# fitting spindle cutters in the router



## apw joinery (Dec 22, 2012)

Hi all

The other day I saw a guy who had holder with a 1/2 shank that enabled small spindle cutters to be used on a fixed router table.

Does anyone know where these can be bought

kind regards 

woodcarver


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## Phil P (Jul 25, 2010)

Hi Paul and welcome!

All I can say is that whoever he is he's barking mad! A router, even a big one like a deWalt DW626 or Makita RF2301, has tiny bearings when compared with those fitted to even a domestic spindle moulder such as a Kity K5 or an American Craftsman. The answer to the question is that in the UK or the EU adaptors like those can't be bought. Simply put they'd never meet the CE marking requirements on safety grounds so nobody is going to take the risk of being sued if or (more likely) when the bearings fail catastrophically and the operator has a nasty accident. Even in the USA I've never seen such a thing advertised. Maybe there's a reason for that?

Regards

Phil


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## Mike (Nov 22, 2004)

There are some spindle shapers that can interchange shafts so they can use router bits or shaper blades. Delta made one and I have seen a clone from HF. They were sold as "Router shapers."


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## Phil P (Jul 25, 2010)

Sadly never available here, Mike. The sort of thing we tend to see are like these:










The bearings on these aren't all that big in reality (smaller even than a "3HP" plunge router). The other issue for the OP might be one of Health & Safety or insurance because these machines aren't fitted with a brake, either (mandatory for trade woodworkers on spindles). US-style shaper cutters with non-circular bodies aren't sold here because they do not meet the far more stringent European safety laws regarding anti-kickback design and chip limitation. In fact smaller spindle moulders, such as the small Kity K5 and Zinken combinations often use a small diameter disposable tip block such as this Euro block:










That one is a standard size one (30mm bore, 78mm diameter before tooling) but I've seen smaller ones in aluminium designed to work on 20mm shaft machines with an overall block diameter of about 60mm (either way still too large and heavy for the BS52 at the top). But there aren't many of them around. Even they would be too heavy for the bearings on a router shaper IMHO.

I mention all of this because the OP is posting with a name which suggests that he might be in business.

Regards

Phil


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## jw2170 (Jan 24, 2008)

Hi Paul.

Welcome to the router forum. 

Thank you for joining us.


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## MAFoElffen (Jun 8, 2012)

Mike said:


> There are some spindle shapers that can interchange shafts so they can use router bits or shaper blades. Delta made one and I have seen a clone from HF. They were sold as "Router shapers."


Delta (as mentioned)... Rockwell, Chicago Electric (Harbor Freight), Grizzly, Craftsman, PowerKraft, etc. made small 1/2" spindle shapers.

Traditional spindled shaper cutters were mentioned. If I had "my" computer up and going (still down) Phil and I could discuss that (I miss our talks Phil!). Think there is a perspective there. Remembering that spindles sizes are 1/2", 3/4", 7/8", 1", 1-1/8", 1-1/4" and 30mm... And most available shaper cutters are for 3/4", 1-1/4" and 30mm.

I use 1/2" shaper cutters. Mine is 3.5 HP. There's not as big an assortment of cutter profiles for that sized spindle. But diameters of the cutters average around 2". Largest I have is 3.5" diameter. Speed of the spindle is from 7000rpm to 10,000rpm (reversible). I don't think the weight of the cutters is any more than a router panel bit.

So in a router? Maybe a 2-1/4 HP router (that could handle a panel bit). Remember that a shaper motor's power are rated differently than router's. A 1/2" shaper cutter spindle to 1/2" router collet adapters can be had for $25 to $50. 1/2" spindled shaper cutters average between $60 - $100 (and up), but some profiles of a cheap brand can be had for about $25 and up. 

Then you need to crank the speed down to around 10,000 rpm (as low as a router can spin) and the power of the router motor is going to degrade from that. So could you burn up a router from digging too much out at a time like you usually normally would with a shaper and not think about it? YES. Will it work with a router fence? If the fence can handle a panel bit and you have 2 sliding fence extensions to shroud the cutter. You have only forward, so you lose half the cutting advantage of shaper profiles.

Going to any cutter larger in a router- such as using a 3/4" collar to use a 3/4" spindled cutter, just because the profile is available in that spindle size? Insanity starts there. Imagine you use a collar, put on a larger diameter cutter, it is mounted in a collet... No positive stop lockdown. Heavy, quickly spinning object with razor sharp cutters coming loose and flying out of control. Not a good visual. (Well, maybe in a Quentin Tarantino movie...)

It can be done. But is it "smart." Thinking about the pro's and con's, just what are you gaining for the added cost, wear and tear? If your router motor can't handle the load at low rpm, your tooling is going to tell.


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## Phil P (Jul 25, 2010)

Hi Mike

Sorry to hera that you're still "in the wars" (computer wise). Hopefully Santa will bring you something....



MAFoElffen said:


> Remembering that spindles sizes are 1/2", 3/4", 7/8", 1", 1-1/8", 1-1/4" and 30mm... And most available shaper cutters are for 3/4", 1-1/4" and 30mm.


That's where the OP hits the first snag in the UK. Spindle sizes here went up to 1-1/4in as a minimum back in to 1960s whilst in mainland Europe, depending on country, they adopted either 30mm or 35mm (France) as the "norm". These days even home shop spindle moulders, like this Kufo SK28SP (small generic Chinese spindle moulder) tend to have 30mm spindles:










Since the 1990s almost everyone has gone over to 30mm as the "norm" with 40mm and 50mm being used where stacked tooling or tenoning discs (300mm/12in diameter) is in regular use. These larger diameter spindles (arbors) will take a lot more power/torque and aren't as prone to bending when put under stress - and since the 1950s there has been an ever increasing move to the use of power feeders in trade shops (the main buyers of spindle moulders/shapers). A 1HP feeder can easily bend a 3/4in shaft like a banana (I've even seen 1-1/4in shafts bent by over-enthusiastic power feeding, although it takes a complete idiot to do that), hence the move to heavier shafts. It's possibly worth noting that in the EU most of this type kit goes to professional woodworkers and so has to meet pretty stringent safety laws. All this means that if you find a machine with a 3/4in or 1in spindle here (or if the kit is French, a 20 or 25mm spindle) then it is probably near to or even over 50 years old. I guess what I'm trying to say is that you just don't see small diameter spindles and the small bore tooling to go with them over here any longer.



MAFoElffen said:


> So in a router? Maybe a 2-1/4 HP router (that could handle a panel bit). Remember that a shaper motor's power are rated differently than router's.


And therein lies a major difference. Smaller spindle moulders here often come with a 2HP (1500watt) motor, sometimes smaller, often a bit larger nowadays. These "puny" motors are, however, continuously rated and kick out several times the torque of the universal motor fitted to the average router. With a router in a table running one of these cutters you'd need to drop the speed to around 8,000 to 10,000 rpm. The "chopping" mechanism used to achieve this in router speed controllers means that a "3-1/4HP" production router, such as a Makita 3612C (which is actually 1850 watts or 2.5HP in real world terms AT FULL SPEED) would at 8,000 to 9,000 rpm only be generating a tad under 40% of full power, or circa 1 HP. Add into that the fact that at lower speeds the cooling fan of a router doesn't work anywhere near as efficiently and it surely becomes self-evident that the router is going to get pretty hot, pretty quickly, against the spindle moulder where the motor is bumbling along, full tilt, at 2850rpm all day long (the arbor is "geared-up" through differential ratio pulleys). 



MAFoElffen said:


> It can be done. But is it "smart." Thinking about the pro's and con's, just what are you gaining for the added cost, wear and tear? If your router motor can't handle the load at low rpm, your tooling is going to tell.


I'd add to that the cost/performance side of this - please baer with me because the OP is in the UK and I am going to quote local market prices for this, shipping and customs clearance costs being what they are. A decent quality plunge router, such as a deWalt DW625 or Makita RP2301FCX, mounted in a home-made table with a decent shaper fence and a basic aluminium plate will cost you around £600 to £650 or so here (assuming £100 to build a worthwhile table and buying a collet extender and/or fine height adjuster). At that you'll still have to import or have made an arbor adaptor, cutterblock, tooling, etc. You also get a machine with no DoL (direct on-line or magnetic safety) starter, no brake, awkeward vertical height adjustment (relative to a spindle moulder), limited cutter sizes (in reality no more than you'd get by buying router cutters to start with) and extremely limited tooling options because every time you want something it will need to be imported. Add a small sliding carraige to do tenons and your budget goes up to £700/£750. 

Against that you can actually buy a basic spindle moulder such as a Kity 429 on a stand with a sliding table for between £750 and £800 new: 










Go for the "stripped down" version, like the one above shorn of legstand and table extensions (which can always be added later) and the price comes down to a very manageable £700 or so - or about the same as a much less capable and less safe cobbled-up router table solution.

Often secondhand machines can be picked up at less than half that price - and an induction motor machine will often outlast a universal motor machine such as a router by decades. The Kity machine given in the example will run conventional Euro cutterblocks like this:










which cost £50 upwards and for which cutter sets cost £8 to £12 (US $12 to 18) and are available in a wide range of sizes and profiles, over the counter from a fair few suppliers in the UK (including one of my favourite suppliers - no names, no pack drill :jester

All together I think cobbling up a potentially dangerous solution makes no sense against the more durable options (in the form of small spindle moulders) available to us in the UK market. Were it me I'd be looking for something like a second-user Scheppach, Elektra-Beckum, Kity or Kufo spindle moulder rather than attempting to build my own.

Sorry for the length of this post, Mike, but this is one area where there are fundamental differences between what is available to us in the EU and you in the USA can purchase and where safety issues here have once again driven our market in a very different direction. I was originally taught to use spindle moulders in the days of square cutterblocks and French cutters when it was very common to see machinists missing a finger or two because of a spindle moulder accident. Thank goodness that sort of tooling is now banned. I honestly feel that the OP's "preferred solution" is a step back to that era and I can do nothing other than be highly critical of that approach

Regards

Phil


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