Review on 🔵 Bosch Cabinet Style Router Table RA1171: A Powerful Blue Innovation for Precision Woodworking by Justin Reese

The packaging for this was perfect when I received it, so I don't know why all these dings, dings and partial defects. Maybe Bosch decided they no longer needed quality control, or maybe they were all in a meeting because they didn't meet quality control standards. In any case, everything went pretty well and everything looked fine apart from all the imperfections found in most of the visible parts. When I went to install the fence, I found that the two halves were not parallel to each other, but deviated by almost 1/32 of an inch. This doesn't seem like such a big deal, but when you try to join a board or other small task to a piece of wood that's over 12 inches long, it wobbles from side to side, causing a very large amount of deflection in what whatever you try to lay. Side-to-side non-parallelism of the fence is made worse by improper adjustment. There is no way to make a fence perpendicular to the table top. It attaches to the countertop with carriage bolts that have to go through the top of the MDF, but they slide just like gravel on concrete rails. When tightening, the stop tilts back slightly, so it's no longer right-angled anyway. As another reviewer noted, the aluminum mounting plate is rough, warped, and has a few small nicks. The beveled sides are the worst and it looks like they were carved with a blunt tool at too high a speed resulting in some flow and eventually an uneven surface. However, don't bother cleaning them. Another review also mentioned that the mounting bolts loosen and need to be retightened after each pass and to fix this use some blue 243 Loctite. The only problem is that if the bit you are using is too big for the router to get out of the ground and also too big for the corner wrenches to fit in the hole, you will have to remove the screws to lift the entire router might be to remove it that bit. This wouldn't be an issue if the top and plate were precision machined, eliminating the need for adjustment screws to adjust the height, or if they had some sort of release lever. Speaking of leveling screws, they are no good. The leveling screws are located at the extreme corners of the panel. So when you align everything and tighten the screws that hold the plate in place, the whole thing sags and throws the plate out of plane again. Again, Loctite will solve the problem of over-tightening the screws holding the plate in place, but that comes at a cost. I like that Bosch has cut a hole in the plate so that the included T-handle can be used to raise and lower the router. But of course they couldn't think of anything. If you base-mount the router yourself, you must unlock the router to change the height. So think about it, Bosch gives a T-handle to adjust the height above the table, but you have to open the cabinet and flip the router to change the height. Why would I look for a height adjustment tool when the latch that releases the router is attached to the height adjustment on the base? It takes less time turning the knob after unlocking the router than sifting through shavings in a closet to find the T-handle hex they provide. With that in mind, if you need to unlock the router to change the height, the router moves at the base when you unlock it, making height adjustment a nightmare. The process looks something like this. Open the case, disconnect the router, set the height as close as possible, lock the router, look at the bit shift, repeat the measurement to see that the bit has now moved a millimeter or two up or down, release the router, adjust as little as possible. Block the router as much as possible, check the height, find a router that is still out of place, etc. Take the router out of the closet as long as possible before giving up and use the diving base for your freehand work. The next point of contention is the idea that there is a hole for a vacuum hose at the bottom of the case. There is so much space around the door that the vacuum port is useless for evacuating chips in a downflow installation. I didn't feel any air movement around the cutter when the dust collector was connected to the port. It is best to thread the smaller hose through the hole and hook it directly onto the dust collector body that is mounted to the base of the router. The problem is that the Bosch proprietary dust extractor doesn't fit on the base when built into a cabinet and as far as I can tell they don't make a proper fit. The final complaint is about the setup, more about the Bosch router (1617EVSPK) than the case. Almost all my tools have power cut protection. If power is interrupted and restored, the tool will remain off until the switch is reset. Bosch doesn't care if their fancy routers have this security feature. I took the router out of the closet to install it in the base for mobile use and it just so happened that I accidentally turned on the power switch before the router was installed in the base. Of course, the router turned on and threw itself out of the rack onto the floor. It's my fault for plugging it in before installing it in the base, but never mind. If you take it out of the closet and plug it in and forget the power button on the router itself (why didn't you forget to turn off the router when you already did it in the closet!?!?), stay away and hopefully the router isn't dangling between you and the outlet! Bottom line, this cabinet gets by, even if it seems like a smoker's shop compared to something like the JessEm lifter, which only comes with a plate for the same price. Buy JessEm and build him his own office. If I hadn't waited so long to open this product upon receipt I would have sent it back immediately. Anyway, I no longer have a return window and regret spending my money on something I hate. The router is good but the case is not. One last note if you've read this far and are still considering buying a wardrobe. Don't bother getting a base for it. Simply remove the handles from the installed depth base and use if you prefer the dive base when the router is outside of the cabinet. This will save you a few bucks on buying a JessEm (or similar) system when you're tired of fiddling with something this delicate.