Not sure if my proceeding example is the best way to achieve a good rail band, or it’s of any interest to anyone but I’m a novice shaper so here goes. First of all Fred. If you’re not sure of what Fred is/does then the best advice I can give you on that one is to watch Shaping 101. Fred’s shortcoming to me is the fact that the angle of the surform is set, you can’t adjust it, which maybe why John Carper only uses it for tucking edges under. Next pinheads railband tool. First of all, thanks pinhead for demonstrating this, it would of taken a lot longer to figure out how to make my own rail band tool without your example. The shortcoming I have with this tool is it’s width. Or lack of it in my opinion. If you have a narrower railband tool and you run it around the permiter of the board it follows that perimiter quite closely. The result for me is the railbands width doesn’t taper out at the nose and tail end, and is more uniform in width I find. With a longer tool, as the board curves away (as you run your rail band tool towards either end) the tool tends to go in more of straight line and the railbands width tapers out (gets thinner).
I’ve uploaded an example as to why I think this is so, so hopefully this will make things clearer. The red line represents the line my railband tool travels, the little blue line represents the width of the railband tool, and the black line is the outline of the board. As you can probably see, only half of the blue line (rail band tool) is touching the outline. This becomes more so I find as the tool heads towards either end of the board. I find that this results in the actual cutting part of the rail band tool moving away from the outline of the board more and more, hence a thinner and thinner rail band. If anyones interested my rail band tool is very similar to pinheads, only wider. I’ll try and get some pics of my railband tool and my resulting railbands in the next couple of days. I’ve enclosed a pic of pinheads tool below as a reference as well. (Hope he doesn’t mind).
Would be very interesting to see… I’m still using just a few measurements + guide points and then just hand/eye coordination, but if the right tool idea comes along I might make one!
I made these from a grater. Plan to make stronger backings to hold various shapes, and maybe even box it up to attach it to a vacuum. The larger one is courser than the other. I’ve done similar things with high density foam and sandpaper. I also use a piece of left over foam like one of the earlier posts to make pencil lines if I want to cut bands with a flat tool.
The problem with all rail tools has been stated already… they don’t allow you to efficiently taper the rail band to match the nose-to-tail foil of the shape. At least I’ve never been able to figure that out…
I measure the nose and tail at one foot up, and the midpoint, and make dots on the sides and deck. Then I freehand sketch a line connecting the three deck dots, the tip of the nose, and the tail “corners” to get a rough idea of where I want to be with each band. Then I take my planer, and, using the depth adjustment, rotate the knob as I make my passes. It takes some practice, but I’m convinced that’s the best way to do it, due to that apparent flaw in all rail tools. I don’t believe there’s a magic bullet for this process, except the skill of using the planer.
Once I cut a band, I step back and use the light/shadows to check my symmetry. I make any primary adjustments to the band with the surform, then hit it with a sanding block with 50 or even 80 grit. This step only takes a few seconds, but it leaves clean, sharp edges on the bands and gives it a perfectly flat and angular surface. Then I make dots in that first band to mark out the outside edge of my second band and repeat the process, following the sketched deck line and using the first band’s edge as a reference line.
This might relate to both rail banding and cut lap tools…
Put a pencil in place of the blade and you’ve got a duel purpose tool…
Quote:
Baked it myself.
I used to use a single tube rail marker, but I could never get a good line. I could do better with a freehand line. Thus the two tube tool. Pics below. Also, since I am showing off my tools, there is a two tube lap cutter that I am really pleased with. I don’t do a lot of cut laps, but this baby is so easy to use. You just insert a new single edge razor blade and tighten the wing nuts and you are ready to cut a perfect line. If you also use it to cut your tape line before cut lap laminating, you can later cut the lap without even seeing the tape. You know where it has to be under the glass. The two tubes keep your cut very tidy while going around the curves. You’ll still have the issues at the nose and tail.
You can see the edge of a single razor blade sticking out between the two blocks of wood. The
wing nuts tighten it down. The two PVC pipe sections provide the almost foolproof guide for going
around curves. The masonite strips just give a glide over the board surface.
The problem with all rail tools has been stated already… they don’t allow you to efficiently taper the rail band to match the nose-to-tail foil of the shape. At least I’ve never been able to figure that out…
I measure the nose and tail at one foot up, and the midpoint, and make dots on the sides and deck. Then I freehand sketch a line connecting the three deck dots,
NJ, that’s how I used to feel also. It is nice to have a line that you can actually cut to, and the way you describe is the way to have that. But for me hand sketching those curves is time consuming. I find it better to quickly draw the constant distance rail band lines with the dummy tool and then just use that as a guide. I only touch the deck band lines in the middle of the board, but they serve as a reference mark as you approach the nose and tail. I think soon I’ll just use a single dot in the middle of the board, but for now that’s hard to see and doesn’t give the same perspective.
What about drawing out a nice line between those measured points with the aid of Your outline template? That’s how I kind of do it before I plane the rail bands with an electric planer.
I do something similar, but if the rail profile/deck contour changes as you move down the board, the line would differ from your outline template. I use fixed angles (like the rail band tool lets you cut in), but the tapering is taken care of by an Excel spreadsheet I put together. Here are the top rail bands for a 9’0" square tail:
It does the tapering at the ends automatically for me, but laying out all the points takes some time. I am going to make a template for all the points out of roofing felt/butcher paper with holes in it so I can just poke a pencil through the holes and make the layout process faster.
Once the points are on the board, I use masking tape to mark the bands (good pinlining practice), and plane first and finish with a sanding block to just hit the tape. Makes the rails very symmetrical side to side.
The spreadsheet ‘morphs’ one rail cross section into another smoothly, and I use 4 rail bands top and bottom so that blending the rail bands is easy.
It’s time consuming, but it works very well. No surprises, and you get what you envisioned/planned. It takes me about an hour and a half to configure the spreadsheet for a certain design, and then it prints out a sheet of points to use.
If I get the time, someday I’ll post the whole process, because I use the same spreadsheet to make the rocker and outline templates. Once the rocker and outline templates are made, I measure them and that’s what the spreadsheet uses for a baseline to get the rail band measurements from. Think of it as a po’ ass shaping machine setup, with you doing all the shaping, but with definite marks to hit so you know what you’ll end up with (most of the time).
I’ve enclosed some photos below of a rail band I did with my tool. I think it shows that the rail band tapers out quite nicely (at least in my opinion). All I used was the tool shown in the final photo. The only thing I don’t like about this tool is that it is a bit slow, even with 40 grit. But you can’t win them all.
Something else that I found why searching on the web was a bevel fence. This is an attachment for a electric planer that would achieve the same thing as the tool I showed above. Only much quicker. I’ve enclosed a photo down below to help clarify.
I see what you mean now, about the tool being wide… At first I though you meant wide as in the sandpaper part being extended so it would reach closer to the stringer.
