Shaper Cutter System

[Paul Canaris]

I am at a point where I want to start building up a profile of shaper cutters. My immediate need is for molding for our home. Attached is a picture of the Craftsman style molding I want to produce.
Also, as I am trying to take a long term outlook on this. I am looking for advise to figure out what system(s) has the most flexibility over the long run (attached are several system types). What are the pros and cons on longevity, sharpening, quality of cut and cost effectiveness of the differing systems?
If you were approaching this from scratch what system(s) would you go with and why?
My shaper has:
A sliding table
6.5 hp motor
Titling spindle
Power feeder
1 ¼” spindle

[Paul B. Cresti]

Paul,
By the way, great name....well i am sure by now you have seen that the costs of creating a shaper cutter library can get a bit expensive. I would have to say the best system would be to have all separate carbide tipped cutters in 1-1/4" bore. The next best thing, in my opinion, is to do a mix and match of single cutter heads and insert tooling heads.

I have a couple of "dedicated cutters" for things like:lock miter cutter, rabeting head, large tenoning head but the majority of my cutters are insert knife type heads. I own a raised panel head, cope & stick head and a straight head for profiles. All of these heads take corrogated back knives (hss or carbide) The initial cost of the head is pricey but the knives are much more reasonable and then of course the profiles are endless both stock & custom. I have gotten all of my cutters from CG Schmidt in Montvale, NJ. Great people to work with and they can cut you any profile you could want.

[Paul Canaris]

Paul, I was leaning toward the corrugated back knives for the architectural molding; this is where I have noticed the greatest variety in profiles.
Do you own a single head if so what size; i.e. 2" high; 3" high? I imagine over time several might be necessary to allow for a broader range of profiles.
Are you satisfied with the sharpening services of CG Schmidt assuming that is who you use?

[Paul B. Cresti]

Paul,
I had them make me a custom straight head, 3.75" tall, in order to max out my knife sizes while still giving me enough clearance to tighten down the cap nut. I have come up with my own profiles, drawn them in Autocad, as I do with all my designs and sent them a DWG file in which they make a knife to match it. They even went as far as emailing me back the profile DWG to make sure it was what I want...very nice. Since my pieces are one offs and a lot of the millwork I have done is painted (using poplar) I have not needed to sharpen any of my knives yet. They also have all kinds of other cutter heads, tools, tooling, blades......

[tod evans]

paul, i too have an eclectic mix of shaper cutters. everything from dedicated profile, brazed carbide to corrogated to a 6" tall unit that`ll take my williams-n-hussey knifes. cg schmidt is a good vendor for industrial tooling, for short run little stuff check out woodline for brazed carbide and amanas "insert-pro" heads out of steel or aluminum. the insert heads use m2 knifes that`ll run you about 20 bucks a set and they have over a hundred profiles. you`ll find just as with a router you`ll quickly spend more on cutters than the machine to spin `em. .02 tod

[Paul Canaris]

[quote=Paul B. Cresti]Paul,
I had them make me a custom straight head, 3.75" tall


Paul, was that a two or four cutter head? Is it simply a difference in feed speeds between the two types?

[Paul Canaris]

paul, "insert-pro" heads out of steel or aluminum. the insert heads use m2 knifes that`ll run you about 20 bucks a set and they have over a hundred profiles. you`ll find just as with a router you`ll quickly spend more on cutters than the machine to spin `em. .02 tod

Tod, it sounds like a good way to go inititaly would be a larger head for bigger knife profiles, and smaller for typical router sized profiles. Or can you also run smaller profiles on a larger head?

[Paul B. Cresti]

Paul,
When I initially had them make the cutter head for me I was still hand feeding, so they made me a two knife head. I can not honestly tell you if a 4 knife head is better with a feeder or not like I have now. All I know is I am getting good results.

I use all sizes of knives in my head: from base cap to very large two knife set-ups for big crowns. If you use a smaller set of knives in a big cutter head you take up the extra space with filler bar. You must tighten down all the gib screws and they all must contact steel within the cutter head. Mutiple heads would be nice but then again they do cost more too.

I still use all of my 1/2" router bits in my shaper too. My shaper "only" goes to 8k rpm and I never have a problem with burning, I have even used 1/4" beading bits!!! (just last night to be exact). Maybe it is because I run my feeder slower..not sure..but this shaper w/ feeder cuts great no matter what I throw at it

[tod evans]

Tod, it sounds like a good way to go inititaly would be a larger head for bigger knife profiles, and smaller for typical router sized profiles. Or can you also run smaller profiles on a larger head?

paul, yes you can run smaller profiles in big heads, like paul says use filler. the good thing about the insert heads is the set-up time is non-existant, stick in your profile, tighten down a screw and you`re off-n-runnin`. with the corogated heads you`ve got to set both/all the knifes dead nuts or your profile is a mess. my fingerjoint cutter has 6 knifes and takes me about 3hrs to dial in when i change all the knifes. just food for thought..02 tod

[Paul B. Cresti]

Tod,
I never really looked into the insert type heads, not sure why. Can you get custom knives cut for the insert heads? I guess with those type of heads you are limited to a knife size to the size of your head and from what I remember in seeing those heads are small. Now since I only have corrogated back cutters heads what is you opinion on the pros & cons of the two?

Oops wait a second I just remembered/looked my cope & stick head is an insert type

[tod evans]

paul c., the insert type heads are limited to 50mm and yes you can grind your own profiles, or have `em ground. corogated heads are still the staple of the moulding industry as folks will change out mulders but keep their knife library. i`d expect that sometime soon a genius from somewhere like tersa will come out with indexed moulding knife steel that can be cut to length and ground but with the amount of corogated knifes out there it`ll be quite a while before the new technology takes hold. in the mean time those of us who use corogated back steel just fuss with the height `till they`re right and the run `em....02 tod

[Paul B. Cresti]

Tod,
Thanks. I guess I never have a problem aligning only two knives on my cutter head. I can see where 6 would be cumbersome. Do you just set yours on a table or do you use some type of jig? 3 hours to set up a finger jointing setup! ouch man I thought I was slow I would guess that mean setting of your linear bearing table and making you test cuts?

[tod evans]

paul, here`s a pic of my ol` fingerjoint head and one of a small 6 knife corogated head set up with two knifes(10min) .02 tod

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[Paul B. Cresti]

Tod,
That 6 cutter head looks nasty! Do you ever run profiles in it? What stuff other than finger jointing do you use it for?

I know what I have spent on cutters...I can only imagine what you have

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

It might actually be cheaper to purchase a cutter grinder set up for few thousand dollars. With that you can gring your own profiles.

It can be done with a conventional surface grinder and some standard machine shop accessories like a precision wheel dresser and compound sine plate and and indexing head. None of which you'd need to buy new.