What is a Cope and Stick Router Bit Set?

[Frank Pellow]

In two very different articles that I was reading today, I came upon the term "cope and stick router bit set" and I have no idea what it means. I turned to four different catalogues with router bits for information (Freud, Lee Valley, Rockler, and Grizzly) but found nothing.

Having found nothing, I am wondering if perhaps this is some class of bit and there are several more specific names used in the catalogues.

I would appreciate it if someone could educate me.

[Joe Scarfo]

I'm no expert here, but I do believe it's inter changeable w/ rail and stile bits.

I know a cabinet maker who referred to door making bits as cope and stick...

I'll keep an eye out here to see if I'm right...

Ciao
Joe in Green Bay

[Dev Emch]

These are terms pulled from the glory days of serious woodworking. The term stick refers to the blank fed into a moulder and sticking an edge is the moulding cut or cut that is inline with the grain. The term cope refers to the end grain cut usually done by a tenoner. For example, my tenoner has five motors. Two motors cut the tenon and two more cope the profile. Often, this cut is an end grain cut that reaches under the cheek of the tenon to form an opposite but equal profile to the stick profile. These two motors spining these cutters are known as the copeing heads and they spin the cope cutters.

Recently, the router table has taken over this task esp. in regard to hobbyists building frame and rail structures for cabinet doors or furniture. The router bit sets that cut the profile for both the long grain cut and the end grain cut are known as cope and stick sets. Incidently, so are the shaper cutter and tenoner sets used to do the same task on these machines.

So as you can see, these are most likely bits you are already familar with. You just didnt know the obsure name.

The enclosed engraving is one of my tenoner. Except mine is a 1968 type 2 model 125 and this is an earlier type 1.

[Mark Singer]

Cope is when you put up with someone or something..
Stick is what you would like to hit them with..:rolleyes:

[Frank Pellow]

Thanks Joe and Dev :) (and no thanks Mark :p )

Dev, I am tempted to get a machine like the one you showed, but I expect that it is more likely that I will end up with a router table like:

30626

and some bits like:

30627

[Jim Dunn]

Frank you should consider the floor of you shop before you get a machine like Dave's. It might crunch the concrete where it sets:eek::eek::p

[Frank Pellow]

Frank you should consider the floor of you shop before you get a machine like Dave's. It might crunch the concrete where it sets:eek::eek::p
Good point Jim (even though my floor has no concrete). :)

So the main reason that I will not get a machine like your's Dev, is not cost ;) , and it is not space ;) , but it is the fact that my floor could not handle the load. :D

[Richard Wolf]

Frank, Rail and stile or stick and cope bits are used to make raised panel and flat panel doors and panels. At first glance they may look a little confussing but after setting them up they work very well. Keep in mind you will also need a rasied panel cutter to go with the rail and stile bits and the three bits often come in a set. I like raised panel cutters that also have a back cutter included to reduce the panel edge to 1/4".

Richard

[Charles McCracken]

Rail and Stile refer to the door components themselves and are generally used to name the bit set. Cope and stick (or cope and profile) refer to the cuts made and are used to name the individual bits.

The bit sets you pictured will produce rail and stile doors (by making cope and stick cuts) but they cannot be reshimmed after sharpening. Each time you have them sharpened the fit of the joint produced will suffer more and more. There are two piece rail and stile sets available (like the Freud 99-260) that have shims between the cutters so they can be adjusted after each sharpening.

Charles M
Freud America, Inc.

[Frank Pellow]

Richard and Charles, thanks for the further information.

Only quite recently did I get a decent router. I am using it quite a bit these days, but I still have a lot to learn. Heck, I don't even have a router table (yet?).

[Jim Becker]

Cope and stick goes beyond just rails and stiles...it's also what gets used for things like the frames that hold glass in multi-pane windows, ets. But the simplest "cope and stick" cutter you have is your table saw!! It's just a somewhat plain profile... ;) (tongue and groove counts as cope and stick)

[Mark Singer]

Cope is when you put up with someone or something..
Stick is what you would like to hit them with..:rolleyes:

I hate to admit it, but.....I may have had another one wrong:confused:

[Frank Pellow]

Cope and stick goes beyond just rails and stiles...it's also what gets used for things like the frames that hold glass in multi-pane windows, ets. But the simplest "cope and stick" cutter you have is your table saw!! It's just a somewhat plain profile... ;) (tongue and groove counts as cope and stick)
OK Jim, this puts many bits into the "cope and stick" category as I first suspected. That makes more sense to me than simply alternative terms for "rail and stile" type bits, because one of the contexts where I encountered the term yesterday was when reading about window frames.

[Rob Blaustein]

But the simplest "cope and stick" cutter you have is your table saw!! It's just a somewhat plain profile... ;) (tongue and groove counts as cope and stick)

So what is the reason people use fancier profiles (router bits vs simple tongue and groove) for rails and stiles in a non-raised panel setting? Is it because of more gluing surface, or simply looks (though the only part you see is that joint when viewed from above). Is it a sign of "fancier" joinery or workmanship, akin to using dovetails vs other joinery (I realize there are distinct structural advantages to using dovetails too...)?

[David Fried]

Frank,

I realize your question has already been answered but I was at woodworking-magazine.com and wanted to try out their Interactive Woodworking Terms Glossary. Here is what it came up with.

Cope-&-stick joint (n)
A good joint for making small- and medium-sized doors. Essentially it’s a tongue-and-groove joint with built-in moulding, which are a nice touch to this reasonably strong joint.
30637

Appears to be a decent glossary!

Dave Fried

[Jim Becker]

OK Jim, this puts many bits into the "cope and stick" category as I first suspected. That makes more sense to me than simply alternative terms for "rail and stile" type bits, because one of the contexts where I encountered the term yesterday was when reading about window frames.

Think of "cope and stick" as being complimentary profiles that fit together...male and female, as it were.


So what is the reason people use fancier profiles (router bits vs simple tongue and groove) for rails and stiles in a non-raised panel setting? Is it because of more gluing surface, or simply looks (though the only part you see is that joint when viewed from above). Is it a sign of "fancier" joinery or workmanship, akin to using dovetails vs other joinery (I realize there are distinct structural advantages to using dovetails too...)?

Style, glue surface area, etc., are all reasons that folks use these joints. They are quite strong, too, especially with modern glues. In many respects this joint gets rid of the extra work that mortise and tenon brings, but sometimes they are actually used in conjunction with it. (haunched tenons are an example)

[Frank Pellow]

Frank,

I realize your question has already been answered but I was at woodworking-magazine.com and wanted to try out their Interactive Woodworking Terms Glossary.
...
Appears to be a decent glossary!

Dave Fried
Thanks Dave, I agree that the glossary looks to be decent and I have bookmarked it.

But, I hasten to add, that it is much better to recieve the information that has been contributed in rtesponse to this thread. Thanks again everyone (everyone, that is, except Mark :p ).

[Jerry Todd]

Thanks Joe and Dev :) (and no thanks Mark :p )

Dev, I am tempted to get a machine like the one you showed, but I expect that it is more likely that I will end up with a router table like:

30626

and some bits like:

30627
Frank,
Be careful with the router table. I have two router tables and use them a lot. However last Friday I got my right thumb and index finger to close to the dovetail bit, Lucky is was a small bit. Nothing serious but at 16,000 rpm it could have been more than bandaids.

[David Fried]

it is much better to receive the information that has been contributed

Two thumbs up Frank!


(everyone, that is, except Mark :p ).

ten thumbs up!!:D

[Paul B. Cresti]

I hate to admit it, but.....I may have had another one wrong:confused:

Mark,
I thought your post was quite informative. I guess us Architects are just a misunderstood bunch. I kind of would have eluded to, cope is what you do with your nutty clients and stick is what you do on your landing after you perform your "Mary Lou" vault-like flip when "landing" the next big project :) but alas I hide in the shadows under my bridge. It has been a long night and not enough coffee yet this morning...............

[Frank Chaffee]

Frank,
Coping also refers to “Scribing the intersections of mouldings instead of mitering”. This cut is made with a coping saw or a sabre saw equipped with a coping foot.
Frank

[Charles McCracken]

The reason for the profile is strictly looks. The Shakers made plain frames.

Charles M
Freud America, Inc.

[Frank Pellow]

Frank,
Coping also refers to “Scribing the intersections of mouldings instead of mitering”. This cut is made with a coping saw or a sabre saw equipped with a coping foot.
Frank
That I do know. The first woodworking tool that my Dad gave to me (when I was 6) was a coping saw. And, I used it a lot.

[Frank Chaffee]

Frank,
I just wanted to bring that up because it is often beneficial to consider related terminology when exploring a definition, in this case processes relating to mating profiles.
Our family’s coping saw died of exposure and I had to replace it.
Frank

[Dev Emch]

Frank,
Coping also refers to “Scribing the intersections of mouldings instead of mitering”. This cut is made with a coping saw or a sabre saw equipped with a coping foot.
Frank

Thanks Frank...
You are absolutely right. That is indeed the ultimate source of the term cope and the verb to cope as it relates to woodworking. As you mentioned, the task of scribing the intersection of mouldings and then cutting to the line is in essence what the copeing heads on a tenoner are all about.

Once the actual tenon is cut by the first two horizontal motors, the next two vertical oriented motors now undercut the cheek of the tenon thereby giving you a prefect cope joint that matches the moulding profile.

The problem with using router bits and conventional shapers for that matter is the tenon. There are actually two issues. First, a router bit or shaper cut designed to perform this copeing cut is depth limited and depth fixed. That is why all router bit sets actually only cut a fixed stub tenon. If I change the tenon length and try to increase it, I now need a customized cutting circle for that particular tenon length. So given the same profile but differing tenon lengths, I wind up with a sizeable collection of cutters for no reason.

Secondly, as the tenon length increases, so does the diameter of the cutters. For traditional exterior entry doors, the coping cutters for a shaper can reach as much as 1 foot or 12 inches in diameter. To compute your maximum tenon length, take the diameter and subtract the dimater of our spindle. For shapers, that would be 12 - 1.25 = 10.75. Now divide that in half or 5.4 inches. That is the longest tenon you can cut. But now, most shapers and routers use cross cut sleds indexed off the main fence which also has your DC chutes. Even heavy duty shapers are often limited to about 8 inches or no more than 3.4 inches for tenon length. All in all, this is not good. So if I reduce my tenon to nothing more than a filler for the panel groove, then it becomes a stub tenon that is fixed. But your joint strength is depdendent on two things. The length of long grain in the tenon itself as well as how much wood you have above and below the tenon. In most applications, the ogee or thumb nail or round over consumes wood right over the stub tenon. Also, to make things nice an pretty, the bit designers use a non-symetrical profile leaving you less than 1/3 of the thickness for the back side of the joint. In many cases, for kitchen cabinet doors, etc, this material is about 1/8 inch thick.

Bottom line is that these joints are incredibly weak. They look good, but they are incredibly weak.

By using the tenoner approach, you can use one set of tooling to cut an infinite combination of cope joints and varying length tenons. If I am using a double profile, then I use both copeing motors. The top one and the bottom one. If I am doing kitchen cabinet doors, then I use but a single or top coping motor with the bottom copeing motor out of the way. The tennon cutters can cut a tenon with perfect cheeks up to 4 inches in length and adjustable thickness and position. By adding a second set uf tenon cutters, some tenoners can cut as much as an 8 inch long tenon.

Now about using a router table for this? A router table using a coping cutter along with either a mitre slot or a copeing sled can cut a respectable copeing cut but one with only a stub tenon. The one modern machine that comes to mind in this regard is either the multirouter or a hinged router table in which the motor axis can be changed to horizontal. This will allow you to cut very nice tenons up to no more than 3 inches deep. But you will have issues in coping the mitre cut.

Another way to solve this problem is to use a router table to preform the coping cut. Then using a router as a slot mortiser, remove a portion of the stub tenon and replace it with a floating tenon. This will give a pretty good version of a coped, haunched mortise and tenon joint. Again, the haunced joint serves two purposes. First, it aides in filling in the panel groove on the side of the finished joint and secondly, its unique L shape tenon resists twisting by your frame and results in a stronger and more stable frame. This is nothing new. This information has been available to cabinet makers for hundreds of years.

[Frank Pellow]

WOW Dev, thanks for a LOT of good information and (as usual from you) well written information!

I am not sure how mush I will be able to act upon it, but I love learning and I am learning quite a bit in this thread.

[Charles McCracken]

Dev,

I agree that the tenon length is limited for most shaper cutters and router bits but I disagree with your comment that the "joints are incredibly weak". Particularly when the options are either router bits/shaper cutters or double end tenoners. That's a pretty big leap for someone to take. For an average sized 3/4" thick cabinet door with 2" wide frame members a 7/16" stub tenon provides plenty of strength. Granted this is not sufficient for very large doors (say for an entertainment center or pantry) or entry doors but even these can easily be strenghtened by use of dowels inserted after assembly. We have also just introduced a router bit set for exterior and passage doors that has a cope cutter capable of making tenons of any length. This does not require a large diameter cutter, just one without a bearing and multiple passes.

Charles M
Freud America, Inc.

[Richard Wolf]

Charles, that sounds like an interesting set. Is it availible yet?

Richard

[Charles McCracken]

Yes, the item is 99-267 and it makes 1-3/8" and 1-3/4" doors. The set consists of a cope bit that has a bearing between the two cutters and the entire top of the bit is removed as a single component to allow the tenon to pass over. The sticking bit is pretty much standard. The profile is a bead.

Charles M
Freud America, Inc.

[Dev Emch]

Dev,

I agree that the tenon length is limited for most shaper cutters and router bits but I disagree with your comment that the "joints are incredibly weak". Particularly when the options are either router bits/shaper cutters or double end tenoners. That's a pretty big leap for someone to take. For an average sized 3/4" thick cabinet door with 2" wide frame members a 7/16" stub tenon provides plenty of strength. Granted this is not sufficient for very large doors (say for an entertainment center or pantry) or entry doors but even these can easily be strenghtened by use of dowels inserted after assembly. We have also just introduced a router bit set for exterior and passage doors that has a cope cutter capable of making tenons of any length. This does not require a large diameter cutter, just one without a bearing and multiple passes.

Charles M
Freud America, Inc.

With all do respect, I have a solution that not only solves the aforementioned problem but is also unique to an extent in the custom woodworking industry. I disagree about having to use double end tenoners. Shapers have been using coping discs for many years and you can purchase relieved coping discs for your shaper up to about 9 inches in diameter from C.G. Schmidt for years. These can cut either straight shaker style tenons or they can be configured to cut profiles. Felder also has rebate/coping discs with insert cutters that can cut up to a 75 mm tenon. I have used these in pairs on my hofmann shaper's sliding table. See my Belated Gloat for photos of this shaper.

The key to using a router table to perform these cuts is what I call the fly cut. The tenoner gets away with this by virtue of the coping head flying over the finished tenon. It only cuts when it needs to relieve the cheek and leave behind the reverse moulding profile. If you can build a router bit that cuts the reverse profile but has no guide bearings or jointing cutters for finishing the stub tenon, then you can perform this exact cut in multiple stages on your router table. Albeit, the top profile is cut face down. No worries. I actually wrote an article about this roughly four years ago and submitted it to FWW for possible review. Unfortunately it was not accepted. Most likely because it deviates from the standard cope and bit set.

In addition to strength, I am not the only one who has complained about weak joints. Review the last two years of FWW and one of the more proflifc guys wrote the same thing. In traditional hand work, the general rule of thumb is the 1/3 rule. Your tenon is centered and 1/3 the thickness of the wood in which the mortise is cut. So you have 1/4 inch on top, 1/4 inch on the bottom and 1/4 inch for the tenon. But if you look at all over the counter bit sets and shaper cutters, none of them follow this rule. Instead, they shift the profile location downwards about 1/8 inch and use the extra meat to enhance the top profile. This weakens the back side significantly as your stub tenon is inline with your weakened mortise back side. If you use this approach, and there is nothing wrong with doing this by the way, you need to push extra tenon into the solid wood for strength. But this requires a longer tenon than the stub and it most likely requires you to finish the tenon as a haunched tenon to neatly fill the stick profile panel groove.

I have found the tenoner to be an ideal solution to this problem. Clearly I do not advocate that everyone should get a tenoner. There are not enough to go around. But this was brought up in lieu of the question as to what is a cope and stick set. Tenoners were once in every shop including the desk top versions made by middlebury.

In my shop, the solution that I use and one I get paid serious money to execute is one of old school tradition coupled with the Stickly philosophy of machine use in fine woodworking. I use a Hofmann TFS-1200 shaper with a tilting spindle and a full coping table or sliding table. In addition, I use a 1968 Oliver model 125-D tenoner with five motors and a tilting roller table. Furthermore, I use a Wysong 284 chisel mortiser for smaller square mortises under 3/4 inch square or for odd size mortises for which I do not have tooling. My main mortise machine is a 2003 Maka STV-161 oscillating chisel mortiser. This mortiser can not only cut a square mortise, but it can also blow haunched mortises with square profiles in a single pass with router bit precision. It makes a chisel mortiser look barbaric in comparision.

Lastly, I draw bore my joints. This can only be done with traditional mortise and tenon configurations if one assumes that the draw bore pin will not be in pairs. A floating tenon will require paired up draw bore pins which, quite frankly, looks stupid and out of place.

When I show customers cut aways of my joints and the other guy's joints, I dont need to say much more. This is my solution and one that works for me. Every one needs to address this problem from their own perspective. This is a free country and you can do what you wish and should be encouraged to do so. I will gladly answer any questions as to how I do this and why I do this.

[Charles McCracken]

Dev,

I didn't mean to start a controversy. I have great respect for your knowledge and I am sure the work you produce is first rate.



The key to using a router table to perform these cuts is what I call the fly cut. The tenoner gets away with this by virtue of the coping head flying over the finished tenon. It only cuts when it needs to relieve the cheek and leave behind the reverse moulding profile. If you can build a router bit that cuts the reverse profile but has no guide bearings or jointing cutters for finishing the stub tenon, then you can perform this exact cut in multiple stages on your router table.
This is exactly what the 99-267 set mentioned above does. The window sash bits also do this. It hasn't been done with cabinet door bits yet but I'm sure it is only a matter of time.

Charles M
Freud America, Inc.

[Curt Harms]

Cope is when you put up with someone or something..
Stick is what you would like to hit them with..:rolleyes:
when you get tired of copeing with them? Always wondered about that:D

[Dev Emch]

Dev,

I didn't mean to start a controversy. I have great respect for your knowledge and I am sure the work you produce is first rate.


This is exactly what the 99-267 set mentioned above does. The window sash bits also do this. It hasn't been done with cabinet door bits yet but I'm sure it is only a matter of time.

Charles M
Freud America, Inc.

Charles...
I am so glad to hear that you guys are going in this direction. I have been preaching to the choir about this very problem for more years than I wish to recall. I am a prefectionist and this is one of my major pet peeves.

Please review the complex joinery on this site.
http://www.solidwoodmachinery.com/

This was done by an older Maka. My maka is not a SM-6P but rather a STV-161. I have been meaning to post a shop tour and that will be my SMC project for Feb.

I also designed a four wing cutter to fly over subflooring to allow you to re-groove flooring that is nailed down and in place. All of the groovers I found had mandrels with arbor nuts on them which interfered with this operation. Not mortise and tenon stuff but still it uses the concept of fly cutting. This cutter can be used to cut shaker style tenons if you think about it.

The big issue is shaper cutters. In order to reduce the diamter and danger of using a shaper cutter to cope profiles by virtue of fly cutting, you will need to redesign the attachment scheme by which cutters attach to the spindle. You will need some form of necked down arbor with a flush mount bolt on the top. Add a couple of keys for safety and you should be O.K. These spindles and flush mount cutters would be a welcome addition to the tooling arsenal and anyone with a small shaper like a Delta HD or powermatic 26 can do the same operation that my oliver 125 single ended tenoner does.

We have been making our own fly cutting router bits for years. A buddy of mine in the woodworking industry has made some of these for me. Wally who owns Vexor Woodworking does a killer job. But he charges a ton of cash for these. The fly cutting groover cost me $220 dollars to have made. By the way, these all have brazed carbide tips supplied by Tigra.

Hopefully we can see some cheaper solutions that actually do the job instead of having to design and fabricate our own.

Best of luck...