Paneled Chest Progress - Spindle Moulder Blunder

[woodshavings]

My current project is a paneled storage chest in American White Oak, using stub mortice & tenon corner joints. Today I was cutting the tenons using the spindle moulder but just could not get the cut right. horrendous tearout, couldn't get the alignment right.

Machining end grain in AWO is never easy but this was ridiculous.

Checked the backer board to prevent the tearout, made sure it was clamped correctly, rechecked the setup - all seems OK. Try again - same result. OK maybe I have damaged the tool -checked that, no thats fine. Try again, more wasted Oak ... then it dawns on me ... I fitted one of the pair of blades on the spindle moulder back to front, swapped with the chiplimiter.
I shouldn't be let out really!

Will take some pics for the competition when my brain re engages!
John

 

[Anonymous]

Bad news John, sorry to hear it. I recently posted pictures of my door where the raised panel showed biscuits
I've never used a spindle moulder but it sounds like an easy mistake to make. hope next attempt is better

 

[Anonymous]

I cut tenons using the outer blades of a dado set separated by a spacer, with the workpiece mounted on a precision tenoning jig, see

http://f2.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/dldund ... m=448b.jpg

With this method, you can reliably produce tenons, whose thickness is within 0.05 mm of the required thickness.

Rockerau

 

[woodshavings]

Hi Rockerau,

Thats an interesting technique, I like the dial gauge and micro adjustment you have incorporated.

Unfortunately dado sets are rarely used on table saws in Europe because of the safety regs. I use one on my Radial Arm Saw but of course could not use your idea on that!

The stub tenons on my paneled chest are profiled to match the channels that the panels fit into. The Spindle Moulder tooling has both the male and female profiles so that a perfect match can be machined. (When you fit them correctly!)

Cheers

John

 

[Newbie_Neil]

Hi John

You've obviously been using my book of tool techniques. :wink:

It is just so annoying when you do something like that, isn't it?

Cheers
Neil

 

[Chris Knight]

I use one on my Radial Arm Saw but of course could not use your idea on that!

You can actually. It requires the motor to be swung so that the blades are horizontal with a purpose built fence exposing what you need in the way of cutting depth and all other guarding removed. You then need a sled to carry the workpiece past the blades, registered off the front edge of the table.

It looks pretty fearsome but it works pretty well as long as you use your loaf. I used to have a RAS - since sold because of space limitations - and found it tremendously versatile. I sold all my books on the use of a RAS (most of which are pretty hard to get nowadays) too so can't post the picture of the set-up I copied for this operation.

 

[woodshavings]

Hi Chris, .... thats a neat idea, I would of liked to have seen your arrangement, particularly how the guards worked.

I guess I very cautious and have not tried anything too adventuress on my RAS. For "normal" tenons I use my bandsaw or woodrat.

John

 

[Alf]

John,

D'oh! At least you pin-pointed the problem in the end though. Looking forward to the pics.

Cheers, Alf