Plug Cutters Revisited - Fail

[DerbyDad03]

I recently started a thread asking about your preferences for plug cutters - fluted (top set in image below) vs. round bottom blade.

I had never tried the fluted style, but I liked the idea of the taper, so I bought a 3/8" cutter from Woodcraft.

Using it to cut plugs in cedar was a complete fail. As shown below, it basically shredded the cedar, while my dull, smoking round bottom blade cutter worked just fine. However, the tapered cutter worked fine in a piece of maple.

My drill press was set at it's slowest speed (540 rpm) and it didn't matter what speed I fed the bit at. The blowout started almost as soon as the cutter hit the wood. Some pieces of the cedar were denser than others, and I did manage to get a couple of decent plugs from the denser pieces, but there were many more fails than successes. Too many.

I ended up using my old straight cutter and then using my combo sander to add a taper. I cut full length plugs, tapered both ends, and then cut them in half on the band saw, getting 2 plugs from each cut.

[krw]

It looks like the round cutter burned its way through.

I've only used the round cutters, and on red oak. It was a complete fail, too. The cutter went in but that fell out had the consistency of packed kitty litter.

[DerbyDad03]

Yes, I mentioned that... "my dull, smoking, round bottom blade cutter". I will be buying a new one, but I didn't want to go out again after picking up the fluted one and finding out that it didn't work in the cedar.

The round cutter, even as dull as it was, cut perfectly usable plugs. It always has. I've used it in poplar, douglas fir, pine, oak and now cedar. The main drawback is that the plugs aren't tapered, so I have to spend time tapering them myself.

I'm not giving up on the fluted one, I just know that I won't be using it in cedar.

[Puckdropper]

DerbyDad03 [e-mail] wrote in news:d7177d49-56ab-463c-8aa8- [e-mail]:

*snip*

From what I recall about working with Cedar, it's a mix of denser and weaker wood. Along the grain it's dense while in the middle it's weak. The weak wood is probably cutting very quickly and taking chunks of the strong wood with it.

Your tool probably isn't set up for Cedar. The geometry should be something with low angles (really sharp like an X-acto blade) so the tool slices as much as possible.

Did you try a faster spindle speed?

*snip*

Puckdropper

[DerbyDad03]

Are you suggesting setting my drill press at an angle to cut a plug with a bit that has 4 separate cutters, as shown in the upper left here:

That sounds like a disaster waiting to happen. Don't you think that a bit like that spinning at an angle is going to wreak havoc?

Yes. The chips just flew faster.

[Scott Lurndal]

I suspect he was suggesting that the sharpened tip of each cutter should be reshaped at a different angle.

[Puckdropper]

[e-mail] (Scott Lurndal) wrote in news:wvtKK.131031$ [e-mail]:

Yes, that's correct.

Puckdropper

[DerbyDad03]

OK, that makes sense.

However, if my option is to modify the fluted bit and hope that I find the correct angle (any idea what that might be?) just so that it works for Cedar vs. using a straight bit and tapering the ends on a combo sander, I'll stick with my sanding method. ;-)

The fluted bit works on the other woods that I work with and like you said, Cedar varies a lot even within the same board. For all we know, there may not even be a proper angle that works all the time.

[Scott Lurndal]