Need flush cut shaper cutter setup.

[Mike Heidrick]

Looking for a recomendation for a nice 1 1/4" bore 2" to 4"+ tall shaper cutter with bearing setup to do pattern flush cutting? Any recomendations? Spiral/Byrd style recomended or no? I wan't a good pattern shaping setup. Shaper is a T1002S Laguna tilting spindle sliding table shaper. Also need links to where to buy and prices if known.

[David DeCristoforo]

Any good quality straight cutter will work fine for this as long as you order a ball bearing rub collar that has the same OD as the cutter. Insert will be better in the long run because every time you sharpen a fixed knife cutter, the diameter is reduced slightly and it will no longer exactly match the bearing.

[Mike Heidrick]

Have a good insert cutter head recomendation Dave? Ever use any Felder Spiral cutters?

[Richard McComas]

As mentioned Felder make a good one. This one is 3'' tall I don't know if they make one taller.

http://i119.photobucket.com/albums/o159/rmccomas0043/felder2.jpg

http://i119.photobucket.com/albums/o159/rmccomas0043/Felder1-1.jpg

[J.R. Rutter]

I have a cheap grizzly helical head that I use to hog out arched door panels before shaping. Nothing to write home about for cut quality. If I were buying this style of head again, I would just go with Byrd or any other high quality company.

I agree with David that any good insert planer head will work fine. You can use stacking heads with 40mm or 50mm carbide inserts. It is possible to get up/down shear planing heads using these standard inserts as well.

Here is one company with a good reputation and decent pricing. This page has many options:
http://www.guhdo.com/cutters.php
I would imagine that they can provide a matching bearing rub collar with the same bore.

[Peter Quinn]

We have a few different height straight three wing cutters at work in the 4" diameter range? Maybe a bit bigger, but around 4". One is an amana, the other freeborn, both cut about the same. Straight cutters work surprisingly well for pattern work given their diameter and exit angle. For curves its nice to have TWO bearings for a given cutter, one under and one over, so you can flip the work to run it at its best advantage without too much hassle restacking or moving a template. Don't know if a spiral head would solve all these problems, but it might still be nice to have twin bearings

I've been considering spiral heads from Amana, Byrd and Schmidt for my own shop, something in the 2"-3" range. I like to use the smallest cutter that will do the job. Haven't bought one yet so no help from me on choosing.

[Pete Bradley]

I use this one from Griz:

http://www.grizzly.com/products/Shaper-Cutter-2-Rabbeting-3-4-Bore/C2036

with a 2 5/8 bearing collar also from Griz. The picture of the cutter is wrong of course, the actual item weighs about 2 lbs. Fine results in amateur use. 2" is the tallest they make w/o going to an insert cutter.

Pete

[David DeCristoforo]

Whatever you do, don't buy a cutter that has the bearing "fixed" on either the bottom or the top of the cutter. There will be some situations in which you want your template on the bottom and others where the template will be on top of the stock. With a "fixed" bearing, the only way to get this flexibility will be to flip the entire cutter over and run "backwards" which will be awkward in many situations. A "plain" straight cutter (whether spiral or straight) with a matching "loose" bearing will be much better.

PS The exception would be, as Peter mentioned, a cutter that has a fixed bearing on both the top and bottom.
PPS For many years, I have used a Freeborn Tantung cutter (3" tall") for pattern work on the shaper.