Re: Norm's highboy... wow!

[Patriarch]

"Rumpty" wrote in news: [e-mail]:

Did you see how he made the moulding for the top? Our two PBS's haven't > shown these episodes yet. >

He did a multistage router table process, cutting the bottom/front of the bonnet, and leaving the higher portion of the pediment for later removal. He used his router table, rather than a shaper, reflecting the tools more likely to be available to 'one of us'. I thought that the procedure was shown in greater detail than most of the rest, since it was really new ground for his program. I also thought that, having seen how he did it, I could conceivably do something like that myself, with the tooling already in my shop. Not that I regularly aspire to Queen Anne style.

Norm made a comment on the episode of TOH that aired this week in the Bay Area that this highboy piece was the most challenging project he had tackled to date. So it seemed to me.

Once again, he showed his real talent, which is making things accessible, and empowering hobbyists. The pros already know this stuff.

Patriarch

[George]

Or at least fancy they do, or know better....

Just got a brad shooter at long last. It doesn't care if I'm using white pine or hard maple edging, and for all the naysayers, I can hide a brad a lot easier than I can hide a couple of misses with the hammer.

[Rumpty]

Thanks! This moulding can also be done on the Radial Arm Saw, I just wanted to see if he came to his senses with this project!

[Ralph E Lindberg]

...

He noted the prototype took over 60 hours of work, the 2nd took over

20.

[SawDust (Pat)]

Hi Ralph,

When I heard the statement. It was 20 days for design/drawings and construction of the prototype. Then he suggested with the drawings the construction would be about 10 days work. That's a lot more than

60 and 20 hrs.

[Patriarch]

"Rumpty" wrote in news: [e-mail]:

I'm sure, in the hands of an artist, many things can be done with a RAS. I can't imagine how one would cut a curved bonnet top moulding with one, however.

Must be a failure of imagination on my part. ;-)

Patriarch

[Rumpty]

can't imagine how one would cut a curved bonnet top moulding with one, however.

It's done all the time! We use the Delta Shaper heads and bits, and a variable fixed rub collar on the table, the cuts are made with the arbor down pointing on the table and the moulding mounted to a guide board and fed past the bit.

[George Max]

Maybe he didn't count the time spent waiting for glue and finish to dry or cure.

[Patriarch]

"Rumpty" wrote in news: [e-mail]:

Pardon me, but my estimation of your courage just went WAY up! That sounds to me very much like an inverted, free-air shaper.

I'll pass, thank you.

Patriarch

[Ralph E Lindberg]

You're right, I heard days and typed hours

[Ralph E Lindberg]

I had just come in from the my shop on Saturday and found the local PBS station was running the "Router" show, where he was drilling holes with a router. I decided they had taken their rule of "routers first" overboard.

[Owen Lawrence]

I once saw Norm use a router and a template to plunge a series of holes for a shelf standard. I used a drillpress and a jig to do the same thing. His solution was better.

- Owen -

[Duane Bozarth]

Such setups can work well and can also be made to be very safe with only a little effort...a fence/hold-down around the cutter head is able to prevent virtually any chance of accidental contact or even approach to the cutterhead. As with a regular spindle shaper or router in table, cutting is "uphill". Only real disadvantage is the lower rpm as is equivalent of using a shaper head on the table saw. This is made up some by the larger diameter as compared to almost any small (3/4" or less spindle) cutter.

[Duane Bozarth]

Owen Lawrence wrote: ...

In what way would you consider it better? Only thing that would come to mind to me would be if it were a tall bookcase it would take additional support to hold the workpiece on the drillpress.

[Rumpty]

Free form moulding on the RAS is quite easy and safe. It's featured in the Mr. Sawdust Book "How To Master The Radial Saw" by Wally Kunkel.

your library of Fine Woodworking goes back a few years, this was featured in the Sept./Oct. 1982 issue.

[Rumpty]

Here's the correct link:

[Owen Lawrence]

Your observation is one way it was better. His way he was moving the tool, which was smaller than the workpiece. My way I was moving the wood, which was smaller than the tool. That's much more cumbersome. He zipped through two series of holes in about the same time it took me to drill just a handful. My jig turned out to be not so easy to adjust, but it did the job the couple of times I needed it, so that's okay. I don't know about anyone else's jigs; I just made something up. It's got a sliding arm with a pin that sticks into the hole you just drilled, to position you for the next hole. Lift it up, slide the work, drop it down, etc. etc.

I also don't know where Norm got his template--perhaps he made it. The next time I need to do this task I intend to use my jig to make a template and see how it works out.

- Owen -

[Peter Ashby]

Sounds like the jig I made up to drill the dog holes down my bench evenly spaced (there are three rows). I have a drill guide, like a router base and pillars you clamp a drill in. So I get the advantages of a drill with the advantage of a router.

Peter