Taunton's Complete Illustrated Guide to Routers (ISBN 1561587664)

Nothing New Here ..........:
I purchased this book believing it would be a worth while addition to my woodworking library. Like all Taunton Press publications, the book contains some impressive glossy photo's, in a well structured, logical format ...... and that's about the best I can say. I felt the book fell far short of it's claimed title " The COMPLETE illustrated guide to routers". In the books ten chapters, you will find the usual subjects, covered to varing degrees, ie: router bits, router table, and all the well worn, free hand /router table techniques.....but certainly nothing new. The book contains references to only American routers and equipment. There is little reference to any of the leading edge equipment, available, or used in other parts of the world. I would suggest to any prospective purchaser, to look at either "The Complete New Router Book For Woodworkers" (ISBN 1-890621-94-3) or of course, the accepted modern day reference on the subject by Bill Hylton "Woodworking With The Router" (ISBN 0-7621-0800-2) These books cover the presented subjects in much greater detail, without the Taunton Press gloss.

Excellent book:
This book has the best illustrations I have ever seen in a book of this type. I probably own about fifteen books on routers and jigs that use routers. Most have similar content. This book has most everything the others have with better illustrations. What sets this book apart is the quality of illustrations and that it has some information that none of the others cover. The issue covered here and in none of my other books is how to use the router as a prelude to hand woodworking. For dovetails, no router jig can match the versatility a skilled woodworker can obtain by hand with a Japanese saw and a good set of chisels, but even a person making hand dovetails can save time and do some prep work with a router for some, but not all, dovetails. I took a class on woodworking essentials, including hand dovetailing, at Lonnie's woodworking school in Dandridge, TN. Many of the time saving techniques he taught in his class are in this book. In his class a router was not used to make dovetails, but but was used to remove excess wood where convenient so that time was not wasted in getting down to the hand work. I might add that I had a week to read and look at the book at his school before buying it. I added it to my collection of router books because of the quality of the book. I have no other relationship to the author or publisher of this book. I strongly recommend this book and also Lonnie's school. He makes museum quality work by hand but knows how to use machines where they make sense. Although I was not one of the best students in his one week class of seven students, the dovetails I made were better than some I have seen as illustrations in books on how to hand cut dovetails. That he could teach me is a testament to both his patience and skill as a teacher. He is an equally good author. Machines can take over and make pieces for you. Every book on routers seems to teach that approach to woodworking. This one goes beyond and teaches things useful to those of us who want to learn fine hand woodworking also. When I buy a book on woodworking I want to learn skills that will last and not information that will be outdated in a short time. It bothered another reviewer that this book did not cover routers from other countries. The features offered by manufacturers of woodworking machines change so frequently that no book could be up to date for long about such matters. Reviews of the relative merits of one router over another can best be obtained from magazines. Even then by the publication date the information will likely have changed. In summary this book is complete and well illustrated. If you will own but one book on routers this one is as good as they get. Jim Fuqua