Occasional metalwork table setup

I have had a 1325 Chinese machine with a 4hp water-cooled spindle for 5+ years. My table surface is MDF with a vacuum hold-down because I mostly mill wood. I occasionally do small aluminum, and I just use some scrap plywood as a spoilboard.

My machine came with a misting system, but I have never used it. When I cut aluminum, I just manually spray cooling fluid on it.

I am finally ready to try cutting steel, but I need some sort or removable hold-down/spoilboard setup that would be better for smaller blanks and protect my MDF from the misting and cuttings. I am thinking I only need something about 2’ x 2’.

Suggestions on what types of material(s) would be ideal would be helpful.

Forget about machining steel on that thing. Aluminum is the hardest metal you can expect it to handle, and that's marginal. The spoilboard is the least of your problems. The frame lacks the rigidity needed, and the spindle is much too fast. Steel needs a slow spindle with high torque - yours is the opposite.

Impressive how you can make such a definitive determination, sight unseen.

Sorry, but this comes up a lot here. You've got a wood router like this one: https://www.alibaba.com/product-deta...540170041.html right? It's certainly more heavy-duty than most people's Chinese routers, but it's still a wood router. I believe it can handle aluminum pretty well, but they aren't claiming it can rout steel. That takes a whole different kind of machine. No matter what kind of bed you put on that router, it will still be a wood router.