" trand that would do the hinges and faceplates but as you need 1/2" for mortising i'll have to pick one up. If i want to use the same one for faceplate and mortising couldn't i just drill a pilot hole each time to start the long reach bit off?
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For lock mortising you need a 1/2 in plunge router with the greatest depth of plunge you can get - for that reason I used to use a DW625 (75 to 80mm plunge depth, used to be one of the best on the market). Problem is when you use the really long pocket hole bits the bit is just too long to allow you to do the faceplates (which are only 2 to 5mm thick). My solution was to have another, smaller plunge router set up with a 1/2in bit and a 30mm guide bush for the face plates in the lock jig, swapping to a 16.7mm guide bush when used on the hinge jig.
For those not in the know the steel lock jigs require a 12.7mm (1/2in) diameter cutter whilst the metal hinge jigs require a 12mm diameter cutter and a 16mm guide bush, however the critical difference is the 4mm difference between the cutter diameter and the guide bush diameter, so any cutter/guide bush combination with that 4mm difference will work, e.g 12.7mm cutter with a 16.7mm guide bush (Trend sell these these days, my original had to be turned to order and set me back about £25), or for radius corner hinges with a 10mm radius a 20mm cutter with a 24mm guide bush will work
For those not in the know the steel lock jigs require a 12.7mm (1/2in) diameter cutter whilst the metal hinge jigs require a 12mm diameter cutter and a 16mm guide bush, however the critical difference is the 4mm difference between the cutter diameter and the guide bush diameter, so any cutter/guide bush combination with that 4mm difference will work, e.g 12.7mm cutter with a 16.7mm guide bush (Trend sell these these days, my original had to be turned to order and set me back about £25), or for radius corner hinges with a 10mm radius a 20mm cutter with a 24mm guide bush will work
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Cheers again. I'll be back in tomorrow and can see what setup the others are using too. I think all the locks/plates are the same on this job which means from 5 to 10 of the same plate rebate for nearly all except bathrooms so i think i might just make a jig for those and use my cordless on those and the hinge jig. Mortise by hand/drill for the moment till i get the big router and bits sorted then i can leave that one setup to do just those.
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Deleted member 174758
As another piece of gen. about the steel lock jigs which may be of use: although Trend dont advertise it in their catalogues or on the web site (or rather, they didn't when i used their jigs), they do have a custom template making service where they can turn round a one-off (special size) template in about 24 hours. You do gave to add an extra day or two for the post, however. Seem to recsll it was under £20 a pop. Because they have done a lot of these specials they have a large library of patterns. Talk to Trend technical about this if you need it
It"s also worth noting that you can install two templates in the jig at the same time. This can be useful to create custom sizes; for example if you had a template for a 140 x 28mm faceplate and combined that with a second template for a 160 x 16mm lock body you'd get a template capable of routing a 140 x 16mm opening. The templates are thin steel and sre held in place in the recess at the to of the jig by a pair of magnets. Got me out of a hole a few times that has
Worthwhile marking the actual size of the openings produced on the individual steel templates with a Sharpie - they are only stsmped "A", "B", "C", etc which is a fat lot of use when you are out on site, you've lost the manual which comes with them and you can't get onto the Trend website
It"s also worth noting that you can install two templates in the jig at the same time. This can be useful to create custom sizes; for example if you had a template for a 140 x 28mm faceplate and combined that with a second template for a 160 x 16mm lock body you'd get a template capable of routing a 140 x 16mm opening. The templates are thin steel and sre held in place in the recess at the to of the jig by a pair of magnets. Got me out of a hole a few times that has
Worthwhile marking the actual size of the openings produced on the individual steel templates with a Sharpie - they are only stsmped "A", "B", "C", etc which is a fat lot of use when you are out on site, you've lost the manual which comes with them and you can't get onto the Trend website
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