Sunday, March 4, 2012

"New" Planer

I've been needing a planer for quite awhile and after much shopping and searching around, I finally purchased this one on Craigslist. It's a Craftsman 12 inch planer which I can find absolutely no information on anywhere on the internet. Strange. However I did find a manual and Sears still sells parts, so I'm happy with that. It's slightly used but in overall very good condition, and being my first planer, I'm very please with it. Well, I'll skip to some photos now!


 The planer is quite the little beast for a benchtop style. It's got a 2 1/2 hp motor and 12" by 5 1/2" capacity and a four post height adjustment system which makes for a much more stable cutterhead. The height adjustment gauge is quite accurate and easy to read. Overall a very good planer.


We've had these old pallet boards lying around for years. (Waiting around to be passed through a planer I guess) So after taking some intial test cuts with some poplar, I passed one of these through to see how the planer would do and what exactly was underneath the weathered surface of the board.

Can you guess which one is the before and which is the after? Haha! Yeah, after the first pass through the planer what I saw a beautiful oak board! Hey what a great way to start of my planing experience!

When I first went to use the planer the boards would not feed through and the feed rollers kept spinning out on the boards. My heart sank. What was wrong? Well I had noticed earlier that the previous owner had never taken off the original plastic bed protector and it had been peeling up everywhere and was causing wood to grab. Well I took that all off and polished the bed and Voila! it worked like a dream. So I'm glad that wasn't anything worse.

Here's my temporary dust collection system. After planing the first board, I realized my that my need for dust collection/control was increasing with every board foot. So...

          ...this has to be emptied out promptly so I won't be buried alive by sawdust.

  Now I can finally get around to cleaning up all those rough cut boards cluttering up my shop!
                                                                   Thanks for reading!



13 comments:

  1. oooooo i like :)))) I have thought of a billion projects that you could make for my apt if you and your shop were down here....sigh...someday :) mwuahahahahaha! you shall be my slave....of course I pay slaves, so you will not be allowed to whine/complain/or otherwise annoy me in any way!!! Peon!!......ahem....good job with the planing lil' bro 0:-]

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  2. With that kind of attitude you won't get anything! haha :)

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  3. Awesome!!! I like seeing "before & after" things:) It makes you feel handy when you can do stuff like that!:D

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  4. So does it sand down the boards?

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  5. Rachel: It has a spinning cutterhead with two blades that shave of pieces of wood. It cuts a maximum of an 1/8th inch per pass, but I usually take only about 1/16th inch per pass. The finished board is pretty smooth and will finish up with just a quick sanding. It also has two power rollers that pull the wood into the machine so you don't have to push it.

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  6. hahaha. That piece of wood that you planed looked just like the table that you had it on! I could hardly tell where it was. Can't wait to see the new creations that you make with it. :)

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  7. This is Thim: Cool, that should come in VERY handy!! Hahaha, Hunt IS right...first time for every thing ;)

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  8. @Erika: You're just jealous that I'm right more than you are.
    Craftsmen: Sorry...didn't mean to turn your blog into a fighting ring. :)

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  9. Hunt:I think you are talking to me...I am now Thimble! (:
    Turning things into a fighting ring, well, you have too, it's the only thing you have the credential for. (heheheh)
    Cman: yea, me too, sorry (:
    Humt: Maybe we should move this to the Battle Arena? hahah

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  10. I'm amused...I discover this blog and discover that I've been causing trouble! hahaha :)

    Anyhow...wow! I'm impressed! Granted, I only understand like half of it, but regardless, very cool, Craftsman!

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  11. haha thanks erika. yeah thimble is often on here under your name causing trouble. you should have a talk with her. ;)

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  12. i'm sad.....there is not much posting going on here....ahem

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  13. Just you wait. I've got a pretty cool post coming up! :)

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