Biesse Rover 5-Axis Router and bSolid Software Power Munson Joinery's Build-to-Order Furniture Model

Paul Munson has dramatically transformed his custom woodworking business since installing a Rover A 5-axis router and implementing bSolid CAD/CAM software from Biesse America. Already, Munson Joinery of Oakland, CA, has transitioned from making furniture for architects and designers to becoming a go-to source of 3D wood parts and architectural components designed with bSolid and fabricated on the Rover A. His even more ambitious plan for the new 5-axis pod and rail router and software will not be fully revealed until this fall when he hopes to launch Radius, a collection of build-to-order fine furniture. “With the help of Biesse I’m concentrating on making parts for other wood shops and architects,” Munson said. “These are usually more complex parts that can only be made on a 5-axis router. When a customer realizes that I can make the dream part they want for their project, I am really solving a problem for him. I can just as easily make 100 pieces as I can one with the Rover A.” Munson Joinery was established in 2007 and currently occupies 3,400 square feet of shop space. Munson and his one full-time employee who was trained at Biesse’s West Coast Showroom in Anaheim, CA, are each capable of programming and operating the Rover A. Munson had previous experience programming and operating a 3-axis router. His former partner, a robotics engineer, modified a 3-axis router into a 5-axis router. “It really opened up my eyes to this other way of woodworking and this approach to looking at workflow from the front end and planning a project from the component level,” he said. Munson attended the 2015 AWFS Fair in Las Vegas and met with several suppliers of 5-axis routers. “I wasn’t really even thinking that I was in the ballpark with Biesse. I just assumed that as a small company I wouldn’t even come close to being able to afford a Rover five-axis. But after I had a couple of conversations with them, they made me feel like maybe this could be a possibility. After the show the Biesse reps came to my shop and were able to dispel the notion that this wasn’t affordable based on my profile." Munson said he knew it was important to look before he leaped into such a major investment as 5-axis technology. “My former partner used to tell me that moving from a three-axis to a five-axis machine is not a trivial jump. The learning curve is exponential,” Munson said. “I’m not a technologist; I’m a furniture maker. Biesse promised and delivered software that would bring the learning curve of the programming down to operator level. The user interface of bSolid is extremely helpful.” Since the Rover A was installed in spring 2016, Munson Joinery’s other woodworking equipment – jointer/planer, table saws, etc. – has taken on auxiliary roles, especially for dimensioning lumber into “a nice clean piece of geometry” to be processed on the Rover. “The traditional equipment has pretty much been relegated to augment the Rover A,” Munson said. “The Rover A with its router tools, shaper tools, saw blades and boring can do so much more. We can really come out with a next to finished 3D part on one machine.”