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Porter Cable Router 7539
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| Written by NormFan (Nick) | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Tuesday, 14 October 2003 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Description
Tools Model: 7539Manufacturer: Porter Cable Price: £350 
User reviews
Average user rating from: 1 user(s)
To write a review please register or login. 2 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Porter Cable 7539, Tuesday, 14 October 2003 Written by NormFan
I have always preferred it when the router is mounted, so I decided to make a router table & needed a beefy router to fit in it, after looking at various models I decided upon the “Porter Cable 7539”. This router is very large & VERY heavy weighing in at 8Kg, despite the weight it was surprisingly pleasant to use as a hand router with the weight keeping the router securely down on the work piece. The 7539 is advertised as a 1850W router, however this is a little misleading as when I received the router, the label on the side said that it was 1680W with the actual power output printed in the manual at a lower figure than that!, I phoned up “Rutlands” where I purchased the router from & they said this was normal & that it was because the windings on the motor were different as its converted from 110v, still it would have been nice to have known this in the beginning, they told me that this model knocks strips off of the 200W Triton model & I can now believe this, read on... Anyway, lets not get bogged down with figures, in practice this router is extremely powerful & while its good practice to do cuts in smaller passes I did try a 2.5” cutter feeding the wood through relatively quickly taking a deep pass & the router didn’t even break sweat, no change in tone or anything, it has “Constant Speed Control” & I can certainly say that this is definitely working great & prevents the router from slowing down & possibly burning the wood. This model has a speed selector switch which is perfect as you know exactly what speed you are using, this however must be selected whilst the machine is off to avoid damage, the trigger can also be locked to the on position for use under the table, this also locks positively & doesn’t unlock during use, the plunge is at first a little sticky but soon gets smoother with the weight of the machine helping a lot, there is a lot of spring noise when plunging as the springs compress making it sound like an old bed, but it works perfectly ok, the plunge lock is the best I have ever used as well, with one move of the finger its locked positively & will not release at all. As far as build quality goes, its worlds away from other makes of routers, the whole case is made out of metal instead of plastic & it just oozes quality from the moment you set eyes on it, despite what it says in the “Rutlands” catalogue, it DOES come with ½” & ¼” collets, which was a pleasant surprise to find, as the price of the collets are around £20, while we are on the subject of collets, the quality of the collets are excellent too, bits cant get stuck “frozen” in the collets as when you loosen the collet nut it forces the bit out & is a pleasure to use. The 7539 also comes supplied with a fence, & this is what I call a fence!! Its made out of extruded aluminium & features a brass microfine adjuster, it works fantastic, however this is not made by “Porter Cable” despite what you may have read, it has their badge but is made in China, still it’s a very good fence & is the best I have ever seen supplied with any router. Now so far its been all good news, how about some bad points? Well to be honest its very hard to find any at all, I guess the only thing I can find is the base opening is rather small, I couldn’t fit a simple shamfer bit in as it wouldn’t plunge & hits on the base opening, I would have personally liked to have seen this a little larger as if you want to shamfer the edge of a board you will have to remove the plastic base on the router & make your own, this isn’t a problem for me though as the router is going to remain permanently in my router table which is really what its been designed for & you don’t need the plastic base then, the label on the router says “Production Plunge Router” which pretty much sums this beast up, it can run all day no problem, not that I have tried this. Final Verdict: For someone looking to buy a router that will be mounted in a router table then I would say this is the ONLY choice if you want to use large cutters, it’s a quality machine that is expensive but you can see where your money has been spent, it’s a fine piece of machinery which should hopefully last for years & years if looked after properly, for those seeking to buy a hand router then I would say its not that ideal as its rather bulky & you get out of breath lugging it about, on the other hand the weight does help to keep the router down on the work. I would definitely buy another “Porter Cable” router, or any other tool come to that, those yanks certainly know how to make good quality tools, I am totally hooked on Porter Cable now, expensive? Yes! but far better than any of the cheap makes we get in the UK, finally a taste of what American life is like :-p
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