shapers

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

How often do you think you'd use a tilt head if you had one?

Or if you do have one - - how often do you use it ?

It's a fair bit of a price jump from about a grand for a fixed spindle to about seven or eight grand for a tilt head.

[Jay Brewer]

Hi Cliff, Ive had an F700 for about 2 years, I have tilted the spindle once to make the back cuts on crown moulding with a byrd head. I found it easier to buy the back cutters for my moulder.


These are much more substantial machines than the $1k shapers you are referring to. Seems like all the Euro shapers have tilting spindles, I just dont find it very useful for the type of work I do. Even though I do like the versatility the machine offers.

If you only want to make simple profiles, the cheaper machines are just fine. Leave some money left over for a good feeder.

[Chris Rosenberger]

I have been using shapers for over 30 years, I can only think of a hand full of times that I thought it would be nice to have a tilting spindle shaper. There were a few times that I made an axillay table for the angle I needed.

[Jeff Duncan]

I've had a tilting spindle for a couple years now and haven't used it yet. It just seems like it offers a lot of flexibility and will come in handy someday.
Personally I would shy away from any new shaper that's less than the Powermatic 27 or Delta HD unless your doing hobby work, but that's just my opinion.

good luck,
JeffD

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

Those were pretty much what I was thinking. I posted the same question in a forum where most the people have a tilt head shaper. They say they do it pretty often like once a month or so. But, the things they say they are using it for seem to me to be operations I might perform using some other technique just as well (mind you: I say that without seeing the actual operations).

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

I've had a tilting spindle for a couple years now and haven't used it yet. It just seems like it offers a lot of flexibility and will come in handy someday.

Yah indeed, the question is will it be worth that extra 5 - 6 Grand~? I suppose of the money isn't an issue then why not.


Personally I would shy away from any new shaper that's less than the Powermatic 27 or Delta HD unless your doing hobby work, but that's just my opinion.

I almost got a shaper with a 3/4" spindle and pulled back at the last minute. I think I want a bigger beast since a router table can do all the small stuff.

I'm just playing with ideas right now though. I like to mull over major tool purchases for about a year.

[J.R. Rutter]

I don't have a tilting head shaper, just lots of fixed spindles. But looking at them, the trunnions that support the spindle need to be engineered for stability and ease of repeatable adjustment. My worry with a cheap tilting shaper would be that it would go out of square or be prone to vibration. I did find an online brochure for one of the current SCMI tilting shapers. There is a page that shows the trunnion setup - pretty amazing...

http://brochure.fotonica.com/index.php?idpub=105&idlang=4

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

My worry with a cheap tilting shaper

lol. Hard to even think of the words "cheap" and "tilting" and "shaper" in the same thought.

[Jeff Duncan]

Cliff, the key for me is that I buy most of my equipment used. So my 3 phase 3 hp tilting spindle with extra spindles, many cutters, and a variable speed Univer power feed was $2k.
Having owned a Delta 3hp, and now a Powermatic 5 hp 27 and the Lin-Mac tilting, I'm planning on picking up something like an SCMI T110 or similar in the not too distant future. Once you give one a look the rest just seem like toys:)
JeffD

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

Once you give one a look the rest just seem like toys

HA HA That's what the Felder guy said.
He was pretty much right, excepting Martin maybe.

[Peter Quinn]

The tilting spindle seems like a tempting option till you try to nail down just exactly would you do with it that could not be done any other way. I have run into a handful of setups at work where a tilting spindle would have been more comfortable, probably safer, but not essential. We do a very wide range of millwork and seem to get by without it, though I wonder if we had one would new methods arise to take advantage of it? I'm told it allows you to get more profiles from your existing molding knives, not sure I see a major advantage there either? If there is a cheap tilting shaper I haven't seen it. If you go with the tilting option rear tilt seems like a more sensible design to me.

Now a sliding table is another story. I am looking forward to the day when I can swing a shaper with a good sliding table. That is a real useful option worth spending on if you do anything with end grain joinery. Not essential strictly speaking, but a real nice upgrade from sleds and t squares.

In my own small shop I have an old Delta 3 HP HD shaper, 3/4" spindle, bought it cheap used, don't sell them short to get started. If your really thinking a router can do what a good 3/4" shaper can do then I'd guess you haven't used one? My little shaper will chew up and spit out any router table ever made, hands down, without exception. The 3/4" spindle size is not without limitations, but an over grown router it isn't.

As an analogy, if shapers were trucks, a router is like pickup, the 3/4" 3HP shaper is like a tri axle dumper, and the 7.5HP powermatic I use at work is like one of those mountain earth movers. And it goes up from there...like the 7 head 12" Weinig molder for instance!

Another real nice option if your budget allows is a quick change spindle with multiple spindles. If your shop is for hobby or custom furniture, one off's, limited sort of production then that cost probably won't make sense. But if you are producing any volume with cope and stick cuts and a single machine it would probably pay for itself quickly in reduced set up times.

[Steve Clardy]

No tilt here.
If I did, I might find a use for it, but can't think of a use for it.
I have a molder for my moldings

[David DeCristoforo]

It really is going to depend on how you use the shaper. Peter's point that a sliding table is a much more useful feature in general is true. But as to what you would do with a tilting spindle? OK just for starters, how about having a bevel cutter for any bevel between 45 and 90 degrees? All with the same straight cutter? Or for angled grooving and dadoing? The variety of moldings you can form with any given profile is expanded exponentially if you can tilt the spindle. Is it worth the extra dough? Tough to say. Again, it depends on your needs. But I can tell you this with certainty; if you never play around with it, you will never realize the potential.

[Paul B. Cresti]

I have only owned a tilting head shaper and it was not cheap ;) I most definately was a good candidate to get a tilting head shaper at the time I purchased it....custom woodworking, custom profiles, etc.... but to tell you the truth I simple have not used it. I tried to use it for some profiles but I found it easier to simply use oversized rough stock, run the cutter straight and then "cut" away what I did not need.
As I am sure you know a shaper is an extremely time consuming machine...a tilting head can be used for other functions like beveling but there may be more efficient ways to do the same (jointer, saw, etc...)
As crazy it sounds If I could only own one shaper and decided on getting a good one I would still get a tilting head just because what if???

[Brad Shipton]

I have used the tilt feature only a few times. With a 4" under the nut you only get a working capacity of 2.8" at 45deg and many manufacturers build some nice adjustable tilt cutters that can accomplish about the same. For me the under the nut capacity, rotation speeds, quick replace spindle and the fence are far more important than the tilt. You should let Mac know you are looking for one. He had a great used PanHans not too long ago. There have been some great deals on some SCM and others on ExFactory and the woodweb lately.

Maybe one of the new Martin T12's? ha!ha!

Brad

[J.R. Rutter]

Here's a cheap tilting shaper:

http://www.grizzly.com/products/7-1-2-HP-3-Phase-Extreme-Series-Tilting-Arbor-Shaper/G0608X

My latest shaper is a low end (no auto set up controller) SCMI T130Class, which is not as highly engineered as the German machines, but the heavy duty, quick change spindle system and digital adjustments will let me reclaim some floor space currently used by 4 stacked spindle machines with fences that never move...

[Rick Potter]

I can come out of the closet finally. I have a tilting shaper, built into my slider tablesaw. Not only have I never used the tilt, I have never used the shaper either. I have a couple Delta 1 1/2 horse shapers with 3/4" spindles. I use one of them as a router table, and the other with shaper cutters (got em cheap, used). I have not yet had a need to learn all about the shaper in the saw, the only reason I got is was that Felder was having a good sale, so adding it to the saw was not too expensive. Someday when I need a larger shaper I will use it. Someday hasn't come yet.

Rick Potter