Handrail Router Gloat

[Richard Wolf]

http://www.ersystech.com/gfx/fg308_2.jpgThis is a photo of a Router that I odered the other day. It is used to make custom curved rails and custom pieces of handrails. It is made in Germany and is rediculously expensive.
It will take about three weeks to recieve and I will post some action pictures when I get it.

I've been looking at it for a long time and finally can justify spending alot of money on it. ($3,600).

Richard

[Todd Davidson]

Wow!
Will this allow you to make handrails that were otherwise beyond your capabilities or will this just simplify the process?
Does this machine use conventional style bits or are there cutterheads?
Have you had the opportunity to test drive one of these?
Are these routers the most effective way to fabricate handrails?
Are they commonly used in the US for handrail fabrication or is there a more popular way?
Is this machine typically handheld or is it mountable (overhead?)?

Sorry about all the questions. One of the most difficult things I've ever attempted was restoring a balustrade. I put put so many hours in on it I technically lost money, but the learning exerience was invaluable.

[Richard Wolf]

Hi Todd, lots of questions.
1) It will allow me to make handrails that look much better than what I was capable of.
2) It does not use standard cutters, you need a bit to match each different handrail profile that you use. They cost about $600 apiece, one is included with the router.
3) I have seen them work, no driving on my part.
4) What this router is used for is to make curved rails. Without this router I could use bending rail, (rail that is ripped into strips, bend around a form, and glued together) but bending rail has alot of limitations. Now I can resaw thinner strips and bend them into tighter radii and after the glue dries, profile the rail.
5) These machine are pretty popluar here in the north east, with larger stairbuilders, for a business my size it's a reach, but I do have a reputation for quality work and always try to do the best job I can. I picked up a large house in East Hampton with two cruved staircases, and the inside radii is very tight, so I can justify this purchase.
6) It is designed to be handheld.

Hope that answers your questions.
Thanks

Richard

[Corey Hallagan]

Very cool Richard, can't wait to see some photos of what you have done with it!

Corey

[Christian Aufreiter]

Hi Richard,

congrats on the Scheer router. Scheer is extremely expensive here too. But although the design looks pretty old-fashioned the quality is said to be excellent.

Regards,

Christian

PS: For those who are interested in Scheer stuff, here are two intersting links:
Scheer Shop (http://www.hanskochgmbh.de/shop/) (German only)
Scheer (http://www.cf-scheer.de/index_html?newGB=no)

[Richard Wolf]

Hats off to you Christian for recognizing it as a Scheer product. How would you have any experience with that company, they seem very specialized?

The web site if anyone is interested is;
www.ersystech.com

Richard

[pat warner]

Mr. Wolf:
Is the router spring loaded or locked on the rail without slop?

Thank you,
PW

[Christian Aufreiter]

Richard,

two years ago, when I was in the process of buying basic handheld power tools (circular saw and router) I collected some information about Scheer because I was contemplating one of their routers (the HM 9 model). Finally, I did not buy it because I wanted a circular saw/router combination with a guide rail and the Scheer was really expensive (about EUR 570 for the router).
Anyway, I frequently visit German woodworking forums and met a guitar builder (among other folks) there who says that Scheer makes the most durable routers he has ever used (and he had worn out several others). A local store sells Scheer routers so I had the chance to actually check them out. The design is not up to date and ergonomics aren't either IMO. (Ever seen something like a soft grip on a Scheer router?) But they appear to be built like tanks and some of them offer almost unique features: Some routers have a M 10 spindle instead of a common collet.
As you stated, Scheer is very specialized. As for power tools, Scheer produces routers and accessories (especially for stair building) and one or two special sanders. Years ago, they also a belt sander with a 380 (400) Volt motor. (The common voltage for handheld tools is 230 V here, 400 V are usually used for stationary equipment). Apart from the handheld stuff, Scheer offers a wide range of high-grade stationary machinery (panel saws, veneer saws, boring machines etc.) that I'm not the least bit familiar with.

Regards,

Christian

[Richard Wolf]

Pat, the router is sring loaded to allow for some slight variation in thickness.

Christian, thanks for the background.

Richard

[Peter Pedisich]

Richard,

Thanks for sharing the pictures, that's a serious machine.
Germany makes serious machines.

I wish I was around back when machines like that were made in America, too.
1930-1940.

Pete

[Alan Turner]

I can't tell from the picture, but are there multiple cutters on this? If so, do they all operate at the same time?

[Richard Wolf]

I can't tell from the picture, but are there multiple cutters on this? If so, do they all operate at the same time?

No, only one cutter. The picture is misleading, you only profile one side at a time and need about 2 to 3 passes. Turn it around and to the other side.
I believe the cutter is threaded on and not a typical router collet.

Richard

[Keith Starosta]

First of all, Richard....very cool gloat! I'm looking forward to seeing it in action.

Second.....did nobody care to comment that Mr. Router himself...Par Warner...just made his first post at the Creek?

Welcome, Pat!! Stick around some...

Keith

[Bruce Page]

Way cool Richard, (and expensive, I wonder what that translates to per pound).
It looks complex, I bet the learning curve will be steep!

[Steve Clardy]

Mr. Wolf:
Is the router spring loaded or locked on the rail without slop?

Thank you,
PW

Welcome to the Creek Pat!!

[Steve Clardy]

That's quite a gloat there Richard. Someday I'll see or have one of those in action.
Looks great, though costly.
Let us know after your test drive.

[Dev Emch]

Richard...
Now that is a toy!!! Congrats!

Why is it that we are more and more having to go to german speaking lands to find the really good woodworking machines? Look at any modern door and window factory and you will see names like Martin and Holzer and Maka. I am starting to think that this is a conspiracy by the europeans to force us to accept the metric system.:D

At any rate, I love that router! But 'splain to us how it works. In the photo, the railing rotates what 90 degrees? Clearly that is for demonstration purposes. But how does the guide system work? Do you need some kind of tracking template?

[Jim Marshall]

Richard, that is one serious machine. When I was doing stair work, I would have bought one in a heart beat. I didn't even know they existed until now, (Been living under a rock). I replaced a rail in a house that was built in 1845 because someone had stollen most of the orignal rail. I had to heat and laminate the wood to make it. The rail dipped, twisted and had a couple of roll overs. Putting a profile on a rail like that will make you do some serious sweating.


I know you will enjoy the router, the good part is it will pay for itself in a couple of tough rails.

With bending rail, the tightest radius I have ever pulled was a 3 foot radius.

[Ian Barley]

Richard

Excellent score - specialised machines often come with scary price tags but, in my experience, are usually worth it. Let us know how you get on with it when it arrives.

[Richard Wolf]

Thanks everyone for your comments and looking.
Ian, yes, specialized tools or even tools dedicated to a special task is what makes doing specialized work profitable and rewarding. Unfortunatly they never come cheaply.

Dev, This router is designed to put a rail profile on a bent lamination. It could be a complete railing for a curved staircase or a small curved, twisted section of rail, called a wreath. The difficult part, even using this router is glueing up and lamination first. This lamination will be strips of wood bend around a form of the staircase or part of a staircase with either alot of clamps or, I use a vacuum bag system. After the glue up, the blank must then be sized to the finished overall dimensions of the rail. Now you have a bent up lamination in the shape of the curve and need to put a handrail profile on it. You can understand that at this point it's not as simple as running it passed a shaper, becuase you have a helic twist to the rail. Here comes the router. It is adjustable to lock rollers onto the flats of the blank and shape the sides of it.
The key to good results is still in the perperation of the blank, but the router give you the ablity to end up with professional results.
Hope this helps.
I promise a photo shot when it comes in.

Richard

[Richard Wolf]

Jim. It will be a welcome addition to my business. The lead time for making the tooling and getting my hands on the router (3 weeks) has always been a problem. When you need it, you can't always wait, and when you don't have a pressing need for it, you don't what to spend the money.
Addmitedly, this will not be anything near an item that I will even use on a weekly basis, but it will sure elevate my quality of work when I do need it.

Richard

[Jim Marshall]

Richard, in the old days they would cut a wreath block for the twisted and bent part of a rail. I have tried to find for a few years how they cut the wreath block. Do you have any idea how they cut them? I spoke with one stair builder that did a lot of the really difficult rails and he said they hand cut the wreath blocks.

I am retired now but I sure would like to know how it could be done today with the machinery that we have.

By the way Richard, I was told that a bending rail could be pulled on a 2 foot radius. I don't see how it could, have you ever tried to pull one that tight?

[Richard Wolf]

Jim, Cutting wreath blocks has always been a super difficult part of stairbuilding, hence, we see less and less of that kind of thing and more of the use of "standard" stair parts. I have done some restoration work and build some wreaths and I have built up a block to accomidate the size of the wreath. I then bandsaw the wreath out in one plane, tape the cutoff blocks back on and recut in the second plane much like cutting out a cabriole leg. Of course then the really difficult part start in trying to crave the profile with anything availible, power grinders, sanders, chiesls.
Layout of the wreath is a difficult part also and I know some stairbuilder glue up styroform blocks and cut them to shape as a model.
There are still some books in print about this kind of work; "Treatise to Stairbuilding" and "The Tangent Method of Handrailing" (not sure those are the exact titles) but they are filled with geometry and read like a phone book. Like all trades today, people really don't want to pay for a real craftsman to come in an work his magic, but I guess with how much me have to make a hour these days, you can't blame people. (And I didn't mean that to imply that I was the real craftsman.) I'm good at what I do, but so are alot of people.
Question #2. I have pulled bending rail alittle tighter by planing down the inner plies thinner and adding extra ones and carefully band sawing the thicker outside plies and adding them after the bending so as to keep them in proper alinement. It's always a wrestling match.

Richard

[Jim Marshall]

Richard, I appreciate the information. You may not say you are a craftsman, but I will say you are. You for sure know what you are talking about. I have the book you are talking about "Treatise to Stairbuilding" and you are right, that book is like a telephone book. They give all the principals to get you to the point of the wreath block, but they don't tell you how it is to be cut.

I thought about cutting the wreath block with a bandsaw but trying to look at both sides of the cut at one time as you are cutting in a spiral was more that I wished to attempt. I have reproduced several rails that bending rail would not work at all as the rail would curve over and upward while spiriling at the same time.

I didn't think about thinning out the fillers and adding back to make a tighter bend with bending rail. You know what you are talking about my friend. Could you start another thread and show some of your rails, I for one would love to see some of them.

[Andy Hoyt]

So Richard. Have you stretched its legs yet?

[John Miliunas]

Yeah, Richard. Get the puppy yet? Up and running? Pics! We need pics!!!:) :cool:

[Richard Wolf]

Thanks for asking, It was ordered on 9/1, and I was told it would be four weeks. Well I finially got a call yesterday that it was in the mail. Should be any day. Meanwhile I need it to finish a job that is hanging.

Richard

[John Miliunas]

Thanks for asking, It was ordered on 9/1, and I was told it would be four weeks. Well I finially got a call yesterday that it was in the mail. Should be any day. Meanwhile I need it to finish a job that is hanging.

Richard

Wow! A "hanging" stairway??? Man, I'll bet that's super-cool!!:D OK, well just give us an update when you do get it! Looks like a very interesting concept in routing.:) :cool:

[Lee DeRaud]

Wow! A "hanging" stairway??? Man, I'll bet that's super-cool!!:D OK, well just give us an update when you do get it! Looks like a very interesting concept in routing.:) :cool:Yeah, but the rail part is easy: you oughta see the machine he's using to turn the balisters.:cool:

(Gonna be all day getting that picture out of my head.:eek: )