Company I work for was gearing to make transition to dowel case construction. We are moving into a larger space and was researching boring machines and tradition machinery for sheet processing.
Now the owner is considering cnc processing of sheet goods as a way to cut down on needed floor space and a quicker/more accurate assembly process (hardware installation etc.)

I have never worked with cnc routers and am curious how you guys using them handle the horizontal boring process.

I would imagine you're talking about a flat table cnc nested based machine.
If so, that will take care of your cutting and vertical drilling. You will most likely need to purchase a drill/dowel insertion machine to take care of your horizontal boring.

Like Kirk said if you are using a flat table cnc nested base machine, you will need to get a horizontal boring machine, most of which also glue and insert your dowels in the same process. If however you are going with what is called a PTP (Point To Point) machine or sometimes called a Rail & Pod Machine most of them have at least 1 drill bit usually 2 that will drill horizontally in both the x and y axis.

I have never worked anywhere using a flat table nesting machine, and have only used PTP type machines. My experience is even though you can drill horizontally it works much better to have a horizontal boring and dowel inserting machine.

These horizontal machines come in different setup, some have a lot of drill bits set at fixed locations. The other type has just 1 bit and insertion tool. This will move left and right to any location you program into it, and even though it only has 1 bit it moves pretty fast and covers the same area as the machine with several bits. In my opinion this single bit machine is much more practical than the multiple bit machines. (Not trying to start an argument just stating opinion so my apologies to those that prefer the multiple bit machine)

I Hope this helps.
Jim Smith:

I use a single spindle accu-systems dowel inserter.. BeamSaw to cut panels and a PTP to machine them.

Defiantly Invest in a case clamp and some lift tables as well.. Just my 2 cents

Thanks for your responses guys. I was hoping we would be able to do away or I should say condense some of the machining process to one cnc station but I guess that's not the case.
So would you say the only major beneifit of a cnc over say just a slider is less material handling (ie no flipping of sheet material) along with the ability to pre drill for hardware.
Of course it would be beneficial for our elliptical work also.

Honestly, I've never used a slider.
One thing I can attest to however is that a cnc machine will open up a whole new world of possibilities besides being able to cut things with curves. Rabbeting, dadoing, surfacing something down to a lesser thickness. Being able to cut acrylic, aluminum, solid surface, hardwood and the list goes on and on.

It all really depends on how much product you are handling and your customization needs. If you are needing to cut rounded parts and want to route, drill system holes and drill for hardware without moving the work piece then a nested base machine would probably be right for you. On the other hand, if you are pushing more product and don't need everything done in one area then the nested base router becomes a choke point to your whole process. It takes a lot of time to process one panel at a time on a cnc router. Plus these machines are pretty large.

Jim is right though, whether you use a saw or a nested router you will need a cnc horizontal drilling and dowel inserting machine. Some of these machines have the option of vertical drilling as well making the process, if you use a saw, a whole lot faster.

If you are a smaller company the Nested base is most beneficial because you can process a panel by program and walk away to work on something else. If you are a larger company that machine will eventually become a choke point and you'll have to move over to a saw.