Hello from Southampton

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painterman
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Location: southampton
Organisation: the farmhouse furniture workshop
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Hello from Southampton

Post by painterman »

Hi , I am a semi-retired woodworker with a good selection of machinery and equipment . But , when it comes to framing I would be relying on my hand-operated Nobex mitre saw( with extensions on the sides ) and my DeWalt 1251 crosscut saw , on which the mitring accuracy is doubtful ( good enough for general joinery work ) . I paint , therefore I want to do my own framing "as and when " , and therefore can anybody recommend a reasonably cheap chop saw .

I am also looking for a source of wood mouldings to produce my own frames so anywhere within a 20 mile of radius of Southampton would be good to know .

Any suggestions appreciated .
Steve
Graysalchemy

Re: Hello from Southampton

Post by Graysalchemy »

Welcome to the forum Steve. As you may have gathered chop saws with a adjustable angle are not the most accurate thing and not really good enough for professional framing IMHO. Some people do use them but usually in conjunction with some form of trimmer. Your best bet is a guillotine, a morso is the main one most people use.

Saws do actually give the best cut with the appropriate blade, but you need to spend rather a lot of money on a twin bladed saw, and they are very bulky and only really used by those of us doing volume as they are faster as well.

Wessex picture framing who's head office in Bournemouth would probably be your best bet. :D
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prospero
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Re: Hello from Southampton

Post by prospero »

Welcome Steve. :D

Yep. The Morso guillotine is pretty much the industry standard. Not a cheap item, but will go on for years and produce consistently good results.

As regards chop saws, you are right about them being great for general woodwork but not quite accurate for frames. As Grays says, there are saws made specifically for picture framing but they are very expensive and very big and heavy. There are smaller ones, but they aren't cheap. All in all, unless you have a good reason to have a saw, go for a Morso. Secondhand ones come up often and are worth buying as they don't wear significantly and take a lot of abuse. The main thing is to use properly sharpened blades.

Having said that, it depends a lot on what mouldings you will be using. Morso's cope well with most mouldings up to about 100mm wide. There are some that are problematic. If you stick to Morso-friendly profiles it's a breeze.
When you get to wide stuff - 3"+, or profiles that have undercuts at the back, or ones with rock-hard coatings, a saw can win out. I use mainly bare wood mouldings and about 18 months ago I made this little setup....

Image

Two Makita saws screwed to a bench with measuring scale. The reason for two is that you can fine tune the angle of the left-hand one by simply twisting it around on the bench. Only tiny adjustments are possible, but that's all you need. With a bit of jiggling you can get perfect angles and joins with no gaps. Also, having two means you don't disturb the angles by constantly swivelling the blades.
I makes short work of big mouldings and saves a lot of time. I swapped the 24t blades for 80t ones and the cuts are very good. That said, you sometimes get slight niggly bits that have to be filled. That bothers be not as I finish the frames after joining so everything is made good in the process. The main accuracy of the joint is spot-on. There are no break-outs on undercuts like you tend to get with a guillotine. Just a few whiskers here and there. Works for me anyway. :P

The whole issue came in at <£500 which is less than a used Morso. You do need a dedicated area though. Not a portable thing. And I'm sure I don't need to mention noise and dust. A dust extraction system would be a plus. I never got round to fitting one so it doesn't look quite as clean now as in the photo. :lol:
Watch Out. There's A Humphrey About
painterman
Posts: 4
Joined: Wed 03 Jun, 2015 4:15 pm
Location: southampton
Organisation: the farmhouse furniture workshop
Interests: woodworking joinery painting in oils sea angling saxophone

Re: Hello from Southampton

Post by painterman »

Graysalchemy and Prospero , you have both confirmed my worst fears . I am not in the "volume" category and not likely to be . Also having moved workshops three times in the past and now have all my joinery equipment crammed into my garage , I wouldn't have room for another machine . Thanks to both of you for very informative and comprehensive replies . The mouldings I have in mind would probably be 2"+ , probably more like 3" .

I will take a look at Wessex .

Cheers
Steve
Jamesnkr

Re: Hello from Southampton

Post by Jamesnkr »

You also need an underpinner (or you can use pins in the corners of the frames, but it's obviously more time consuming, but then if you're not a volume framer it may not matter...)

Alternatively, you can buy moulding that has been pre-chopped to the right length; all that is left to do is to join it and make the frame.
painterman
Posts: 4
Joined: Wed 03 Jun, 2015 4:15 pm
Location: southampton
Organisation: the farmhouse furniture workshop
Interests: woodworking joinery painting in oils sea angling saxophone

Re: Hello from Southampton

Post by painterman »

Jamesnkr , thanks , pre-chopped could be an option .

Steve
Jamesnkr

Re: Hello from Southampton

Post by Jamesnkr »

Jamesnkr wrote: (or you can use pins in the corners of the frames, but it's obviously more time consuming, but then if you're not a volume framer it may not matter...)
That's a bit vague. What I means is nails inserted from the sides of the frames, in the time-honoured fashion.
painterman
Posts: 4
Joined: Wed 03 Jun, 2015 4:15 pm
Location: southampton
Organisation: the farmhouse furniture workshop
Interests: woodworking joinery painting in oils sea angling saxophone

Re: Hello from Southampton

Post by painterman »

Jamesnkr , I was considering using my biscuit cutter , on the flat side of the moulding , to put a biscuit slot in the opposing mitres with a decent glue , and corner clamps . Anybody got an opinion on biscuits used in this way ?

Steve
perhaps this should be a separate thread ....
Graysalchemy

Re: Hello from Southampton

Post by Graysalchemy »

I use biscuits on very large frames with wide mouldings. As long as you get ghe slots parallel with the back and each other then you could be ok but you certainly wouldn't join small mouldings or thin ones.
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prospero
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Re: Hello from Southampton

Post by prospero »

I use biscuits a lot. :D

My usual method on big frames with big mouldings is to cut a slot (from the back) near to the inside on the moulding. With #20 biscuits in a 3"ish moulding, that leaves enough wood at the back to wack in some underpin wedges. On big frames I glue it all up first and strap-clamp the whole issue - making sure all the corners are aligned. The biscuits help as they keep everything in place but allow lateral movement for fine alignment. When everything is pukka I cinch the strap very tight which squeezes the joints tight for a good glue bond. Very useful if you are doing a big frame single-handed. Then I take it to the underpinner. All strapped up it's easy to handle. On really huge frames I also add steel 'L' plates near the inside of the frames. This combined with the biscuits makes about as strong a joint as you can get. (You can pin though biscuits, but it's not all that good.)
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Graysalchemy

Re: Hello from Southampton

Post by Graysalchemy »

I find with my pneumatic pinner I can pin through the biscuit, so I tend to glue biscuit and pin in one go then strap with ratchet straps to keep the top edges of deep mouldings in and tight. I then leave for 12 hrs before attaching corner plates, before putting in a piece of glass or mirror as the weight of these in a 2m x 1.5m can exert incredible pressures on the joints and cause them to collapse.

I did 2 on thursday/Friday using this method. One had a very heavy 1.8 x 1.2m piece of 6mm mirror in it.
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