Reddit reviews Roman Carbide DC1261 1-1/2-Inch Bottom Cleaning, 1/2-Inch Shank

Router sled.

Mine is very similar to this one, though you should probably start smaller to fit the sizes you would commonly work on.

You'll need a full size router and a wide flat bottom bit (I have this one). Wider bits for larger pieces to save time.

Or:
http://www.amazon.com/Roman-Carbide-DC1261-2-Inch-Cleaning/dp/B005W18EIW

Good idea for the spacer. I actually had to make my router sled two sided. One side had rails that were one layer thick, the other had two for the thicker stock. So if the boards were too thick for the side with one layer, i could take it down to that size first.


The sides were supposed to be about .065 to about .080 inches thick i was closer to about .055 to .060 in thick. Thin enough to bow out a bit eventually, even though bending adds structure. This was the first thing I did so I didnt quite have the technique down. I found the key was to take small even measurements, as well as to measure often and since i hot glued the pieces down, i had to remember to take into account the dofference that makes, as well as having to sand/scrape away the striations left by the router. I also found that running the router in line with the plunge handles and in very shallow passes helped minimize this.

The back of mine is about 3mm, and I was shooting for about 2.5 final. The front should have been about 2mm, and that ended up about 2.5 the last I measured, but while finishing i actually stripped all the finish off and scraping a bunch to remove gouge marks so I think i emded up closer to my goal anyway.

Forgive the mixture of units, but my calipers went between the two easily and different sources said different things.


This is the bit I used. I boughr it for this project and I have been more that happy with it. If you do make the uke, be sure to practice on scraps for everything you havent tried before. Using the router, you will want to get a card scrapper, it takes care of the srriations in no time.