[OP]
Contributor
Can anyone recommend a shop for making custom 40mm shaper cutters (for Amana 61068)? I've found one place; but, it's $166 a pair. Whitehill sells them for $110 including shipping from the UK to the US, so I assume there's a quality shop offering a competitive price in the US.
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Mttoolco in Baltimore. iirc I paid $80 for the last pair. Honestly most shops should be able to do them for less then $166 though.Originally Posted by Mike Stelts
Id suggest sticking to stock 40/50mm profiles as once you go custom ground corrugated knives are a better value
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Schmidt Co. in Montvale NJ will grind knife profiles on their cnc machine to fit almost any cutterhead. Can order "rough ground" from them to get the shape, then lap the back of the knives on your own to get it sharp. Saves a few bucks.
https://cggschmidt.net/cggwp/knife-grinding/
That $110 price is probably for knives and limiters, though I'm not sure if the $80 price Jared got was for both or not. Whitehill will do knives only but you have to specify because they default to knives and limiters.
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Knives only. I don't have any limiter heads.
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I haven't ordered any for probably 15 years. Some will make their quote look better by useing the cheap ,lousy "semi"
high speed steel ( AKA rubbish) . Demand real M-2. If the profile is something that doesn't have sharp corners ,it's
not hard to just buy the steel and grind by hand.
Exactly, the commonly available 40mm knives in North America are very cheap, with low quality steel. They have a role, and I own many, but the Whitehill steel is industry standard from the same German source as supplies many manufacturers.
B
Contributor
Shutte Lumber in Kansas City. They are the only custom knife shop in the KC area and have been around for a long time. The folks restoring old houses go there to get moldings because they probably already have the knives. Years ago, some kid burned the place down and everyone in KC was asking about the knives (they were ok). The rest was just money. The kid just wanted to see it burn.
Full disclosure: I don't have a shaper and have never had knives made. I just used to shop there. Nice people.
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One option for these 3 hole euro blocks is to have custom knives made with better steel. Hot knives made the set on the right using 5mm thick quality HSS instead of the normal 4 mm thick out of the low grade steel. I suspect Neil at MTToolco could do this also with his water jet technology. I normally use corrugated for short run custom profiles but if it is something used a lot the Euroblocks are a little easier to set.
l.C9333327-1331-4F0D-AE71-888A9AB8868C.jpg
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Schmidt Co. gets my vote. I have been a customer for decades.
Epilog Mini 24-45W, Corel Draw X6, Photoshop CS5, Multi Cam CNC
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When buying knives from a new vendor be sure to tell them that ,where aplicable , knives without "side clearance" will
not be accepted. There are places that will send out knives for round hand rail with no side clearance. Then you have to
deal with burn marks.
Wow, really?
Contributor
this is what Mel is talking about. This knife came from a moulding machine from a furniture manufacturer. You can see the back grind or "side clearance" on every aspect of this knife other than the double bevel. Not all will grind this way plus the last one I used would have a double bevel on the left raised section there. Should have cleaned the knife, zooming in still looks like there is a small extra bevel on the front
P1310914A.jpg
Last edited by Warren Lake; 10-04-2020 at 1:31 PM.
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Yeah, Brent. In employments sometimes a company "buyer" would get on phone trying to find a cheaper vendor.
And they would cleverly find a hack.
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