We've been doing a fair amount of cope and stick joinery lately, and I'm less than satisfied with our method for profiling the end grain. Seems to me that a sliding table would be the way to go. Do most of you have a dedicated sled for this type of operation?
On a related note, it seems like a 3 spindle shaper would be a "very good thing" to have, so you can leave the profiles for the raised panels, cope and stick untouched for the entire milling operation. Any thoughts?
JP
balance out cost, footprint and time..... if you have room, funds and need for it, you may not be able to justify *not* having one...
I have the Woodtek 3 hp shaper and use the sliding table for precisely this purpose. I have a jig that is held down by the sliding table's clamp. This jig includes a piece at the rear of the cut to reduce tear-out.
I'm not a production shop, so I can't comment on this, but it seems that for a production shop, the cost of time to set-up and zero in on profiles would easily justify such a setup.
I've got the sliding fixture Delta makes, works fine for a lot of things.
I suppose 3 would be nice. Setup time's the same, though. If the work flow is correct, should equal a single spindle.
Most cabinet shops will have at least three shaper for door making. Cope, stick, raised panel and perhaps edge detail. More if they have different door profiles. The problem with one, is that every time you change from one cutter to the next, you almost always have to reshim to get the proper fit. This is especially bad when you realize you have to run another rail and you have to go through the setup again. Unfortunately, I only have two shapers. I might get another one, but I don't have large runs of doors ( more than
50) very often, and I am out of room in the shop. One thing I did that helped a lot (I got the tip off the Delta site) was to buy an extra spindle. Once I had a cutter shimmed correctly and had to change to another cutter, I took the the cutter and spindle off the shaper in one unit and put in another cutter/spindle. I marked the height of the cutters with a dial indicator, so when I put it back on, it was within a thousandth or so. So much better. I just tried this out with a run of about 100 door last month. As usual, a couple of pieces go screwed up and I had to remake them. Using the dial indicator, re-setting up went much quicker. Setting the fences properly took the most time and it wasn't too bad. It went much faster than before.You might also check out
Preston
Thanks for the info. I'm thinking along the same lines as you. I contacted Grizzly to see about their 3 spindle set up, and was amazed to hear that not only can it not support 3 separate power feeders - it can't support even one!! They say that the table is too small to mount a feeder on it. That will definitely eliminate them from the running, as I've found a power feeder to be indispensible for clean profiles.
WRT the weaver system, do you know if it supports power feeders?
Thanks for the info - JP
HomeOwnersHub website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.