iso carpenter or woodworker who specailizes in custom molding
Hello all, I need to replace some door/window casings in a house that’s over a 100 years old so the regular molding companies like Dykes or Adriatic do not have the molding profiles that I need. I’m hoping that if there is someone out there (maybe even a company) that does custom moldings, they might already have the knives? [20210626_154313](//muut.com/u/brownstoner/s3/:brownstoner:tgVc:20210626_154313.jpg.jpg) Thanks.
CHM
in General Discussion 3 years and 10 months ago
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58 replies
JohnHancock | 3 years and 10 months ago
LOL, you guys realize that OP checked out 15 days ago right? It is very informative and interesting to see how everyone is figuring this out and could one day be a nice “how to” booklet. I do appreciate the enthusiasm tho ?
JohnHancock | 3 years and 10 months ago
LOL, you guys realize that OP checked out 15 days ago right? It is very informative and interesting to see how everyone is figuring this out and could one day be a nice “how to” booklet. I do appreciate the enthusiasm tho ?
hkapstein | 3 years and 10 months ago
There are machines that can make these profiles in one pass, but for <100 feet of moulding, does it really matter? It may not be worth tooling and calibrating the machine to make it in one pass vs just running two passes, I'd leave that up to the shop. Now on the other hand, maybe you need a second knife, but maybe you don't. Are you sure you no one would have a stock knife for that back profile that is an acceptable match? If you're doing the entire casing for a window, maybe it doesn't even have to be an exact match. But at any rate, this is all technical stuff that a customer shouldn't really have to think about too much, except to know that there's more than one way to fabricate a moulding profile, and different fabricators may do it differently at a different cost depending on their equipment, skill, and experience.
andriywww1990 | 3 years and 10 months ago
OP, so i did some reading last night. i have never done what i am about to tell you so i am less familiar with it but it is possible to stack shaper blades on a shaper with spacers in between as needed to “make up any combination of profiles”. this would take someone who has almost every configuration of blade in their shop. Not me. someone who has been doing this for a very very long time and has relied less on places like adriatic and more on themselves. find someone who has a shaper and a lot of shaper cutters. that is not just any trim carpenter. (and by the way, i did check the shaper blades i have and i have nothing close).
urbandad is correct that there is a machine that can make this wood in a single pass but i doubt anyone has one around here. they are two and three head molding machines and i suspect they are used in manufacturing where they know they will be making runs of 10,000 feet for retail. i have not checked the cost of said machine but i doubt it is worth it for the local shops who recreate profiles in 100 foot runs for a sing le customer. and with a two head machine, there is still the cost of cutting two blades and setting up two blades – so even if someone had the machine, there is no escaping that-
andriywww1990 | 3 years and 10 months ago
urbandad: i just listed three machines. this is not really about whether adriatic has the machine, it is about whether adriatic, monteath, rosenwieg or anyone else has it. its about whether it exists. so why not address what i said in a more general sense and address the three machines i mention and add to that if you know something? Record makes a massive molding plane with a heap of blades that run straight down the wood, but i doubt the OP wants to go down that road so i did not mention it here and i definitely will not mention something here that i would not be willing to tackle for a customer or do in my own house. if you think such a machine exists why not find the name of it instead of throwing open ended suggestions out here that will only lead people down rabbit holes.
(there are also molding blades that can be used in table saw but this looks too large for that).
in so far as built up moldings, i looked at OP’s picture several times and tried to figure out if there was someone who had those pieces stock that are close enough that OP could maybe cut off what might not work, say off of what Dork posted, and glue on what does work. We make built up moldings all the time and when i ran crown molding many years ago now, i would often build it up right on site as i ran it. but making a built up molding is often more complicated than a homeowner or even a moderately experience carpenter can do without a lot of experimentation and a shaper, table saw, and router so that begins to mean they need someone with a full on shop.
to your comments about the cost of the product. you do not seem to understand that for a small run, two blades, two passes, this is extremely expensive. OP is looking at the per foot cost of the finished product and if this costs a 1,000 plus the cost of the wood to make and they order 20 feet, it is $50 per foot plus the cost of wood. that is exorbitant. the price drops with the more feet they run say a 100 feet it might be $10 per foot plus the cost of wood. it is really the very small runs that make people look for alternatives as 10 or 13 $ per foot is ok with most of us. this is stuff you learn selling these jobs: i understood OPs position as soon as i saw the post; they want a magic way around all of this and i am not sure it exists (rip all the casing off the windows in the room and change it all to what dork presented or something else).
you may not realize it but your comment about pricing, while not true for the short run on a machine with custom knives, is true for someone ripping down stock moldings and altering them with a router and trying to make a built up molding. Maybe someone can make up a molding for them in a shop like mine for say $400 for 20 feet. But i have done a lot of this and decided i could not say for sure if it can be done to match and decided to leave it go. in truth, when we get a door missing ONE piece of molding, we often make a molding up in house by using several blades and with some build up. but it is tedious work and there is often no guarantee it will be successful – which is exactly why I did not say i can do this even though i seem to know a lot about this line of work (it is what i do for a living).
so i am every eager to know about these other wood forming machines that seem to exist. would you please tell us about them?
Guest User | 3 years and 10 months ago
My sense after looking into this is some instances it’s ok to go with Adriatic but in other instances the markup is ridiculous and better off hiring the trim carpenter.
hkapstein | 3 years and 10 months ago
@steve, just because adriatic doesn’t have a certain machine doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. You probably send way too much work to adriatic. Sure 20 years ago that may have made sense, but there’s many more fabrication options available.
Yes, I understand what you’re saying in your picture, obviously I understood that complication immediately, having accomplished this task before. You have this idea in your head that I don’t know how to make mouldings, and just read about knives on the internet, and apparently didn’t even do that right. I know how to do more than go to Adriatic and hand john a profile. And one time I talked to them, they seemed stunned and annoyed they I knew how to make a built up moulding and didn’t require a massive markup for them to match it.
But that said, for a small run, does it even matter how many passes it takes? It might cost a few extra bucks, but I doubt it’s that much extra labor unless you’re running a lot of feet. It is likely they can make the back without a custom knife, but maybe not.
Not that I have anything against Adriatic, I think they’d do a fine job on this project.
Guest User | 3 years and 10 months ago
Thank you for explaining Steve.
andriywww1990 | 3 years and 10 months ago
dork, when we go to buy stock new profiles based on the old, they may have very similar lines but they are much lighter in their relief or depth of cut. it can be noticeable. what we sometimes recommend and what i often do on doors is instead of trying to copy something, i just make all new that is very close and traditional.
dorkofwindsor | 3 years and 10 months ago
Ok so i guess im the only one who is comfused by all this. This is a classic Ogee picture rail under 50 layers of paint. It really isn’t that special at all. Matching seems tough with that much paint. I think for a given room that needs work, i would pick the closest ogee picture rail moulding and do the whole room / door / whatever. I just don’t think anyone will notice what is going on from room to room, other than everything seems to be coated in hideous thick paint. Maybe it just seems like pimping out an AMC Gremlin with custom tooling to me. I would find something stock.
andriywww1990 | 3 years and 10 months ago
so i just called Monteath. they charge $55 per inch of detail to cut the knife and a $175 machine set up. if you are having a smaller molding made there would be savings but as soon as you hit say a 5 inch molding, that begins to fade. especially if one factors the drive to NJ into the equation. i would say for a contractor to want to drive to them, they would have to be ordering a lot of different smaller moldings to make it worth while.
also, adriatic can often have product in as little as 3 days and i think on the outside, the longest i have ever waited was one week for a custom run. Monteath said their lead time is three weeks now (a molding machine is down) and usually runs two to three weeks. sounds like they have only two molding machines – adriatic has a 1/2 dozen of them.
andriywww1990 | 3 years and 10 months ago
jane, it is kind of a separate business. yes, people with big shops have molders but i am not sure that trim carpenters working in the city have the space and i am wondering if even some of the GC’s you were talking to were saying that they made it as part of the job but really meant they were sending it out. and then there is the issue of the knives. so someone might have a molder but then they have to get the knives made (making a knife is another specialty in itself) and i know my small shaper knives cost about 200 a pair but the knives for a molder are probably 300 or more. so by the time a contractor gets done figuring all of this and the drive to NJ, it might be better to go to Adriatic. Not sure if they are cheaper over in NJ (though JH seems to be a reliable source), but contractors do have to factor time and tolls into the equation – so it may wash any benefit. for someone who has a lot of time on their hands and likes driving, a trip over the bridge may not be an issue.
i read the website that JH posted yesterday and was very happy to know abou t these people. Worth a visit. they have almost twice the species of wood that adriatic has (like 50, adriatic has 29; adriatic does not carry a lot of soft woods) and the history of the place. to deal with people who go that far back in the NY region is alluring and i am wondering how much work they did for brownstones.
a note about one thing on their website. they refer to sapele as “sapele mahogany”. genetically, there are three types of mahogany (if that) and sapele is not one of them. I no longer use mahogany myself but use sapele for just the reasons that this company mentions (as the african sits in the shop after being planed it seems to become brittle and crack when we go to use it). Overall, sapele is a better wood than the mahogany (sapele is great for outdoors) but there is a trend among some of the manufacturers (particularly manufacturers in China) and less than professional users of imported woods in this country to begin naming all sorts of woods “mahogany” (ever hear of “Phillipine Mahogany”? its is what we in this trade call “Luan” – basically garbage). We have gotten calls from people who have bought imported doors that they have had problems and they will say “we have these mahogany doors that we have a problem with and we paid a fortune for them”. Well, the doors are often not mahogany and they did not pay a fortune for them . Monteath is correct in what they are saying about sapele (that it is an excellent wood), but i do not like the trend to call things that they are not because as stuff like this creeps into the vernacular, it becomes hard to explain things to customers and hard to sort out myths and rumors from what is true. though granted, this one is somewhat innocent and well intended.
Guest User | 3 years and 10 months ago
Is Adriatic the cheaper way to go? I’m not sure yet. There must be companies that do both and that would be more efficient. A couple of GCs told me they make the molding as part of the job. My GC isn’t one of them so I’m in the same boat.
JohnHancock | 3 years and 10 months ago
I’m copying this from a similar thread from a FB group…. Monteath Mouldings is well worth the trip to Old Bridge. They are just on the other side of staten island. They probably have the cutting knives you need in the library and if they do not they will make you a knife. They are really friendly, accommodating and cheap. I have used them for years. When you visit bring a profile or piece of the wainscott you need. Even for a visit, it is a super cool place… If you visit, ask to see their collection of molding knives… some of them are a 170 years old. http://monteath.com/
andriywww1990 | 3 years and 10 months ago
@chris & others: the guys that can do this are a dime a dozen (me included; that is why less and less people are doing this- it is going the way of painting and painters). and for everyone else pondering over this, OP knows they can walk into adriatic and have that piece of wood made up; they are trying to avoid the cost of doing that.
there may be someone out there who has that profile but most of us running around the city doing trim work do not have molding machines. we go to adriatic or the place in the bronx (op needs to check with rosenwieg).
once they find the knife blades and a person with a molding machine, they can begin to talk about someone to install the trim. (and i do not know chris, maybe your guy has a molder and a career’s worth of profiles – worth a call or maybe that guy knows someone with a molder; i tell people on here all the time, start asking around and someone will say they “know a guy”).
Op would have been better to title their post “searching for a trim carpenter with a molding machine and traditional knife profiles”.
lkrshacmzcy | 3 years and 10 months ago
In my rented apartment* I am not a homeowner unfortunately….
lkrshacmzcy | 3 years and 10 months ago
In my rented apartment* I am not a homeowner unfortunately….
lkrshacmzcy | 3 years and 10 months ago
Terrance Dugan
516-978-6340
Used to have a large shop but retired and takes on smaller work; he loves the finer work too. I have used him in my home and a lot of colleagues have as well. We have a slew of clients to say the same. He is particular though; fair warning.
lkrshacmzcy | 3 years and 10 months ago
Terrance Dugan
516-978-6340
Used to have a large shop but retired and takes on smaller work; he loves the finer work too. I have used him in my home and a lot of colleagues have as well. We have a slew of clients to say the same. He is particular though; fair warning.