Shaper/Molder

I will soon be purchasing an 8-year old 2-story traditional that needs some TLC to the entire upstairs. The previous owners skimped on all the materials so I want to do the following:

  1. Remove Carpet
  2. Remove Window/Door Casing
  3. Remove Baseboard
  4. Remove Doors/Bi-Folds
  5. Re-Paint
  6. Install 6-Panel Oak & Oak Bi-Folds
  7. Install New Carpet
  8. Install New Casing/BaseBoard (Natural Oak).

I am not happy with the selection at the home centers; they offer only 1 or

2 different types (Colonial or Teardrop in Casing). I am stuck with 2 1/4" casing(since that is the max width my house will allow in many places) and maybe a 4" baseboard. I have been to a few Millwork Shops and found W180 Profile that would look good but it's not available in Oak. There are no Sills/Aprons on any of the windows so that makes things a bit easier for me.

That being said, I was thinking of going for a Shaper or Moulder equipped with a stock feeder to create my own Casing as well as Baseboard to go along with it. I was watching This Old House Yesterday and noticed that Tom Silva had a Moulder with a custom set of knives. There are no Sills/Aprons on any of the windows upstairs so that makes things a bit easier for me. I already know that in addition to this project I will have many other projects requiring it so I am not afraid to spend some $$'s to get myself setup. When casing runs $3-$6 per foot, this seems like an expense that could be justified. I have a 25x40 Shop that has plenty of open floorspace for equipment like this and enjoy woodworking with my tablesaw,router,jointer, etc.

Any thoughts from fellow woodworkers?

Thanks,

-Mike Bittel

Reply to
Mike Bittel
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Absolutly do it. But don't do it thinking your going to save money. You buy wood at retail plus you have the hump of the expense of the equipment to get over. And then your still doing the making yourself. Do it because you will get a really good, crisp, nice relief moulding rather that flattish junk. Also you will probably then notch things up in your wood selection too. Do it for the quality. Moulder, sticker, shaper or good router table. Study moulding designs.

John

Mike Bittel wrote:

Reply to
Eddie Munster

Thanks for your input, my thoughts exactly. I want to create something unique, something that can't be found at every Home Center. I realize that the initial cost is high.

Are there any online vendors that carry Shapers/moulders and knives? Any recommendations here on equipment?

tablesaw,router,jointer,

Reply to
Mike Bittel

I have done kind of the same thing. I purchased a used Williams and Hussey unit. It does a very nice job. (I recently went to a seminar that used a Jet molder/planer that is somewhat similar to the W/H unit). Overall I probably haven't saved any money, but I enjoy custom woodwork, and I got my own molder. Plus you have your choice of woods!

Reply to
ToolMiser

Shop around some more! Home centers are the poorest place to find millwork for older homes, they only sell what is popular at the moment. Look up millwork in the yellow pages, you will find companies that specialize in doors and trimwork. Surly someone in a reasable area will do custom millwork for you also. Check with contractors in the area that do high end homes, you may get some leads that way.

If that all fails, buy the equipment and make your own. It may satisfy your tool habit! Greg

Reply to
Greg O

For inspiration (if you can avoid intimidation ) browse here a couple hours:

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-- Mark

Reply to
Mark Jerde

Mike Bittel notes:

Plenty of vendors carry shaper-molders and knives. I tried earlier to post a note telling you to see if you can check with Tom Watson. He had a Williams & Hussey molder/planer for sale a short while ago. I think it also had some knives already with it. In case you don't know, the W&H is the best of the small molder/planers, though it has a narrower planing head than most. It takes just a couple minutes to change knives, is powerful, and basically works wonderfully well. It is also the most expensive of the small units (used to cost about two grand ready to go, with accessories to quickly run that way up).

I don't have Tom's e-mail to hand, nor his web site, but both are easy to google up.

Charlie Self "Character is much easier kept than recovered." Thomas Paine

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Reply to
Charlie Self

I have a WoodMaster planer/molder and the basic setup on it is around $2000 and you have to help get it off the truck. Knives cost $50 - $100 more if you need really tall profiles.

In my area of KY red oak runs $2.30 per board foot, undressed, $.15 more for S2S.

Reply to
KYHighlander

If you are planning to replace all the casing, baseboard, etc. I'd be inclined to order it rather than make it... If, on the other hand, you are trying to match existing that cannot be found then make it.

Towards the purchase end, I just got a millwork catalog in the mail Friday from The Millworks that may be of interest to you. They have oak listed and a web site at

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.

John

Reply to
John Grossbohlin

That URL

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is not found.

tablesaw,router,jointer,

Reply to
Mike Bittel

I have a shaper and a nice router table. But if I suddenly had a house to do......

I would look hard at those planer/moulder thingys. I think Jet and Sears makes one. ( Or check out a CT050 at

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) This isn't an endorsment and if anybody had one, please speak up and let us know how they really work. As it looks easy to make many types including crown. This is just an idea. I have a 3hp $haper and still this other little buggy looks very intrigueing.

John

Reply to
Eddie Munster

Some good suggestions already. If you try to make your own, then consider doing one room first, the one you care least about, in order to iron all the kinks out. Plus, doing the millwork for an entire house with a non-production machine will be tedious.

H.

Reply to
Hylourgos

Well at the risk of annoying the non-import crowd..

*****
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?itemnumber=G1037ZYou will have enough money left over to buy knives also:

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*****I don't want to start any grizzly is good or grizzly is bad wars. So far I have 4 (tablesaw, jointer, shaper, dust collector) and no problems.

Take care,

Dave

Reply to
Dave

Those look really great. But, I'll bite. How do you know where they where made?

John

Dave wrote:

Reply to
Eddie Munster

Very wierd... I pulled out the catalog to see if I misstated the URL and it is plain-as-day explicitly listed as

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also list an e-mail address of snipped-for-privacy@frontier.net Phone is 1-800-933-3930

Google turned up:

Silverton Victorian Millworks-The Millworks Overview Manufacturer of Victorian, traditional, and country millwork in white hardwood. Large stocked inventory of more than 1,000 products. Call for a dealer near you, or shop at Sutherland Lumber. Free catalog.

Contact Info Main Phone 970-259-5915 Location PO Box 2987 Durango , CO 81302

This address matches what is on the catalog.

The link to them on

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fails too.

I'll send them an e-mail and see what they have to say!

John

Reply to
John Grossbohlin

I've got the 13" Jet molder/planer and a Jet 1.5 HP shaper. My intent when I purchased these tools was to do relatively small jobs not production runs. Both tools work but I don't think I'd want to make many many hundreds of feet of casing, base, etc. for a whole house with either one of them. You still have to get a flat face and two square, parallel, edges that are perpendicular to the flat face to get good results.

This isn't just true of "home" production. I've watched my wife's cousin in his commercial cabinet shop use a W&H Molder to create wide crown molding. The 16+ foot red oak stock was face jointed, edge jointed, ripped on the table saw, and then went through the W&H. Sal was working his ass off running those 16+ footers over his Powermatic 8" jointer. Sal has 4 shapers ranging from 3-9 HP with power feeds but for crown he uses the W&H. He doesn't have a four head molder as he doesn't make enough molding to justify the expense...

Personally, I need to make a couple hundred feet of base and about 400 feet of casing to match existing patterns in my house. I haven't found the pattern in any of the millwork catalogs I've come across... I don't look forward to it!

John

Reply to
John Grossbohlin

I got a response to my e-mail inquiry to The Millworks:

Hi! Thanks for the email. Our website is currently undergoing contruction. We hope to have it up and running again by this weekend. If you have any questions I can answer for you please give me a call at 800-933-3930.

Donna Hilse The Millworks, Inc.

Reply to
John Grossbohlin

Well they are most certainly not made in America but if that was a deciding factor for every decision you couldn't buy much of anything.

My "American" Chevy pickup has lotsa parts from other countries, I don't like it but it's reality.

The grizzly's work fine and cost 2/3rds or sometimes less than their "american" counterparts.

All right there I said it. Now's the time for the Delta folks and the $350 (!!!) dovetail jig guy to start hollering.

Take care,

Dave

Reply to
Dave

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