Carpentry and Woodworking - making your own moldings with router

I have a PC router and table along with a 1000 bf of 5/4 red oak. Most of the oak is 10-14 feet long and 10-16 " wide. Do I rip the strip first on my table saw and then rout the edge or rout first and rip second? I thinking of making cove moldings and some small 1/4 round.

Any suggestions or tips. I just purchased the router and table.

Thanks, JB

The proper way to do it is to, joint the edge so it's nice and straight, route the profile, cut the piece off on the table saw, joint the edge, route the profile, cut the piece off on the table saw etc. You must joint the edge after each time you cut the edge off.

I would rip the boards in half first. This will make it easier to handle.

JB.
Welcome tho the forum.

For small mouldings, it's safer to rip the board after routing the profile. 10-16" wide boards may be too cumbersome to handle in those lengths though. You say you just got the router table, did you happen to get a featherboard too? It will definitley help keep the board in contact with the router table fence, making a much smoother profile.

I would go with Sawdustguy's recommendation to rip them in half first. :coffee:

Herm,

A feather board wouldn't be necessary, unless he's not using the whole cutter head. If he is, then the wood would just ride against the bearing.

With boards that long, it wouldn't be a half bad idea to have one person keeping it against the bering and the other holding the long end up, while the other person guides it through.

If I had 10" (or wider) oak boards that were flat and straight, I sure wouldn't use them to make moldings. They would be carefully stored for use on a project like door panels or a table/desk top. :D

When I make my own moldings, I first cut my stock a little longer than I expect to need then rip it to a width (or widths) that will give me 3-4 pieces plus an inch, or so. The idea is to work with pieces that are easy to handle.

When I have enough rough cut stock, I set up my shaper with the molding bit and set up the table saw to rip the finished width I need - usually with feather boards on both machines. From there, it's profile - rip, profile - rip until I have enough molding (plus some extra to cover those pesky "oops" situations. :D)

That leftover inch wide piece is saved for later use. When I'm overrun with those narrow pieces, they get cut up for use as kindling. :)

Great information on the feather boards and handling the wide boards to make molding. I hope I'm not driving you crazy about ripping 10-12" red oak boards to make molding. I'm in the tree industry and I've got unlimited supply of woodmizer milled lumber.

Thanks for the replies.

JB

Hi
Get extra router bit, oak is hard on the cutter. dulls edge fast.
Sound advice is given above.

cheers

pg

An unlimited supply of milled lumber????

Do you need a new "best buddy"?? :D

Dave

It's nice to cherry pick the straight saw logs of oak, ash, maple, cherry and give half of them to the woodmizer guy so he mills the other half for you. I've got some nice 2" by 24" by 14' boards that have been air drying for a few years now that I'll make a large harvest table with. Recently I removed an old Taxus (yew) from a property in NJ. The log is 8 foot long and 12" wide. Taxus wood is very dark and I think the wood is used to make chessmen and arrows! I don't know what to do with it. Maybe I'll joint it and make a shaker bench or something like that. Any Thoughts? JB

Wood is hard on the router cutter, buy carbide.