Bosch Home and Garden router POF 1200 AE (1200 W, in carton packaging), Design 2019 | Pale Green

Background: Having used the same DIY (Green Bosch) for the last 20 years professionally, I decided to retire my old POF1100AE, (it's in my loft I kept it as it just needs a service). And purchased a Popular brand that ar3 Red in colour (not Mi...ie) that unit was more expensive than this POF1400ace and was new but no better than my old Bosch 1000AE, worse actually as both bush caps are broken, the spindle lock is broken, and its is completely dead! How long did the Red router last? About 20 hours use over 13 months, yes just out of warrantee, so I have a new looking router that is not worth repairing. So I went back to Bosch getting the new powerful model. Review: Once in hand it felt solid and well constructed. Works beautifully, smooth, sturdy, quiet and powerful. Joy to use, first use being cutting out a body for a guitar as per photo. I packed it away and as usual can't work out how it goes back in the case! is it base down or base up? Front up or front down. Then I noticed pressed into the case bottom an image of how the router fits back in the case. OMG so simple but will save me 5 minuets every time I put it away and a lot of stress. I almost forgot, whilst using it I 'could actually see the blade and cutting edge because there a two LED lights either side of the collet! Amazing! The faster you cut the brighter the light l, bright and very white. Making my work more accurate, easier and a lot safer. A few other tools have lights but nowhere near as brigjtas these. Overall its 10/10, Bosch has never let me down but I have been disappointed with some of the other brands, including the expensive Yellow units 😕 my table saw is in the repairer shop today as its broken in 2 ways and only 1.5 years into a 3 year extended warranty. Update: after use for 4 hours day one and w hours day two, I've found something that is a negative. The start trigger moves in 90 before the blade starts up, that's fine probably a safety feature. The problem I'm experiencing is this, with 90% of the trigger doing nothing the last 10% of trigger travel turns it on and off, meaning that not only do I need to hold the handle as expected I also have to squeeze and hold very tightly. Often my squeeze pressure relaxes slightly and the unit turns off. The trigger requires a lot of force to keep the motor running. After a few hours my hand is killing me! (I have a very strong hands) inorder for me to be able to use this unit I'm going to have to put a rubber band, jubilee club or cable tie around the on button (yes potentially dangerous) and use the plug switch to turn on and off, buy passing the power trigger (I don't recommend anything to do this!). For the first 2 hours use it is fine, so most will not even notice the issue.

I bought this router at B&Q as it was a Bosch, and was on offer at £20.00 reduction. I suppose the first thing to say is that if I was considering this product for professional trade I'd spend the extra and go for a 'professional' router with fine adjustment capabilities and proven longevity etc. Having said that, if I was starting out with little cash, I'd be confident in its abilities, and use it as a second router when I could afford the 'proper' stuff. It is extremely comfortable and stable in use, and despite being confined to quarter inch, 6mm and 8mm router bits, ploughs through anything you throw at it with nice results. I used it straight away on renovating an old wooden sailing boat, tackling some meaty lengths of wood, and it didn't flinch..............especially impressed with its deep and long rebating ability. I've also used it to build speaker cabinets of various complexity and have found that the guide plate (provided with attachable pin) allows you to rout perfect circular, rebated speaker apertures extremely easily and accurately, despite it not having fine tuning capabilities. It will also rout down to a very tight radius. The template guide provided, in conjunction with home-made and appropriately shaped and sized jig, facilitates the cutting of weird and irregular shapes, quickly and accurately. I noticed in a previous review that reviewer said you couldn't use the 1200 AE in a router table because of the safety trigger mechanism (excellent feature). It is possible however, by clamping it with a large clip/peg, or some other method. You can also rig up a car jack or simple lever system to raise and lower the router to the desired depth, locking it off in the normal way on the router itself. The plunge action wasn't that smooth initially, as other reviews have mentioned, but a quick squirt of WD40 rendered it as smooth as butter. Apparently routers in all price ranges can be a bit sticky initially. So, to sum up, the Bosch POF 1200 AE in my experience, is an incredibly versatile and capable router, possessing a high degree of comfort and usability for such a reasonable price. It's maybe not a 'pro' tool, but it achieves professional results and gets a hearty 5 stars from me.

I bought this to replace a basic old Black & Decker router that really wasn't up to the job. The POF 1400 is clearly built to a much better standard, and good value at the Amazon price, so I'm not complaining about value for money. I'm also not going to dwell on the positive points, but make no mistake - I reckon this is a good router and I am overall pleased with my purchase. I have been using it for a while on oak, and the results are good. However, I have noticed a few drawbacks which make me give it only 4 stars instead of 5: (a) The "quick release" mechanism doesn't seem to work that well. Although it is easy enough to unscrew the collets, the bits seem to have a tendency to jam in the shaft, as some other reviewers have also noticed, and I have already managed to damage one TCT bit while trying to remove it. (b) The one feature that the Bosch doesn't have, and my old B&D router did, was a HORIZONTAL micro-fine adjustment for the parallel guide. This is a pity, as I reckon it would only have needed quite a minor addition to the guide, and it would have been very useful at times. (c) I have discovered that 8mm router bits are harder to find compared with 1/4" or 1/2" ones, and the ones that you can find are significantly more expensive. I can make do with 1/4" bits, but I would prefer to use 8mm ones if they were more readily available.

It's a good tool to have

Bosh is excellent, came in original packing all sealed, so happy to do unboxing but unfortunately speed control doesn't work from 1-3 so I have to return.

V. Good.

Everything is good, built, quality, performance all solid, voltage 230v 50hz, three pin Uk plug, router comes with 8mm, 6.35mm & 6mm collect, parallel guides, new box, original Bosch, all performs more than expectation. But I don't understand, the variable speed control is only usable is 5 and 6, lower than that doesn't work. Previously I purchased Bosh POF1400 had the same issue, so I returned. I decided to keep this and live with Bosch POF 1200 AE because the sweet spot for speed is anyway 5 and 6 for 99 percent of the work. Bosch the boss.

The build quality of this is good. I do like Bosch tools for the evident quality in their tools and this one doesn't disappoint. This is a very powerful router. The extra collets are very useful. It is important to get good quality router bits to go along with this router otherwise the power of this tool will damage them. I have damaged a few router bits of a poor quality build. This is an excellent router and the storage case makes it even the more impressive.

Hier ist ein ausländischer Netzanschlussstecker verbaut, der nicht in die deutsche Schutzkontaktsteckdose passt, daher klare Nichtempfehlung für den Bereich Deutschland.