Has anyone used one of the Grizzly spiral cutters for a shaper or jointer?
I’m just curious, I have done a fair amount of template work with straight cutters with rub collars and was wondering if these are any advantage as far as cut quality or safety?
It appears that the cutters still chop and aren’t angled to provide a shear cut so I don’t see how there would be that much of an improvement. But I haven’t any experience with these so its just speculation.
I guess there may be some difference in that there would be much more frequent cutting action since the cutters are staggered and this may be a bit safer.
Anyhow, any users out there?
Replies
I just got a jointer with one, but haven't had a chance to set it up.
Regarding the shear cut heads, one downside of those (that seems often overlooked) is that, due to geometry, these heads will inevitably leave slight grooves and ridges in the surface. 'not very much in good ones, and easy to sand or plane out, but they are inevitable.
Think about it: imagine a spiral router bit. Chop it up into a bunch of little slices. On each slice, is the edge of the small piece of cutter on each slice a straight line? No. If you make the slices small enough, they are close to a line, but they are actually a portion of a compound curve.
That's essentially what the shear cut heads are doing: they are approximating a true spiral shape with a bunch of little (straight) line segments. Each one of these little line segments cuts a little above the nominal cut surface on one end, and below it on the other. That's one of the big reasons they tend to have more cutters than the non-shear heads, in order to minimze this effect.
Edited 4/26/2005 5:14 pm ET by BarryO
I really do not know much about the cutters to which you refer,however,back in the days when I made Duncan Phyfe dining room chairs,I used a 3 inch long X4 inch diameter spiral milling machine cutter. I used it on the shaper to profile the outside profile after the chairs 3 side parts were assembled with glue and mortise and tenon joints.
The inside profiles were milled in the same fashion. before any assembly.The cutters were bushed to fit the 1" diameter spindle on the shaper.A 4" diameter bearing was also bushed to fit under the cutter to guide the profile template. As I remember,very little sanding was required after the milling operation.In my shop.wood and metal working equipment was used as needed to do the best job possible.Thank you,Mr.Croney,where ever you may be.
Work safely ¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬PAT¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬
Edited 4/26/2005 6:22 pm ET by Pat
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