At first I thought it was just another unfounded rumor, but after talking to a number of suppliers and outlets, it appears to be true. Porter Cable is no longer going to produce routers. Sales are now limited to stock on hand everywhere. So if you want a 690, 890, or 7518, get it now if you can even find one. Nothing in stock on Amazon, ebay, woodcraft, etc.
I just bought a new 7518 motor for another router table and I had to look pretty hard to find one. Finally found one at PCMtool. I have 4 of these in my shop and I didn’t want a new tool with different wrenches and collets to keep track of.
PC/DeWalt/B&D hasn’t made it official yet, but it appears to already be in effect. Obviously they’re going to push the DeWalt line of routers, which is fine, but their biggest router that fits a router lift is 2 1/4 HP. That ain’t gonna cut it. Their 3 hp router has a plunge base permanently attached to the motor, so I hope they come out with something more suitable for production work.
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Sad to hear that. I always thought it was a weird sales strategy to sell low cost consumer-grade cordless tools under the Porter-Cable name and then sell routers aimed at professionals under the same brand.
Hopefully B&D will come out with a replacement product in the 3HP category and not abandon the segment to Milwaukee, Triton, etc....
Interesting. I heard the same thing about Milwaukee routers some years ago from a senior guy at Tool-r-Us. Since I love my Mil's I bought a few more at a savings while people were "clearing them out". I actually got a combo kit on Amazon for about $100 ;-)
They never stopped making them for which I am grateful although the new ones have a lot more sharp edges on them than the previous runs. Easily remedied but, a disappointment.
FWIIW I am only moderately happy with my big Triton Router.
I have the TRA001B which is not cheap. It is plenty powerful and converts well to table use (you can remove the plunge spring) but it's just not perfect, and for the price, I could have got one of the cheaper options and a decent lift...
This is crazy news I have been seeing the same here in the Los Angeles area. Last week I found two #7518 routers and bought both. One for my brother and one as a back up to the one I have in my router table. I paid $428.00 plus tax. I also called the distributor in Oregon and they said that they really did not know the future status on the availability of any future router orders..
Found a bunch of them on PorterCable's website.
i notice this too when I was looking for a router motor for my incra mast-r-lift. I ended up going with a Bora router motor.
"Found a bunch of them on PorterCable's website."
The website lists all the routers, but when you click the "Buy Now" button, you just get, "We're sorry, we couldn't find any sellers for this product."
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