Hi,
Looking for a way to machine 3 parallel flutes into the corner stiles of a cabinet design. I have a router/table. But, I’m having a hard time figuring out how to build a jig that would allow me to cut 1/4 rounded flutes with tapered ends (as opposed to stopped ends). And, my wood of choice is Cherry, which burns if the router bit sits too long in one place. I want to avoid the unsightly burn marks at the ends.
Anybody know how to do this?
-John
Replies
I can't think of no quick and easy way to do this. But if you absolutely want the tapered flutes, I think you will have to build some jig to hold the size of your stile with a gradual ramp or transition on each end of it. I can't see it being done accurately on the router table. Maybe I'm wrong, I probably am. Who knows. I'd mess around with some scrap the same size as your cherry stile and find out the appropriate transition needed to get the taper you want. You won't have to plunge the router because the jig will do that gradually as your router enters the flat of the jig. Make sense? I think it would work. The thing is you will have to use your edge guide or make something into the jig for indexing the spaces between flutes. I don't see why this wouldn't work. Good luck.
This is just an idea, but I'm thinking it would be easier to figure out with a bull nose slot cutter on a table rather then a straight cutter with some kind of tapering fixture or jig.
Don
How many do you have to do? It might take less time and effort to get some gouges and do it by hand.
John Nanasy- Spokeshave, put you in the right direction. Basically, build an open U shaped trough into which you drop and fix the leg. If your leg or stile is straight and square, a snug fit will suffice,and at least one end of the trough can be sealed off to index the parts. The two long exposed top edges of the trough are sloped from one end to the other, in your case, maybe only by 1°- 3°. The router base runs on these edges, and a side fence controls the distance from the edge, and the flute will gradually run out as you run the router along the length. You should only need to set the side fence twice-- once for the centre flute, and once for a pass on either side of the jig to rout the outer flutes. This is a procedure where I would take a hand held plunge router to the job rather than take the job to the inverted router table-- I like to see what's going on.
The result that you seem to be after is somewhat similar to fluting a tapered column (or leg for e.g.,)where the width of each flute needs to get narrower towards the narrow end of the column to retain an equal width of timber between each flute all along the length. The jigs for that are more complex, because the centre point between each flute is greater at the wide end than the centre points are at the narrow end. I think I've explained that correctly. With a pen and paper it would be simple to explain, but it's not really relevant here anyway, ha, ha. Slainte, RJ.
Edited 9/7/2002 2:27:08 PM ET by Sgian Dubh
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