Crosscut dados in plywood

[Rick Potter]

At the last show I bought a DOWNCUT spiral all carbide router bit from Woodline. I am cutting dados in Chinese prefinished birch plywood for cabinet insides. I could not believe it. The crosscuts are just as clean as the cuts with the grain.

The plywood is not the cheapest, nor the best. It was about $45 a sheet for pre-finished from my lumber supplier. The crosscuts were slightly cleaner with the router bit than with a new melamine/plywood blade on the saw.

Only problem is that the chips need to be cleaned out, since they are driven down, rather than out.

Rick Potter

[Joe Scharle]

That's a small inconvenience for clean edges. I pop the vac hose off the router and run it down the groove and they're clean! Then on to the next. I use a compression bit when I plowing slots and it works well too.