Shaper wings or Shop built top?

[Rob Holcomb]

Hello all, I have a G1035 Grizzly shaper but it has no wings on it. Grizzly sells the wings for it but I was wondering if it might be better to make a table top to go over the existing table and bolts into it with the provided holes on the edge of the cast iron table it has. I like a lot of support and I don't like the lack of support there would be at the corners. I made a crude drawing to show what I mean. IS making my own table ok? I realize I would be losing the height adjustment by the thickness of the add on top but I have 3 inches of height adjustment so it wouldn't be too bad. I could also take the top off if I needed that extra amount of height adjustment on a particular project.

http://www.robholcomb.com/shaper.jpg

[Chip Lindley]

Sure, it's OK Rob! Just don't clash with the Grizzly Green! Hopefully you will not have flatness issues with the top.

[Rob Holcomb]

I would use something flat and stable like MDF and I wouldn't be extending more than 10 inches or so to go from 18"X20" to 28"X30" or something close to that.

[Peter Quinn]

I'd either run legs to the floor or braces back to the cabinet as you see fit for real support. The iron wings can hold firm with a few 1/2"/13 bolts, but the MDF tables aren't going to give that kind of support IMO hanging in the breeze. They just aren't that rigid. If you want some simple tables to help you get the stock to a power feed and catch some weight on the way out, than pretty much any extension scheme will work, and I have made some pretty simple plywood set ups that worked well enough. They don't really even have to be flat as the power feed will hold the stock flat as it passes the cutter head in most thicknesses up to 8/4. But if you want real support for pattern shaping large pieces, the table had better be flat and rigid, because stock support that doesn't support stock is, well, no bueno.

We have one shaper at work set up with 3/8" 2X2 steel angle iron bolted to the front and rear edge of the main table that extends past the table by maybe 15" on each side. It sits 1/2" below the table height, and supports 1/2" MDF extension tables. This type of arrangement is quite rigid and cheap to do, and wont interfere with any mobile base should that be a problem.

[Bob Potter]

Hello Rob

I used to have a shaper and I also found that the top was not big enough for some jobs. And also when using straight router bits I couldn't get the bits low enough. So I made a bigger top out of the painted particle board. The bolts that held the fence on were just long enough to catch enough threads to hold.
Any way it served the purpose.

Hope this helps, Bob