How The Spindle Moulder Gained Its Notoriety

[AJB Temple]

i have dabbled. Guided by Dan, who is the expert here. Scary tools and I use a remote control starter. I think routers are also potentially dangerous and so I have a lot of respect for all high speed spinning tools.

 

[Jar944]

Some of those cutter blocks look really barbaric and I can see why the router table became more popular for home use than a spindle moulder.

Some are more fun than others.


And sometimes the sheer size of thr heads is amusing (8"x2.5" rebate blocks & 254mm scribe head)

 

[Spectric]

Some of those almost look like a slice from a P/T cutter block and use that same screw arrangement to wedge the blades in so if it comes loose that blade will be ejected outwards harder than kickback on a table saw. It looks like the newer blocks actually retain the blades which is much safer.

 

[AJB Temple]

I think it is worth getting a fully guarded SM. I had a couple of false starts (sold on at no loss luckily) and ended up with a Sedgewick SM4 Model II. I find it a great deal safer (feeling - so may be imaginary) than using a router table to do similar things. It came with quite a lot of useful cutters, from an eBay dealer. I mainly use it to do t&g for oak flooring, overlap MDF, strip for panel mouldings, and some skirting. I've done a few hundred maybe even thousand metres of mouldings for acquaintances, which has pretty much covered the cost of the machine. It has a pretty basic power feed and a remote starter (rigged up by me). As I am super careful with changing cutters, and it has a cover head thing, I am generally well away from the firing line. I actually feel safer with it than my old router table (only any use for small amounts). Will probably move it on though soonish as I suspect this is our last house renovation.

 

[Trevanion]

And sometimes the sheer size of thr heads is amusing (8"x2.5" rebate blocks & 254mm scribe head)

Yes, some of the tenoning equipment gets very large! The Whitehill HP flush window tooling is 325mm in diameter on a 125mm tall stack, definitely not for the faint of heart on startup.

 

[Jar944]

Some of those almost look like a slice from a P/T cutter block and use that same screw arrangement to wedge the blades in so if it comes loose that blade will be ejected outwards harder than kickback on a table saw. It looks like the newer blocks actually retain the blades which is much safer.

The wedge gib is an older design (but still available new over here). The current style corrugated heads are pocket gibs with grub screws.

Modern pocket gib head


Smooth back vs corrugated (the corrugated is an original from my 1950s 4 sider)


If you look at a cutterhead from a P/T the knife pockets are smaller as are the gibs and gib bolts. Though the same concept.

 

[Doug71]

We used to have a big old Wadkin 5 head planer/moulder that had square blocks, sometimes if just a small amount of moulding was needed we would use one of the blocks in the spindle moulder, this seemed perfectly normal at the time but I wouldn't be doing it these days!

The Wadkin had a maximum capacity of 4"x3" which became a bit limiting so we got a Dominion which could machine up to 7" wide which was great for skirtings etc.

We still kept the Wadkin and it was left set up for making dado rail, this was in the 80's and we sold 1000's of feet of the stuff. I remember we sold it for 25p per foot and couldn't make enough of it at the time.

For some reason talking square cutter blocks got me feeling all nostalgic

 

[kirkpoore1]

Just saw this video, then saw this thread resurrected. Yikes!
Yes, it's FB, what can I say?

 

[Trevanion]

Just saw this video, then saw this thread resurrected. Yikes!
Yes, it's FB, what can I say?

I nearly bought those tenon cutters myself when I saw them on eBay, I'm glad Alex is enjoying them

 

[Cabinetman]

Certainly looks frightening, also he’s not afraid to take a lot off in one go, even the end cut is half an inch!

 

[Doug]

I don’t have a lot to do with tenoning heads, these are the biggest I’ve had dealings with.



A mate bought them but they were for a 2” shaft so wanted a sleeve to fit them to his machine so he sent over the shaft off his tenoner & the blocks & we machined him a shaft up.
I saw them in action a couple of years ago & they certainly removed some material in a single pass, not for the faint hearted.

 

[Jar944]

I wouldn't mind having a set of those wadkin tenon heads.

 

[Guineafowl21]

I use these on the Wadkin BRA, not spindle moulder, but they work very nicely for trenching and tenoning. In fact, I used them last week to notch out some uprights for a shed. They were initially too big, for a Wadkin CC I think, but a certain Mr @Trevanion guided me through modifying them on the lathe a few years ago. The ribbed ‘nickers’ are set just out from the blades:

 

[wallace]

I wouldn't mind having a set of those wadkin tenon heads.

They are handy things and are not as scary as they look, I use a set on my CK Radial arm saw. You'd think they would try and walk through the work but they dont.

 

[Jar944]

Did lockedge (considered the safety improvement) or bevel edge collars see any use over there? They were widely used here.

Not to be confused with the square profile slotted collar which was not widespread on this side of the Atlantic.

Lockedge




Bevel edge

 

[Trevanion]

Did lockedge (considered the safety improvement) or bevel edge collars see any use over there? They were widely used here.

You could get bevelled edge collars though I don't believe they were very popular here, as they're very rare compared to the plain square slot versions. Lockedge never made it over here, I suspect mainly because the American stuff was rarely imported after the Second World War, and it would've been very expensive compared to domestic offerings.

 

[Jar944]

You could get bevelled edge collars though I don't believe they were very popular here, as they're very rare compared to the plain square slot versions. Lockedge never made it over here, I suspect mainly because the American stuff was rarely imported after the Second World War, and it would've been very expensive compared to domestic offerings.

That makes sense, the wadkin style safety block was not really used here, but the bevel edge collars (straight and lock) were used extensively up until corrugated back knives became common.

All the inventions described by Rohr to keep non matched knives from slipping out of collars would seem to indicate thrown knives were more common than not.

 

[Trevanion]

All the inventions described by Rohr to keep non matched knives from slipping out of collars would seem to indicate thrown knives were more common than not.

A big issue with the slotted collars is that the slots themselves would wear in time nearer the front edge of the slot from being clamped up, meaning the cutter was only really gripped at the back edge. This was also a similar issue with slotted/french spindles, where the clamping surface at the base of the slot would become convex and not grip effectively.

 

[williams1185]

seeing these blocks an cutters bring back bad memories as an apprentice i refused to use the spindle moulder as it was almost unguarded didnt help that the old guy i worked with would tell stories of the accidents that he had seen in other workshops . the one bit of advice that stuck with me was never stand in front of the machine when you turn it on he then proceeded to tell me of the day he had set the spindle up moved to the side and turned it on for the clamp to fail and a cutter shot forty feet across the shop and went through 20 sheets of 3/4 blockboard found it in the 21st . when i went on to study for my advanced cert in college they had a rogues gallery of cutters and bolts from square blocks there was one bolt that had stretched twice its length cutters bent 90 degrees horror stories !