QA

Quick Answer: What Is A Thickness Planer Used For

Thickness planers are used for removing the timber’s surface residue caused by the cutting process, making the WOOD’s surface smooth. These machines can perform different tasks depending on their features.

What can I do with a thickness planer?

A thickness planer serves three unique purposes that other tools do not: 1) It makes the second face of a board parallel to the other face; 2) It smooths rough stock; and 3) It reduces stock down to the exact thickness you need.

When would you use a planer?

Woodworking jointers and planers are used to mill wood so they can be used to build furniture and other projects to correct dimensions. If your workshop doesn’t have a jointer to square up an edge or your wood piece is too large to fit through, you can use your planer to flatten both pieces of wood.

Do you really need a planer?

Most woodworkers know that you need both a planer and a jointer to get the most out of rough lumber (at least for power tool users). If you run the other rough face on the jointer, you can certainly make it flat but you won’t make it parallel to the first face.

What is the difference between a thicknesser and planer?

A jointer creates a flat surface on wood, and yes, it can be used to correct bow and warp on one side of a board at a time. “A planer is a thicknesser. It takes a thick board and makes it thinner. That smooth side goes down onto the bed, and the thicknesser (planer) cuts slices off the top (unsmoothed) side.

Can you run pressure treated wood through a planer?

There should be no issue running pressure-treated boards through a planer, however, if you do a little housekeeping afterward. Give the planer a good blasting off with an air hose after you finish for the day to reduce the amount of PT sawdust left in the machine.

Which type of stock should never be run through the planer?

What should you avoid when using a jointer or planer? Do not cut stock that has loose knots, splits, defects or foreign objects (e.g., metal stone) in it. Do not leave the machine running unattended. Shut off the power and make sure that the cutting head has stopped revolving before leaving the area.

Does a planer sand wood?

Whereas sanders are used to alter the finish of wood, a wood planer is used to even out wood to an exact thickness. With a planer you can smooth rough lumber, clean up sawn edges and give new life to old wood. Each planed piece of wood can be used by itself or glued to other planed pieces for a thicker board or block.

Can you use a planer to remove old finish?

You could plane off an old finish, but it’s not worth the risk. Planer cutterheads can generate sufficient friction to soften such finishes as polyurethane, gumming up their knives. Instead, use a belt sander set to about half its maximum speed and an 80- or 100-grit belt to remove the old film finish, as shown above.

How much can a planer take off?

Examine the width of the lumber. Most planers remove a maximum of 3 mm per pass. If a narrow piece of lumber is being planed, the maximum amount may be removed. A piece that it at the maximum width of the planer may cause the motor to overheat and the cutter to stall.

Is a hand planer as good as a thickness planer?

The better tool for thicknessing stock is a dedicated benchtop planer (see photo, above). They don’t take up much storage space, even in a small shop, and they work great for reducing boards up to about 12- or 13-in. wide (depending on the planer) down to whatever thickness you need them to be.

Can I use my table saw as a planer?

Simply run the board through the table saw to remove the 1/16″ or 1/32″. Make sure you hold the board as tight against the fence as possible and be careful with the blade up so high. Use push sticks and pads, keeping your hands away from the blade after starting the cut.

Is a jointer necessary?

Simply purchase your lumber already milled in S3S or S4S form (surfaced on three sides or surfaced on 4 sides). If you’re at a point in your woodworking where you’re starting to use rough sawn lumber, say from a lumber mill or your local sawyer, then a jointer is absolutely essential to your shop workflow.

What is jointer used for?

The jointer derives its name from its primary function of producing flat edges on boards prior to joining them edge-to-edge to produce wider boards. The use of this term probably arises from the name of a type of hand plane, the jointer plane, which is also used primarily for this purpose.

Can you use a table saw as a jointer?

Although the table saw can be used as a jointer to make the faces of a wood piece flat, it can also be used to square an edge to have perfectly perpendicular faces. You can use the same jig to do this. For adjacent faces to be perpendicular, the table saw blade must be square with the tabletop.