The Framers Forum

Hi guys , newbie first post.....

My seconhand Morso F arrived this morning, spent all day cleaning and oiling.....

Seems to be cutting OK, saving the spare blades till I have the hang of things.

A couple of questions

1) DO you attempt to cut mouldings in one go, or do you always take two cuts or more... obviously on the large mouldings it take more than one go, but on the smaller moulding do you get a better cut with two passes.

2) the other thing that is confusing me big style is the measuring scale.
How do you use the rules.IT looks to start at 300mm, and how does the smaller sliding scale measure, the spacing on the rule is not as is shown by the numbers.

Hope that makes sense!!!!

I am going to ask Morso for a new set of instrucitons, but I expect that to take a few days, so any advice would be appreciated.

Tim

Hi Tim
depends on how old your Morso is - the measuring system varies a bit. but assuming from your comments that you have a horizontal rule - along the bed of the morso - and a vertical rule across the bed. Cut your first mitre - push the moulding along the bed untill you can use the vertical rule to measure the width of the moulding. the figure read off at this point is used on the sliding stop to allow for the width of the moulding when cutting. say width measures at 7 - and you want to cut a 200mm length of moulding - mark the sliding scale at seven ( i use a bit of tape as i just cant remember numbers - goldfish have a huge advantage over me when it comes to memory)move the marked point to 200mm - cut and measure to make sure all is accurate. Always cut the longest lengths first - if you cock up you can always get a short length out of the cut - and if watched claim you were just testing.

Please remember that morso blades when sharp are really sharp - even brushing your hand against them will cut you. You will find postings on this site about adjusting morso's to get a good clean cut. it pays to understand the dynamic forces at play when a morso cuts - the cutting force should balance - if not the blades want to force the moulding or the blades away from the cut. sharp blades are essential as is the set up of the machine - depth of cut - angle of all relative guides. Morsos are wonderfull bits of kit - looked after they will last for many, many years.

Hi Tim,

Welcome to the forum.

Using the scales on the Morso is harder to explain on paper than it would be to just show you. For this reason it might be worth your while to look for someone in your area offering a one or two day course in picture framing - could be money well spent, and save a lot of frustration in the future.

It is possible to cut many profiles with just a single chop of the Morso, however you will always get a cleaner, more precise, cut by taking two or more bites and ensure that the last bite is a very fine cut.