Raised panel cutter for shaper

[Warren Lake]

HI Mel

how many cutters in the head, 2?
how thick is the steel 3/8"
degree of head or use more than one?
knife grind angle, secondary bevel on the tip?
how much cutting length on your medium or larger panels
do your cutters start cutting under the head itself, think so,
two passes how deep the second one one guy on the site says have to have a fairly deep cut to get clean cutting or so cutters last longer so wondered how much material on your second pass when you do, depends on the wood as well,
I dont get your speeds my corg heads are rated im pretty sure each brand for 5,500 RPM Max but should take a look forgotten now,


I have two cutters, lowest RPM about 3000 or 2,900, and feeder set on slowest speed and done one pass. Ran it faster but dont like to when the cutter overhang is not by the book. I think I tried taking off a second pass minimal say .020 - .030 and it was no cleaner on poplar either way. Have to try that again and with fresh cutters. I normally hone stuff first and think I prefer the ones that dont have the secondary bevel on the top

If its like the grocery store and isle one only so many I might have asked too many questions

[Mel Fulks]

Warren, as an employee I've refused to do anything I knew to be dangerous ; but of course , have not always had the stuff I thought best. Most set ups have been 3/8 or 5/16 steel. If they only bought low grade steel could usually get them to buy m2 or t1 and prove its superior finish. In this town there are a lot more 20 degree heads than the 12 degree even though, these days, most jobs are with hardwoods. Panel sizes as small as 3/4 inch installed exposure to probably 1 and 3/4. The the small get one pass ,the larger get two passes controlled by moving fence about 3/8 to 1/2, not height. In all my years of work I broke one knife. I get better finish and knife wear by feeding not too slowly. With the smallest raises on stained work I've been able to eliminate sanding on with the grain cuts and just 180 or 220 on end grain.

[Martin Wasner]

There's a formula we used to determine our rpm and feed rate. We went above and below in spindle speed and feed rate but kept coming back to what the formula gave us.

Running the rpm too high will nuke your edges faster. If your getting any burning or burnishing, you're spinning too fast and just abusing the knives. Or, they're already dull. The tough part about panel raising is the massive speed difference of the major diameter compared to the minor diameter. The inside edge of the knife is crawling, the tip is moving at ludicrous speed.

If you're getting dents, chances are your feed rate is too high and the knives aren't effectively evacuating the swarf.

Another thing that has really helped us as far as tear out at the edge goes, is using a continuous fence under the cutter instead of using a bearing. Think of it as a zero clearance insert when cutting melamine. The cut isn't 100% supported since the fence the panel rides on is 3/16" thick, but it is much more so than riding on a bearing. I haven't had a panel split right at the edge since making this change. It's also nice for feeding since there's no bumps coming off the split fence and onto the bearing. Properly aligned it's not a huge deal, but even set up perfectly you're bridging at least four inches with the head I use if you're running a bearing. It's a poo your pants moment when a tiny panel jams and starts twisting around under the feeder unexpectedly. I run 5/8" panels with no relief on the back. I'm not sure how a continuous gene would work with there back cutter.

I'll try to find that formula and post it

[Warren Lake]

HI Mel

thanks for my gaggle of questions. Its just me here and ive not been by the book I know at times. What about the RPM I wont get a chance till tonight to check the RPM on the heads but arent you over the spec on currugated heads? .

Thanks on how you do the fence you cut in part way to finished depth then a second the rest of the way as opposed to dropping and taking of another X amount. I have a small mickey mouse moulding machine I modified and tests either way made no difference, the slow speed thing is overcome by feed rate at least on my tests on these machines im at low RPM for knife safety as my overhang from the head is big so I offset that with the slow speed then slowest feed rate.

Know all too well about not always having what I need stuff, I look at Joes posts and all that gear and almost dont sleep at night, man would that be nice or geez thats a great set up or.

My panel corrugated came with this last machine havent sharpened any of them yet and once through this reno stuff will be able to put time into it. Sounds like you are getting a very clean cut.

[Mel Fulks]

Warren, I've seen some heads that were not even stamped with rpm limit. But I think most of the moulders run about 7500 rpm and use a little larger diameter ,so I consider the 8000 speed safe on the 4 inch diameter shaper heads. And the design of those corg heads allows some cutting inside the head diameter at bottom of head. One place I worked used a bunch of college students to sand wood raised panels cut with low grade three wing carbide head. The boss did not believe I was going to eliminate all that ,but I did. I do understand that the good heads with insert carbide are a good product miles ahead of the stuff only suitable for mdf.

[Martin Wasner]

Here's that formula:




This is with the head installed. I thought it was 7" in diameter, it's 6". I bought this second hand from a cousin that had it custom made by Dimensions in Tooling, in Grainger Indiana. My cousin never got it to work correctly since he didn't have a shaper with a slow enough spindle speed, or enough power.




Here you can see the continious fence that rides under the cutter itself. When I originally made it, I made it out of UHMW plastic. But i messed it up, and didn't have another scrap big enough to work. I need to replace that. The baltic birch one that is on there is also a little messed up, I had to throw a different cutter in there for a reason I can't remember and had to thin it out around the cutter. So right now it's only about 1/8" thick under the head. I wish I had that smaller throat plate, but so far it has not been an issue. I can't be too picky when I paid $1200 for this shaper. Sourcing a replacement would be tricky as well since the deck of the machine is ground with the plates in it. They might be all rusted in too, since this thing was pretty much a wreck when I got it.




To be fair, these are brand new knives. I had this profile on my old LRH head, but not for the Dimension in Tooling head so I ordered a set of knives and backers. They just showed up last week so I ran a panel for a sample door for a customer. You could scrub it with a kitten and be good to go.




and the end grain of that same panel.

[Jim Andrew]

Martin, thanks for posting that!

[Justin Ludwig]

I've been using the 3/16" fence for some time now. Martin articulated it's use very well with pics. It takes away the hesitation of running short end-grain panels and the "ohh sh*" moment of "is it gonna make it?" I use only have a 3 wheel feeder so it's very important how the 2 close wheels are positioned. I still run a backer sacrificial board behind a narrow panel that gives me a warm and fuzzy on those passes.

[Mel Fulks]

Agree that the 3/16 fence is a good idea. You can also use wide boards with sap edges or knots for a few narrow panels ;leaving them wide for end grain passes ,then ripping before with grain passes.

[Martin Wasner]

I've been using the 3/16" fence for some time now. Martin articulated it's use very well with pics. It takes away the hesitation of running short end-grain panels and the "ohh sh*" moment of "is it gonna make it?" I use only have a 3 wheel feeder so it's very important how the 2 close wheels are positioned. I still run a backer sacrificial board behind a narrow panel that gives me a warm and fuzzy on those passes.

I wasn't able to do it until I had a shaper that I could leave set up for panel raising. I always wanted to try setting it up this way, but the change over time would put me in a murderous rage if I had to remake a door for whatever reason.

The second shaper pic, in the upper right you can just see the end of my chaser board for short stuff.

Mel is spot on about using wider boards, running the end grain, then ripping it down. I don't really feel there's any danger, but when it's barely in contact with the feeder the part can lift a little and muck up the profile.

[Rod Sheridan]

I've been using the 3/16" fence for some time now. Martin articulated it's use very well with pics. It takes away the hesitation of running short end-grain panels and the "ohh sh*" moment of "is it gonna make it?" I use only have a 3 wheel feeder so it's very important how the 2 close wheels are positioned. I still run a backer sacrificial board behind a narrow panel that gives me a warm and fuzzy on those passes.

Hi, I added the safety finger kit to my shaper, it can be used on metal or wood fences. It has 4 aluminum fingers, 2 thick, 2 thin.

Here's a photo of it on my shaper.

Safety finger in use.jpg

regards, Rod.

[Jordan Lane]

Where might one locate a finger safety kit for the shaper? Google did not help much

[Warren Lake]

now that I logged in there are two posts Rods and one other about fingers that I dont see so not sure where this will go, maybe to mars.

You can also just add a 3/16 strip of metal to the bottom of a wood fence that works fine as well if you need to keep it simple. Drill holes countersink put fine flat head screws in and away you go. I have one with a wood strip on the bottom its not strong enough and I dont trust it.

Martin I was told you can do narrow stuff with a belt feeder, One came with a machine and I tested that statement and it worked perfect just passing it on didnt matter how narrow the panel was, I only did a few and was suspicious at first but it worked perfectly as it rode on the metal strip and had constant pressure,

[John Lankers]

Felder makes them, so does Aigner and several others, or you can build your own:
http://www.woodweb.com/knowledge_bas...per_Fence.html

[David Kumm]

DSCN3330.jpgDSCN3329.jpg Here are the Aigner and Felder kits. The downside of the Aigner is the fingers are too thick to work with most Freeborn or Freud 6" cutters unless you use a short tongue. I like a little larger profile. Here are some for comparisonDSCN3331.jpgDSCN3332.jpg The left is Leitz and you can see the additional field compared to the Freeborn. The large one is just crazy but really cheap because so few can run it. Dave