Many years ago I did a lot of woodworking, always using a friend’s 6″ jointer/planer to prepare hardwood stock. Now after about 20 years I am again finding the time to do some serious woodworking. But alas, I no longer have my friend’s jointer available. In those days the 12 or 13″ thickness planers of today were not commonly available at reasonable prices so the jointer was the only real option. So my question is: can rough sawn stock be prepared with a thickness planer, or does one need to begin with a planer/jointer to get one side smooth and flat before using the thickness planer?
Thanks,
Forrest
Replies
I find both to be indispensible, and if I was forced to have only one, it would be the jointer, for truing boards and ensuring accurate edges. You can even do some thicknessing with it. If expense and/or space is a concern, you might try benchtop models. I use those as I am extremely limited on space in my shop, and stick to smaller items for the most part anyway.
Hey y'all, I just built a cedar chest out of rough sawn cedar. It had been drying in a neighbor's shop about 15 years. The stuff still had the bark on the edges. I struck a chalk line on down one edge and cut the edge straight with a circular saw. I then used that edge against my ts fence to cut the other edge straight. My ts with a 60 tooth carbide blade cuts a glueable edge. Flip the board over and zip the circular sawn edge down the ts to make it true and parallel to the other edge. I then planed it to thickness with my Dewalt thickness planer. Worked great. I own a grizzly 6" jointer/planer but don't use it all the time due the quality of cut with my Delta 10" contractorj's ts. Rick W.
I too build blanket chests from aromatic cedar.My proceedure is: After cutting to rough length ,I face the worst side of each piece on the jointer.Next I rip to rough width. I try to eliminate most of the sap wood.I then resaw the thickness,plus cleanup, on the bandsaw.I then make the glue joints on the TS as you have stated. After the panels have set overnite, a light sanding is all thet is needed for cleanup. My jointer with the 4 knife cutterhead,does a decent job of facing,but with the cedar, tears and knot problems always seem to happen.The sawed surface on the finish or show side,eliminates this problem. Sometimes,I come across an especially attractively grained board. This piece,I resaw into veneers to be book matched for the tops.The less desirable pieces can be faced and planed to whatever thickness they will make.I stack laminate them into a billet of about 6 inches in height. Next,I resaw them into boards and use them for substrate for the tops. I veneer the individual boards and treat them as any solid board for the top glueup. This,for me,is much easier than pressing the veneer on a wide surface.I treat the ends with breadboards in the usual manner.I have built tops by this method for many years. I have never had a top to warp or check. Please forgive an old man`s ramblings.¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬PAT¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬
In my opinoin It depends on How much fine furniture your gonna make. You can always pay to have the material planed for you and the hardwood yard where you buy the wood. It might be more cost effective but if your going to be building furniture professionally or over a long term and are going to be needing it alot then go ahead and buy one.
Darkworksite4: When the job is to small for everyone else, Its just about right for me"
forrest, you can sometimes get away with only a thickness planer, if your rough sawn stock has dried straight and flat, but a jointer is really handy to have. if new machines are too expensive, look for used. once you get into cutting joinery warped stock will give you a lot of headaches and you'll wish you had a jointer as well. you can also go the route of handplaning stock flat before sending it through the thicknesser. it's a lot more work though. a jointer and planer are really two machines that compliment one and other, and are necessary if you want to prepare roughsawn lumber in a reasonable amount of time. hope this helps
andrew
Need both, really. For rough cut stuff, I first sight down the board to see how it looks. If ok, then I run both sides through the thickness planer until its about 1/16" over-thick. Then I check again. I usually do the final pass on the side to be exposed with the jointer cause I get a better finish with it (can slow down the feed rate).
If not ok on the initial inspection, then I usually cut it to length needed (plus some) then run it throught the jointer first to get one good side.
My planer is an old Parks 12" cast iron beastie circa 1930's and the jointer is a 6" Jet bought about 4 years ago. Shoulda bought a jointer 30 years ago.
PlaneWood by Mike_in_Katy
PlaneWood
Here's a method that I used for years until I finally bought a good jointer (a used, old, great, very heavy 12" one) 2 months ago.
Take your rough cut stock, and lay it on a piece of MDF cut to the approx width of your planer, being sure the MDF is itself on a flat surface. Then, using hardwood wedges (one of my favorite tools), hot glue wedges on to the stock where any spaces appear between the stock and the MDF. The hot glue dries in a min. or less, but is thick, so when you put the wedge on, just thow a quick clamp on it to squish the glue to flat. Put a cleat on the MDF at the front end so that the stock does not shoot out, and plane the sandwich until you have a flat side. Teh wedges do not permit the deflection in the stock caused by the planer, which is what reproduces warps, etc. Depending on the planer, and the thickness of the stock, use more or fewer wedges.
Then, take it off of the sled, flip it over, and plane the other side to dead parallel. This is a quite accurate method, inexpensive, quite slow, and may require a helper. N.B. -- Be very careful in chiseling off the wedges. The glue is a bit rubbery, does not chisel well, and tends to release all at once. One Sunday morning I wasn't careful, but that is another story.
As to edge jointing, this can be done on a TS quite easily, although not as easily as on a jointer. I have 4' and an 8' straight edge clamps. Put one on the edge, slightly overhanging, that registers to the fence. Set it parallel (approx) to the side to be sawn. Set the clamp, give it a rip, remove the clamp, and you have a very straight edge. Without these clamps, you can make a carriage (which I did before I had bought these clams for another purpose). The carriage, of plywood, rides against the fence, and the stock is mounted to it. Same result.
If money permits, a good jointer will save much time, and leave you with more time for the fun stuff. Life without a planer would be bleak indeed.
Funny you should mention the wedges.
I had the same idea for stock wider than my 8" jointer could flatten.
I used a piece of 6/4 perfect plank from Freeman.
I laid out a hole pattern on 4" centers and installed 3/8 tee nuts.I installed 3/8" hollow head set screws in the nuts.
Place the warped stock on the bench with the jig on top.Run the screws down until they just touch the stock to be planed. The screws do the same job as the wedges but lots quicker and can be reused.
I made mine 50" long since I seldom need to flatten stock longer than 4Ft.
FWIW ¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬PAT¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬
Edited 8/3/2002 6:52:29 PM ET by Pat
Pat-
That's a wonderful idea. Thanks.
Don
I told myself, that I would not get involved in another of these planer vs. jointer debates, but here I go again. I make furniture every day; I never had or will have a jointer, but I used them for a while over 20 years ago. The capacity of a standard jointer is so limited, and large ones so expensive, that I find them the least useful tool in a shop, not to mention that they require some knowledge to use predictably. I flatten my wood by hand (I use rough sawn stock, but even S2S material is rarely if ever flat and true). For boards that exceed my planers capacity, I thickness them by hand also. This is an easy to learn and very basic skill, that does not rely on any jigs, just 2 winding sticks and a straight edge. If I have to hog off a lot of material I turn to my portable power plane, otherwise I use a jack plane. As an example of how long it takes, I flattened, planed to thickness and straightened one or more edges of all the stock for a small Queen Anne tea table yesterday, in slightly over an hour. This included resawing the aprons from 8/4 stock. Also, it included using a full width mahogany board for the top that measured 18", which is far beyond the capacity of any normal jointer (this board was way out of flat, which is unusual for mahogany). So in my book there is no choice, the planer always wins, because flattening stock is easy, while getting it to thickness, is not difficult, it is somewhat time consuming, and the planer makes short work of that, while requiring almost no input form the operator.
Forrest, I would own a jointer before a planer for the simple reason that if you have a jointer that is true, you can make a perfect 90 degree edge on rough stock and finish it up on the tablesaw equipped with a good blade.
Steve
A tip for putting wildly twisted/warped timber through a thicknesser that I picked up watching a stoneworks cutting slices off irregular granite blocks with a huge diamond saw.
The blocks were wedged in place using plaster of paris -- I use the same method.
The timber to be planed is set on a piece of ply the same size, on which has been placed dobs of wet plaster. The board is pushed into the plaster so the face is roughly parallel with the ply -- wait 15-20 minutes for the plaster to set and away you go.
Many years ago I was faced with the same decision and went for the jointer. I absolutely made the right choice. Later I bought a thickness planer but I rarely use it because it makes such a god-awful noise and a mess.Only rarely do I have to pay extra for S2S stock, so I rarely have need of the thicknesser.
A good table saw and jointer are the essential machines for the shop.
Ask different trades and you'll get different answers. A carpenter will surely tell you table saw and jointer. He's probably buying s4s stock and just needs to build face frames and trim cabinet doors. As far as furniture makers go, the comment by Rob agrees with me: you can flatten quicker and easier than you can thickness. And you can't flatten to the tolerances you'll need to get good joints without going through some of the gyrations with the planer described in other posts. Personally, I think those set-ups are more time consuming than doing it by hand. (Not to mention the risk of something going wobbly halfway through the run with the planer).
If your stock isn't too bad and you will be working with narrow pieces, you may get by without flattening. I've produced plenty of maple face frames, rails, stiles and drawer fronts with only a table saw and an old Ryobi AP-10. Ideally, though, in the shop, your bandsaw, jointer and planer should complement each other. I do enjoy working with a handplane, but I do not have the time to flatten every board by hand. I have a large jointer and, as a practical matter, I could not get along without it. If you have to choose only one, however, I do agree that a lone planer eliminates more handwork and saves more time than a lone jointer.
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