When I first started this project, I thought I would be done in a month.  Now 6 months later, I don’t know where all the time went. I lost a week to a neck injury, but other than that I’ve worked on this project 10 to 15 hours every week. Either I work a lot slower than I think I do, or Norm has some magic tool to warp time.

All kidding aside, I’m really pleased with the results. I’ve gained additional storage space (always a plus in a small shop), and a valuable tool that I’m sure will be make many of my future projects much easier and pleasurable. And now it’s time for the obligatory final photos.

Step one – Align the through hole template, and drill a starter hole all the way through the top.  To ensure good alignment, I clamped a jointed 2×4  perpendicular to the front of the top, this gave me two good edges to reference the templates off of.

Step two – Use a pattern bit, to trace out the through hole. In order to get a clean cut, I’d recommend taking several passes, lowering the bit an 1/8″ – 1/4″ after each pass.  Depending on the length of your bit, you can remove the template after a few passes, and reference off the side of the slot you just routed.

Step three – After routing as deep as you can with the pattern bit, secure the recess template to the top and rout out the recess.

Step four -  Depending on how thick your top is, you might be able to skip this step. My top is 2-1/4″ thick, so in order to completely rout out the through hole, I had to flip the top, and use a flush trim bit, to remove the last little bit of material.

Step five – Grab a broom, and start cleaning up all the MDF dust.

Step one – Cut two large pieces of MDF to the same size, the pieces I used where 18″ wide by 24″ long.

Step two – Place  your lift, on one of the pieces of MDF, and then carefully align it. Once the lift is aligned to the edges, carefully surround it with scrap pieces of MDF. To hold the scrap in place use double sided tape.  Take your time during this step, you want absolutely no gaps around the lift.

Step three – Use a flush trim, or pattern bit, to rout out the material inside the scrap pieces of MDF.  Please note, that the radius of the bit must be the same as the corners of the lift. When done, you will have an exact copy of the lift top.

Step four – Double side tape the routed piece of MDF to the second large piece.  Sit the lift inside the recess you just created, and use yet more scrap MDF to outline what will eventually become the lip the lift sits on. The bottom of the BenchDog is fairly complicated, so it took me an hour or so to shape all the little pieces so they fit snugly.

Step five – Again using double sided tape, securely align all the little pieces  in side the routed recess.

Step six – Again using  a flush trim, or pattern bit,  rout out the material inside the scrap pieces of MDF. When done, you’ll have two templates that will make the job of recessing your router lift/plate into the top of your router table a cake walk.