 | This article needs additional citations for verification .(February 2008) |
| Wood shaper | |
|---|---|
 Wood shaper, a single-axis tool | |
| Application | Woodworking |
A wood shaper (usually just shaper in North America or spindle moulder in the UK and Europe), is a stationary woodworking machine in which a vertically oriented spindle drives one or more stacked cutter heads to mill profiles on wood stock.
Wood shaper cutter heads typically have three blades, and turn at one-half to one-eighth the speed of smaller, much less expensive two-bladed bits used on a hand-held wood router. [1] [ failed verification ] Adapters are sold allowing a shaper to drive router bits, a compromise on several levels.[ clarification needed ] As are router tables, cost-saving adaptations of hand-held routers mounted to comparatively light-duty dedicated work tables.
The wood being fed into a moulder is commonly referred to as either stock or blanks. The spindle may be raised and lowered relative to the shaper's table, and rotates between 3,000 and 10,000 rpm, with stock running along a vertical fence.
Being both larger and much more powerful than routers, shapers can cut much larger profiles than routers –such as for crown moulding and raised-panel doors –and readily drive custom-made bits fabricated with unique profiles. Shapers feature between 1.5 and 5 horsepower (1.1 and 3.7 kW) belt-driven motors, which run much more quietly and smoothly than typically 10,000 to 25,000 rpm direct-drive routers. Speed adjustments are typically made by relocating the belts on a stepped pulley system, much like that on a drill press. Unlike routers, shapers are also able to run in reverse, which is necessary in performing some cuts. [2]
The most common form of wood shaper has a vertical spindle, some with tilting spindles or tables. Some European models variously combine sliding tablesaws, jointers, planers, and mortisers.[ clarify ]
Shapers can be adapted to perform specialized cuts employing accessories such as sliding tables, tenon tables, tilting arbor, tenoning hoods, and interchangeable spindles. The standard US spindle shaft is 1+3⁄4 in (44 mm), with 3⁄4 or 1⁄2 in (19 or 13 mm) on small shapers and 30 mm on European models. Most spindles are tall enough to accommodate more than one cutter head, allowing rapid tooling changes by raising or lowering desired heads into position. Additional spindles can be fitted with pre-spaced cutter heads when more are needed for a job than fit on one.
A wood moulder (American English) is similar to a shaper, but is a more powerful and complex machine with multiple cutting heads at both 90-degrees and parallel to its table. A wood shaper has only a single cutting head, mounted on a perpendicular axis to its table.
The primary safety feature on a wood shaper is a guard mounted above the cutter protecting hands and garments from being drawn into its blades. Jigs, fixtures such as hold-downs, and accessories that include featherboards, also help prevent injury and generally result in better cuts. The starter, or fulcrum, pin is a metal rod which threads into the table a few inches away from the cutter allowing stock to be fed into it in a freehand cut.
In addition to aiding productivity and setting a consistent rate of milling, a power feeder keeps appendages and garments out of harm's way. It may be multi-speed, and employ rubber wheels to feed stock past the cutter head.
| |
Single head moulder (a "shaper" in the US):
Multi Head Moulder (a "moulder" in the US):
An alternative configuration has two bottom and two top heads, in order to size the lumber with the first top and the first bottom head, and then shape the lumber with the remaining top and bottom heads. Machines with two or more right heads are more common in the furniture industry to give the ability to run shorter stock and deeper more detailed cuts on the edge of the stock.
Tooling refers to cutters, knives, blades, as well as planer blades, and cutter heads.[ clarify ] Most blades are made from either a tool steel alloy known as high speed steel (HSS), or from carbide steel. Cutter heads are normally made from either steel or aluminum. High Speed Steel, carbide, aluminium, and steel for the cutter heads all come in a wide variety of grades.
The router is a power tool with a flat base and a rotating blade extending past the base. The spindle may be driven by an electric motor or by a pneumatic motor. It routs an area in hard material, such as wood or plastic. Routers are used most often in woodworking, especially cabinetry. They may be handheld or affixed to router tables. Some woodworkers consider the router one of the most versatile power tools.
A chisel is a wedged hand tool with a characteristically shaped cutting edge on the end of its blade, for carving or cutting a hard material. The tool can be used by hand, struck with a mallet, or applied with mechanical power. The handle and blade of some types of chisel are made of metal or wood with a sharp edge in it.
A lathe is a machine tool that rotates a workpiece about an axis of rotation to perform various operations such as cutting, sanding, knurling, drilling, deformation, facing, threading and turning, with tools that are applied to the workpiece to create an object with symmetry about that axis.
A saw is a tool consisting of a tough blade, wire, or chain with a hard toothed edge used to cut through material. Various terms are used to describe toothed and abrasive saws.
A drill is a tool used for making round holes or driving fasteners. It is fitted with a bit, either a drill or driver chuck. Hand-operated types are dramatically decreasing in popularity and cordless battery-powered ones proliferating due to increased efficiency and ease of use.
In machining, a shaper is a type of machine tool that uses linear relative motion between the workpiece and a single-point cutting tool to machine a linear toolpath. Its cut is analogous to that of a lathe, except that it is (archetypally) linear instead of helical.
A table saw is a woodworking tool, consisting of a circular saw blade, mounted on an arbor, that is driven by an electric motor. The drive mechanism is mounted below a table that provides support for the material, usually wood, being cut, with the blade protruding up through the table into the material.
A Woodworking machine is a machine that is intended to process wood. These machines are usually powered by electric motors and are used extensively in woodworking. Sometimes grinding machines are also considered a part of woodworking machinery.
A drill bit is a cutting tool used in a drill to remove material to create holes, almost always of circular cross-section. Drill bits come in many sizes and shapes and can create different kinds of holes in many different materials. In order to create holes drill bits are usually attached to a drill, which powers them to cut through the workpiece, typically by rotation. The drill will grasp the upper end of a bit called the shank in the chuck.
A hand plane is a tool for shaping wood using muscle power to force the cutting blade over the wood surface. Some rotary power planers are motorized power tools used for the same types of larger tasks, but are unsuitable for fine-scale planing, where a miniature hand plane is used.
A bandsaw is a power saw with a long, sharp blade consisting of a continuous band of toothed metal stretched between two or more wheels to cut material. They are used principally in woodworking, metalworking, and lumbering, but may cut a variety of materials. Advantages include uniform cutting action as a result of an evenly distributed tooth load, and the ability to cut irregular or curved shapes like a jigsaw. The minimum radius of a curve is determined by the width of the band and its kerf. Most bandsaws have two wheels rotating in the same plane, one of which is powered, although some may have three or four to distribute the load. The blade itself can come in a variety of sizes and tooth pitches, which enables the machine to be highly versatile and able to cut a wide variety of materials including wood, metal and plastic. Band saw is recommended for use in cutting metal as it produces much less toxic fumes and particulates when compared with angle grinder and reciprocating saw.
Woodturning is the craft of using a wood lathe with hand-held tools to cut a shape that is symmetrical around the axis of rotation. Like the potter's wheel, the wood lathe is a mechanism that can generate a variety of forms. The operator is known as a turner, and the skills needed to use the tools were traditionally known as turnery. In pre-industrial England, these skills were sufficiently difficult to be known as "the mysteries of the turners' guild." The skills to use the tools by hand, without a fixed point of contact with the wood, distinguish woodturning and the wood lathe from the machinist's lathe, or metal-working lathe.
A mortiser or morticer is a specialized woodworking machine used to cut square or rectangular holes in a piece of lumber (timber), such as a mortise in a mortise and tenon joint.
The phrase speeds and feeds or feeds and speeds refers to two separate parameters in machine tool practice, cutting speed and feed rate. They are often considered as a pair because of their combined effect on the cutting process. Each, however, can also be considered and analyzed in its own right.
In machining, a tool bit is a non-rotary cutting tool used in metal lathes, shapers, and planers. Such cutters are also often referred to by the set-phrase name of single-point cutting tool, as distinguished from other cutting tools such as a saw or water jet cutter. The cutting edge is ground to suit a particular machining operation and may be resharpened or reshaped as needed. The ground tool bit is held rigidly by a tool holder while it is cutting.
Milling cutters are cutting tools typically used in milling machines or machining centres to perform milling operations. They remove material by their movement within the machine or directly from the cutter's shape.
In woodworking, a moulding plane is a specialised plane used for making the complex shapes found in wooden mouldings.
A computer numerical control (CNC) router is a computer-controlled cutting machine which typically mounts a hand-held router as a spindle which is used for cutting various materials, such as wood, composites, metals, plastics, glass, and foams. CNC routers can perform the tasks of many carpentry shop machines such as the panel saw, the spindle moulder, and the boring machine. They can also cut joinery such as mortises and tenons.
A router table is a stationary woodworking machine in which a vertically oriented spindle of a woodworking router protrudes from the machine table and can be spun at speeds typically between 3000 and 24,000 rpm. Cutter heads may be mounted in the spindle chuck. As the workpiece is fed into the machine, the cutters mold a profile into it. The machine normally features a vertical fence, against which the workpiece is guided to control the horizontal depth of cut. Router tables are used to increase the versatility of a hand-held router, as each method of use is particularly suited to specific application, e.g. very large workpieces would be too large to support on a router table and must be routed with a hand-held machine, very small workpieces would not support a hand-held router and must be routed on a router table with the aid of pushtool accessories etc.
Milling is the process of machining using rotary cutters to remove material by advancing a cutter into a workpiece. This may be done by varying directions on one or several axes, cutter head speed, and pressure. Milling covers a wide variety of different operations and machines, on scales from small individual parts to large, heavy-duty gang milling operations. It is one of the most commonly used processes for machining custom parts to precise tolerances.
 | This article includes a list of references, related reading, or external links, but its sources remain unclear because it lacks inline citations .(August 2023) |
