Aigner BowmouldMaster

[David Zaret]

does anyone own and use this thing? i have a bunch of curved work coming up, and consistently find myself terrified running against a shaper bearing by hand. if anyone has advice on their general experience with it, and guidance on which accessories you would or wouldn't get again, i'd love to hear it.

thanks in advance!

-- dz

[John Lankers]

I have the Felder version which is comparable and I use it a lot, the plexiglass shield works very well for covering the cutter and makes operations safe. Two accessories I can strongly recommend are the 'I called it" starting finger (equivalent to a starting pin for router tables) and the template guide ring which can be helpful for curved template work. One other accessory would be the 'brake thing that keeps the guide bearing, if you use one, from spinning at high speed and burning your work' (for the lack of a better term - it's been a long day)

[peter gagliardi]

Yes, I have it on my newer Martin shaper. In my opinion, with that and the curved machining guide, they are the best things I've used for curved runs, by far! Safe, user friendly, and easy to work with. One of the best improvements you can get for doing that type work.

[David Zaret]

this is very helpful guys, thanks. it comes with a "starter finger" of sorts that seems to ride adjacent to the bearing. the guys at Martin tell me it's in stock, so hopefully i'll have it this week. thanks for the feedback.

[Joe Calhoon]

We have used the Bowmould for 15 years. It is a huge improvement over bearings and starting pins. I have over 20 years experience with those.

Its versatile and can be used in many configurations. For cutters less than 100mm or so the dead collar does not work and you can use a bearing. The only other limitation is tight radius work where the hood gets in the way. I have a shop made fixture to hold the dead collar for the rare times this happens.

CPS and Felder have curve hoods for less money if you only do small amounts of curve work. They are not as easy to set as the Bowmould and less features. There is also a smaller Bowmould but no experience with that one.
Aigner bow mould.jpgcurve moulding.jpgShaping the curve.jpgShaping outside.jpgCPS curve hood.jpg
Shaping large arch T26.jpg

[Steve Jenkins]

With any pattern work always try to make your pattern longer than your workpiece so your bearing hits the pattern before the cutter starts cutting. Not possible on full circles so extra care must be taken with them.

[Mel Fulks]

I enjoyed the post enough to do some googling on the bowmaster. I don't doubt it works but it's got to be a LOT more expensive than the very best of the old acme thread spring hold downs. I think the best affordable safety addition in most shops would be their return to production. When I have worked in shops not having one I made one that was "crude but effective". Doing a job without common sense precautions is a cause of injuries, not the lack of a Bowmaster.

[peter gagliardi]

Mel, you certainly make a point. However I will tell you, from past experiences, common sense is in precious short supply for woodworkers in a shop! Not to mention, there is basically no formal training or instruction on set up and running these machines- at least that I've seen. There are hardly any true woodworking shops besides myself near enough to me that I hardly could hire an experienced person! Shops don't run like they used to- there is no "older more experienced guy" that you would watch and he would teach in a shop. Things are much leaner now- you know what you're doing, or you're just dead weight getting in the way of production.
As an employer, that hood is mighty, mighty convenient, and cheap compared to an inexperienced fingerless , or worse worker!
We used the acme threaded hold downs back then, because they were the best of their day, we now have better in some cases, and with some people there is enough common sense to use it.
Maybe I am a strange employer, but I want my people to be as safe and efficient as possible. There is no dollar out there that is worth risking my employees health or safety needlessly.
I KNOW there are other employers who think and do otherwise.

[Joe Calhoon]

I have always done most of the curve shaping in my shop unless it is production of many like pieces with good templates or large work. Mainly for safety and also because I enjoy it! It can be argued that a CNC router is the most cost effective way to produce curves in a pro shop. I think it depends a lot on type of work and volume. I still see a lot of German shops using the curve door and window method from the 80s with tenoners and manual shapers even when they have CNC machines.
In our case the Bowmould has paid for itself over and over. With doors and windows one curve door or window usually requires sash curve, curve glass bead, frame curve, inside casing, outside casing and sometimes a curve top screen. With the adjustable dead collar you can sometimes use one template to do most of the work. With split tooling no template is required. One other feature of the Bowmould is good dust collection.

I think the cheaper curve hoods I mentioned are a good choice for the hobby woodworker if you do not mind the extra setup time.

Here are some outside casings we have to duplicate this week for a historic project we are working on. Notice how the old guys did the crown in small cut straight pieces. This lasted a hundred years. Hope mine does as well.

Curve 1.jpg
curve 2.jpg
curve 3.jpg