Best Price Porter Cable 513 For Sale. Buy Now!.
Read more Porter-Cable 513 1-1/2 Horsepower Lock Mortiser
I do not own this thing but have used it and seen it used numerous times.
Pros:
Strong motor with good bearings.
Automatic centering of clamping mechanism with heavy-duty reverse-twin threads...
Lever-driven vertical motion is smooth and easy
Heavy-duty STEEL guide rods--- At first glance, it looks like you could penetrate a bank vault with it!
Cons:
Weight--- this thing is so heavy, you have to really clamp down hard to keep it in place, and holding it while clamping is a three handed job. The faces of the clamps are plain aluminum or magnesium, so they need friction tape or cork or sandpaper to help them hold on. The weight of the machine PLUS the significant lateral forces involved in routing add up quickly. The clamps WILL hold, but I have seen how this thing leaves indentations on the door surface. It needs much larger surface plates for the clamps.
Cable-driven vertical motion--- Instead of continuing with cheap-but-reliable threaded rod, (as they used for the clamping mechanism) they chose to use cable and pulley system. Why??? ... cable stretches so you have to coax the final micrometers of cut in the upward direction. Obviously, this is less of a problem when you do the sensible thing and rout with the door on the floor, with the lock facing up. That helps with the weight / clamping issue too, but it negates the assumed efficiency of routing in place with the door hung. For this kind of dough, they could easily have used Acme style threaded rod throughout.
Cutter is good but replacements are expensive and because of the design, (it can't accept standard up-cut spiral-bits) cutter choices are limited. Replacements are certainly NOT easy-to-find at your local home-store.
Fine-Adjustments are finicky and non-intuitive. Requires tests cuts in pre-sized scrap. That totally defeats the implied efficiency, especially if you have several different sizes of doors and locks to mortise. ( as in most restorations)
No provisions whatsoever for dust collection. Are they kidding? They want to sell a tool with a street-price of one-grand, presumably designed for routing mortises in place, but there is absolutely NO thought given to the mess this machine makes. Milled mortised are one of those places where missing-matter from black-holes magically reappears. It's funny how a four-inch mortise can make a three-foot pile of wood-chips and fill a freshly painted and carpeted room with dust. If you need kindling, this is the machine to have!
Cost... I just can't see a thousand bucks worth of metal or machining here. Perhaps I am just too old, too cheap or too experienced... but I can make a similar tool for less, and that's paying retail for premium parts: hardened stainless-steel guide rods, acme twin-threads, handles, machined parts, welding, router-motor... everything. Lots of people have more metal working experience than I do, and they could probably build one faster than I can.
As it is, when I have to do deep mortises in fancy hardwood doors (for Lawyers offices, historic buildings and recording studios, etc.) I use a simple plywood jig and a big-plunge router like the PC Speedmatic. Simple stop-blocks reliably set X-Y axis travel-limits, cheap C-clamps with padded cauls hold the jig in place and I cover the whole caboodle with a clear plastic box attached to my shop-vac. Admittedly, I cannot rout a mortise with the door in place, nor will my biggest router go four-and-a-half inches deep. ( All my drill-bits do though!) But it only takes a minute to pull the pins and clamp the door over some saw-horses or a portable bench. And if the specified lock-set is the antique square-corner type, we still have to finish the mortise with a chisel anyway... so where is the advantage?
When I first saw this thing on a job-site, it looked like that post-industrial Porter-Cable design-magic was back... Then I saw its owner reading the manual, fussing with adjustments, cussing, more adjustments, more cussing. He asked for my help and we got it to work. But for all the time it took, I could have gone to my truck, got my home-made jig and finished three doors.
He got his used, ( the previous owner used it only once) so he has no chance of returning it. Even at five-bills, (what he paid) I can't see the value, even though it looks as tough as a '55 Buick.
It is a great-looking heavy-duty tool, and will definitely HOG out some massive mortises... once you get it set-up. But... The adjustments are not fast, the clamps are not quite big enough, there is no way to collect or contain the mountain of dust it makes, it is cumbersome and (for the noble working-stiffs) WAY overpriced.
There are better, more versatile and much more practical products / methods for deep-mortising.
For well over thirty years, I have done the same types of mortises with a square, a marking gauge, a drill (with a fifty-cent chunk of wood for a guide-block) and a sharp-mortising chisel. If you have only one mortise to do, that is just as fast and far more economical. And if you have twelve doors to do, spend thirty minutes making a routing jig. Don't forget to buy a cheap clear plastic bin from Target. Use a utility knife to cut holes on the sides for your hands to go through so you can hold the router. Attach your shop vac hose with a two-dollar fitting hot-glued in place. It's amazing how well that sucks up the dust and chips!
Assuming you already have a router and some know-how, you can build a better contraption with plywood and a plastic bucket for less than thirty bucks worth of time and materials.
One last point... the entire purpose of this thing it to do DEEP mortises in pre-hung doors. Of the countless doors I have built and hung, the ONLY time I have needed deep mortises for specialty lock-sets are in high-end installations or restoration work. For the high-end new stuff, we do everything in the shop then install the door on-site. For restoration work, dust is ALWAYS an issue. Half of the problem of getting the bid is guaranteeing a clean and safe work-site. (that means NO dust) And if the work is on a public building ( like restoration of historic museums, court-houses, banks or battleships) many times the restoration committee insists all the work is done with hand tools or off-site anyway. You can buy a really good mortise chisel or two for a hundred bucks. You already have a square, a pencil and a hammer, right?
Great Tool. We had (14) custom mortisse locks to install in white oak doors. No room for error. Once set up correctly (took some practice runs in scrap wood), the tool did each lock cut out in minutes. Expensive, yes. It is a great tool if you have a large # of deep mortisse locks to do.
This is a door mortiser and thats all. It's a lot of money to pay for a tool with only one job but there is nothing else in the world that can do the job it does in the everyday world. Set up is a little slow but when all adjustments are complete it seldom runs over 20 seconds and its job is done.The depth adjustment came broke on my first one. Amazon leaned over backwards to get it swapped out and we went on with business.
I have to say that when doing a home full of custom doors with mortised hardware this tool was worth its weight in gold. I found the set up to be a bit frustrating because of finding the tools initial alignment but once it was established it was perfect. The only down side was that the tool has to be used in the vertical position which b/ of its weight makes it a bit awkward. The only problem I had with the tool was after about 3 doors the switch toggle stopped working and I had to unplug it to stop it. I played with the toggle and got it working again, but it was frustrating and potentially dangerous. Overall. I am happy and found it to be a real time saver. I highly recommend the face plate template too.
If you are a finish carpenter, door/hardware installer, or door shop that does a lot of mortise lock prep, this is THE tool! Together with the PC 517 Lock Face Template, this stuff preps wood doors for mortise locks quickly and accurately.<p>Why only 4 stars?<p>One: Price; it's pretty spendy. Purchase both tools and you spent something like $.... The occasional mortise lock installer should stay away from this equipment unless you think it might grow into a Specialty Skill. <p>Two: Adjustability; Adjusting back and forth between different lock configurations can be a hassle until you figure out the learning curve. The markings on the frame for mortise height, and the stop rod for mortise depth, are "not that accurate;" takes a bit of time and practice to figure this thing out.<p>And this: You spend this much on a fine tool, you sure don't want to lug it around in the cardboard box it came in. Build a nice wood box, a place for everything and everything in it's place. Why PC has the nerve to sell this tool for so much money and not provide a decent storage box, even if it's blow-molded plastic, is a mystery to me. Sign of the times, I guess.
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