Cutting Crown Flat Questions

[Jery Madigan]

Hi,

I will be cutting crown for my cabinets that is too big to nest, si I need to cut it flat. I searched prior discussions and they invariably evolve into "nest it" discussions. My 10" saw can cut a depth of about 3.75 and I need 4.5+, so nesting is out.

I found two good online miter/bevel angle calculators, so I am good there.

I cannot find a comprehensive, comprehensible guide to positioning of the crown. miter direction and bevel direction for each type of cut.

I have laid out a chart below with 16 questions. Hopefully they will be easy for someone experienced in this. If so, please indicate and answer for 1-16. Abbreviations are fine (like U for up)

Thanks a million

Jerry






Bottom/top
Miter
Bevel


Type of cut
Face up or down?
to fence?
right/left?
right/left?









Left hand outside cut
1
2
3
4









Right hand outside cut
5
6
7
8









Left hand insde cut
9
10
11
12









Right hand inside cut
13
14
15
16




1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16

[Maurice Mcmurry]

Good instructions were included in the manual that came with my compound miter saw. If I can find them I will scan and post them. They should also be on the web. I think a 10 inch saw needs to be a slider to cut 4 1/2 crown on the flat.

DeWalt and others cover this in YouTube videos.

[Tom M King]

I've never taken the time to figure out how to cut very large crown on the flat. I just make a couple of plywood miter guides the right size, and use a handsaw. The width inside the channel is the same as the width at the ceiling, and cut it upside down. A thick board for the bottom keeps the vertical sides square.

[Mike Kees]

I second Tom's advice. Another option would be to rent a 12'' saw from Home Depot for a day. Cutting crown on the flat is possible but the learning curve could quite possibly use up your material faster than real progress is accomplished.

[Tom M King]

4-5/8 crown is no problem at all for a 12" sliding miter saw. I'm not sure about other brands, but the Dewalt crown stops for the Dewalt saw are worth buying even if just for one job. I thought maybe the discussion was about something like 8" crown.

[Paul F Franklin]

Jerry, SawdustGirl has about the best page I've seen for this, including pics of 4 templates that show the settings for each of the four types of cuts (inside L&R, outside L&R). She also gives instructions for how to alter the settings based on the spring angle of your crown. When I had to do this, I bought a stick of crown of the same profile as my "good" stock, but in poplar, and made templates like hers. The one thing she doesn't cover in detail is adjusting the settings for out of square corners (pretty much every corner in every house). On paint grade a little caulk takes care of that almost always. On stain grade, it requires small tweaks to possibly both miter and bevel angles. Dealing with that is another good use of the cheaper-but-same-profile crown; you can experiment as needed.

Here's her page: https://sawdustgirl.com/how-to-cut-crown-molding-using-easy-templates/

[Richard Coers]

Maybe this will help. Having short pieces of crown with the correct cuts next to the miter saw for reference are invaluable for beginners. As mentioned, buy a short stick for practice and reference. https://www.dewalt.com/why-dewalt/featured-articles/how-to-cut-crown-molding

[Jery Madigan]

Thanks Paul,

That is exactly what I was looking for and did not find. I am still doing some experimenting as I am trying to make all cuts with the keeper piece to the left of the blade due to workshop spacing. The crown I made is totally flippable, so that helps. I have the out side corners worked out and will be working on the inside. Here is the info for outside corners:




Face up
Bottom/top
Miter
Bevel
Wood vs


Type of cut
or down
to fence?
right/left?
right/left?
blade










Left hand outside cut
Down
Bottom
Right
Left
Left










Right hand outside cut
Down
Top
Left
Left
Left



I found it very helpful to draw the rough angles on a scrap board - sort of takes the place of her templates.

She noted that out of square corners are a problem. The two angle calulators below allow you to enter the actual corner angle. I am using the second one because the first one only goes down to a 30 degree spring angle. My spring angle is 30 degrees, but may be off slightly on a particulr piece.

https://www.blocklayer.com/crown-molding.aspx

http://www.installcrown.com/Crown_angle_generator.html



Edit: below is a chart with the 4 types of cuts. This is just one way - I believe that there are 4 variations for each type. For my purposes, face up or down works and I prefer to cut with the keeper piece of crown left of the blade.




Face up
Bottom/top
Miter
Bevel
Wood vs


Type of cut
or down
to fence?
right/left?
right/left?
blade










Left hand outside cut
Down
Bottom
Right
Left
Left










Right hand outside cut
Down
Top
Left
Left
Left










Left hand insde cut
Up
Top
Right
Right
Left










Right hand inside cut
Up
Bottom
Left
Left
Left

[Tom M King]

Not about cutting, but working by myself since the pandemic started, I found these hangers to change an otherwise hard job for one person into an easy one. These things are very easy to operate.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B015M1IKOY/ref=redir_mobile_desktop?_encoding=UTF8&aaxitk=0ade3553945b69a6582b44ac1a0adaba&hsa_cr_id=1122373050601&pd_rd_plhdr=t&pd_rd_r=d0ea004e-e702-41fb-867e-8584535d16bc&pd_rd_w=pW0LZ&pd_rd_wg=hAF4F&ref_=sbx_be_s_sparkle_mcd_asin_0_title

Also inserting some maybe otherwise useless information in case it does anyone reading it some good, this crown molding needed a perfectly square ceiling corner for both edges to fit perfectly. I cheated the crown up a little so it fit tightly against the wall. The ceiling joint was going to get caulked anyway. A gauge block was made to set the crown stops on the miter saw, that allowed for the slight out of position up, and the coped corners fit perfectly.

I always prefinish the little cove on the bottom of this style of crown molding, prepaint the wall, and that joint if finished with no cutting in. Wall drape will be hung from the top of the little cove, the ceiling caulked, and sprayed.

[Warren Lake]

You can sometimes make your crown out of two pieces and then you are only cutting 45 or bit more.

For 4/4 stuff take your spring angle look up your angles and get a test piece. Cut your test pieces for each corner and keep them as samples for future set up, mark your angles on the back. Ive only ever cut crown on a table saw, never had a compound mitre saw and having one now might change that thinking. Sure they are fine but I trust a cabinet saw more. For carpentry stuff where pieces are long then the compound saw would make sense as too hard to manage on a table saw. If this is on a cabinet id cut the long piece first, its easier to adjust shorter side pieces to match that have extra length and tweak if need be.

[Jery Madigan]

As an alternative, for those wh do not want to change the miter/bevel once set but don't mind flipping and working both left and right of the blade, this set should work:




Face up
Bottom/top
Miter
Bevel
Wood vs


Type of cut
or down
to fence?
right/left?
right/left?
blade










Left hand outside cut
Up
Top
Right
Right
Right










Right hand outside cut
Up
Bottom
Right
Right
Left










Left hand insde cut
Down
Top
Right
Right
Right










Right hand inside cut
Down
Top
Right
Right
Left

[Mike Henderson]

I did my whole house, including cathedral ceilings, cutting crown flat. I had a book and calculator and I'll try to find the name.

It's not hard once you understand it. The transition from wall to cathedral is special but not difficult.

Here's the book "Crown Molding and Trim - Install it like a pro (https://www.amazon.com/Crown-Molding-Trim-Install-Like/dp/1612331807/ref=sr_1_1?crid=1OODGC67FZ07V&keywords=crown+molding+and+trim+install+it+like+a+ pro&qid=1645753264&s=books&sprefix=crown+molding+and+trim+install+it+like+a+p ro%2Cstripbooks%2C128&sr=1-1)." The author, Wayne Drake, sold out to someone. He had a web site and sold an Excel program that you could use to calculate your miter saw settings for different situations.

I found the web site (https://www.compoundmiter.com/). And here's the Excel program (https://www.compoundmiter.com/excel.html).

Mike

[Jeff Bartley]

Just remember ‘upside down and backwards’.
For out of square inside corners I would recommend coping the joint. With a coped corner you can ‘spring’ the piece in and get a great fit. Also, locate your nailers before starting the crown, and if the joists above are running parallel to you crown install an angled nailer behind the crown.
Lastly, take a short piece of scrap and set it in place checking that the spring angle is correct, make a couple small pencil lines at the top and bottom. Do this every four feet or so, that way when you put up the long run of crown you’ll have reference marks.
Lastly (for real) if working alone make a ‘T’ out of some scrap 2x (or whatever) to hold up one end while you nail the other.

[Tom M King]

All inside corners should be coped, unless it's a small captured space like ceiling coffers. Especially if it's not a painted job where you can get some help from caulking.

This is the only job I can remember where I didn't cope the inside corners. All the pieces are fairly short, so they could be squeezed in there when the coffers were built in the shop before putting them up.

For something like a room with sheetrock walls, a mitered joint is almost sure to open up when nailed if the inside corners are mitered. That's why anything but flat baseboard is coped too.

[Ron Citerone]

Maybe this will help. Having short pieces of crown with the correct cuts next to the miter saw for reference are invaluable for beginners. As mentioned, buy a short stick for practice and reference. https://www.dewalt.com/why-dewalt/featured-articles/how-to-cut-crown-molding

I agree with the short pieces. The article is a great resource too, I just saved it to my favorites.

[Tom M King]

I glanced at that Dewalt page, and was surprised not to see their Crown Stops. Maybe it was on there somewhere, but I didn't take time to go through it.

This is the first video I found about using crown stops. I'm sure there are better videos, but this will make it obvious how they work. This is the absolute easiest way on a miter saw. This guy changed from the stock knobs for tightening them, but if you have any grip and wrist strength at all, the stock knobs work fine. He does use a gauge block to set them on both sides the same way.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VoCpWENOEHo

[Tom M King]

I took a closeup picture of the crown in that room I posted earlier in the one about the hangers. This is 4-5/4 crown. If you incorporate painting in the whole process, as you go along, you can save yourself extra time and trouble. I rolled the top of the wall, andpainted the cove at the bottom of the crown with a brush before I put it up.

This crown was cheated up a little past the manufacturers intended postion so that the lower edge would fit tightly, not needing any caulking. Since the crown and the ceiling were painted together, only the top joint between the crown and ceiling was caulked. In short, once it was put up, there was no other process of cutting in paint along the bottom edge of the crown, and the transition came out perfectly clean with no extra effort.

Figuring out angles to be able to cut the crown flat, while cheating it up a little, would ad some sort of extra time figuring, whereas with the crown stops there was no extra anything involved. It all went very quickly.

For spraying the ceiling, the walls were draped with the cling stuff, and the top protected with paper taped to the lower cove of the crown. Again, very quick. If you can zoom in, you can see the masking tape edge line, but you can't see that from standing on the floor.