Moulder options

[Bobby Robbinett]

Been looking at getting a Moulder for having the ability to make my own crown, light rail, bolection moulding and the occasional job for mitered doors. Will a W&H do this? The largest crown that I would make is 6.5” or so. I am ok with machining in multiple passes.

[Jared Sankovich]

The w&h will work in that application.

[Paul Haus]

I have a Shop Fox clone of the W&H molder. I would say that to do all you're talking about you'd want the molder, a table saw and a shaper or router table. Things like rabit cuts for overlaps would be easier on the TS or shaper though it's possible you could do them all on the molder. I believe the max width is between 7" and 7.5" knives.
Hope that helps.

[Kevin Jenness]

The W&H does a remarkable job considering its crude design, but it is best suited to short runs and curved projects. For any kind of production and a better finish you may want to look at something with a more sophisticated feedworks and more heads. If you do go in that direction plan for lots of chip production.

[Bradley Gray]

I have the W&H, a older model. It does the job making crowns out of matching wood, etc

[Richard Coers]

You have the positives, here are the negatives. One a very wide crown, it goes much better if you used a dado cut on the table saw to reduce the mass of wood to be removed. If you try to take a final light cut on a W&H you can grind up an infeed roller because of the small contact area on the wood. You need to keep hand pressure on the wood all the time as slippage on the feed destroys a roller fairly quickly. Second is you don't get the cuts per inch that you would get from a big commercial molder. Profile sanding is imperative on stock coming from a W&H. Same goes for tarot. You don't get the fine cuts off the knives, so tear out can be an issue. You definitely want to read the grain on your stock and feed correctly.

[Mike King]

Why not a shaper? A more versatile tool.

Mike

[Paul Haus]

Why not a shaper? A more versatile tool.
Mike

I know you weren't directing this to me but thought I could give 2 cents worth of thoughts being I have both a molder and a shaper and use both of them. You can get custom molder knives and shaper knives ground, but you will be getting them for an insert cutterhead (for the most part) for a shaper unless you lucked into some form of carbide 3 wing cutter. Unless you have a 'very substantial' shaper (meaning a production unit), IMO it can put a lot of stress even on a 1.25" spindle and that doesn't even take into account the limited length of the spindle. Except for substantial machines, you likely won't find much over 3" spindle lengths for most popular machines. IMO unless you are doing little more than short runs, you should have a feeder on a shaper. I use Board Buddies on the shaper, but most of my work is more like edge shaping boards. If I'm going to make crown moldings, I'm getting the molder out, I'd use the shaper to cut rabits and tweek the edge a little if desired.
Personally I have more faith in bolting in the cutters in a molder vs. using an insert molding head on a shaper. That's my thoughts, hope it helps someone.

[Rod Sheridan]

Multi head moulders can convert rough material into completed product in one pass, a shaper is very versatile however it’s no substitute for a molder in an industrial shop.

I had a job setting up moulders, 2 gang rips fed 3 moulders.

2 moulders ran continuously, #3 was offline for maintenance or tooling changes. It would have taken a dozen shapers and 20 operators to keep up with that, as well as requiring jointers and planers.

Regards, Rod.

[Warren Lake]

the old guy ran the shop in toronto and they had 12 stickers running daily. They fed other businesses as well as their own that were left in original owners names. Not relevant to bobbys question.

I have a woodmaster bought used bent shaft so I changed out the shaft oversize and had a corrugated moulding head made to take up to six inch knives. You can do curves it will be based on the radius you have to do and the machine width. Its a very lightweight machine and I dont like that but it works, the 5 HP motor is enough. The feed motor is a gear motor so you can dial in your feed rate and you will get a clean cut in one pass using high speed steel corrugated knives. Grain direction I dont care about it changes often enough. The slow feed rate is the reason it will cut a crown in one pass and it will cut clean. Hand sanding after that like anything else off a machine.

Its more sensible than a shaper. I dont do long runs as it does heat up even with doubling the bearings but it cuts clean. Next level for me would be a Micron.

[Jared Sankovich]

Why not a shaper? A more versatile tool.

Mike

Full profile face cuts are considerably easier on a moulder, and you get a consistent thickness. It's possible on a shaper, but not as simple in setup.

I'd also assume the op already has a shaper or shapers.