# Crown molding



## chubby190 (Sep 20, 2007)

Hey everyone. I'm brand new here. I have to tell you I am very impressed with the gallery. I spent hours looking at all the pictures of your work.

I am planning to build my soon-to-be-wife an Armoire for our bedroom as a christmas present. After changing my mind several times on which design to go with (started out shaker, now going french) I am debating how I want to cap the project. I want to wrap the top in crown molding, which I've in made before in straight boards. I don't know the best method to make a curved crown molding. One guy suggested I pull the fences and hand feed it through the shaper, but I can only see the shaping my fingers. Here's an example of what I want the top to look like. http://www.ghconline.com/images/products/european_pine/french_armoire.jpg

Any suggestions?

Once again, awesome, awesome stuff in your personal collections!


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## Dansbell (Jul 29, 2007)

I should preface this by stating I have personally not done this before. I suspect there are many here who have and can provide more details than myself. A while back we had a project that required an arched moulding. We used several templates of the arch attached to our board stock to cut the profile. 

I think you need to start by not looking at this as a traditional crown moulding with a spring angle and such but as a flat arched moulding you can apply to the face or top of your furniture. In other words your board stock will need to be thick enough to provide the look of springing forward off the face of the cabinet. I would suggest you make a template of the shape you want the top moulding to be. Then lay up and cut out your board stock so it is the same shape as the template. Next I would make a template of the negative top arch or shape and attach the top of your now shaped board stock to it so the face of the stock and template are flush. This gives the router a surface to ride on and a surface to attach multiple other guide templates to. I would then begin working the face of the stock with my router, multiple negative templates for the router to use as a guide, and multiple bits to shape it similar to a crown moulding. 

There may be a much better way to do this. I am sure there are machines that could make such a moulding. If I could turn my crown profile sharper bit on an angle and not have the base or table obstruct the cutting of the profile there would be a way to use it. I cant see any way to do this with the tools I have. 

I am interested in what others have done.


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## chubby190 (Sep 20, 2007)

Thanks Dansbell, that's actually what I was trying to avoid. I'm sorta' a perfectionist when it comes to detail work, so I like to have fences and edges to reference off of. I may have to resort to working it down with several bits and passes.


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## cabinetman (Jul 5, 2007)

Not too difficult with excellent results. Read this thread and scroll down to where I describe how I made the curved moulding. This procedure was to curve the moulding on a horizontal plane in the manner by which it was cut. If you cut the moulding horizontally instead of vertically, it will stack back up on a vertical plane as one completed profile. You can stack up several and achieve a combined look .


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## chubby190 (Sep 20, 2007)

Thanks cabinetman. I had actually read that thread, I found this through google, your thread popped up. 

My problem (other than inexperience) is that I am going for a spring forward look in the molding. It's going to angle away from it's base at 45 deg. 

I quick drew up the profile of the molding, you'll have to excuse appearance I have a CAD drawing at home, but I'm 'busy' at work right now. I drew gray lines, which I assume is the way you'd cut the 1/8 strips to build up the profile. I also put in a quick drawing of the top of the armoire.


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## cabinetman (Jul 5, 2007)

chubby190 said:


> Thanks cabinetman. I had actually read that thread, I found this through google, your thread popped up.
> 
> My problem (other than inexperience) is that I am going for a spring forward look in the molding. It's going to angle away from it's base at 45 deg.
> 
> I quick drew up the profile of the molding, you'll have to excuse appearance I have a CAD drawing at home, but I'm 'busy' at work right now. I drew gray lines, which I assume is the way you'd cut the 1/8 strips to build up the profile. I also put in a quick drawing of the top of the armoire.




Chubby

In looking at your pictures, I still say that the moulding has to be cut horizontally. It has to bend on the plane that it sits. Think of it this way; suppose you took a thin strip of wood and held it on top of the cabinet, and bent the ends down, that is the direction of the curve. 

What throws a slight wrench into this mix is that the dang thing sits at an angle. Well, it has to be supported at that angle while cutting it on the TS. You will have to support the moulding to be able to section it to the end of the cuts to do it safely. Furthermore, your drawing shows the swale of the moulding too thin to perform this procedure. It will have to be thick enough to maintain integrity of the sections. 

In my showing the repositioning of your drawing, I didn't change your shading layout. The lines should be vertical in the position that the moulding shows. Positioning for the cut, the moulding would have to be like this on the TS:


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## chubby190 (Sep 20, 2007)

Much like your last thread my lightbulb just went off. I lay the strips out horizontally, cut them, and then bend the curve. Duh! Thanks

Like I said about the drawing, it was a quick at work windows paint. Here's the autocad render (i'm home now)


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## Peers (Jun 25, 2009)

useful information available..........


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