dewalt planer 974

The Best Benchtop Planer Options For Woodworking

We applied blue chalk to the surface of the boards in order to improve our visual inspection combined with a physical inspection to rank the surface finish for each planer. For this evaluation we wanted to look at how accurately the planers remove a specified depth. Each planer has a dial that when turned a specified amount will theoretically dewalt tools remove a given depth in a single pass. We compared how accurately each planer was able to remove a fixed depth based on the dial. We measured the no-load feed rate of each planer and compared that to the feed rates under load for different material types. In our opinion this provides a sense of how powerful the motors are.

Its carriage lock is also a four-column lock that keeps the lumber in place for a smooth cut to avoid snipe. The depth capacity is 6 inches and it has a maximum depth of cuts of 1/8 inches in one pass. When you get the DW735X, you get infeed and outfeed tables and an extra set of planer knives to go along with it. One of the unique features the DeWalt DW735 Planer has is two feed speeds – one meant for quick thickness planing and the other for detailed finishing. Speed 1 slows the automatic feed, allowing the blades to cut the workpiece 179 times per inch which leaves a nice smooth finish.

dewalt planer

Benchtop planers, also known as thickness planers, are box-shaped power tools with rotating blades inside that allow you to adjust the thickness of a piece of wood. By passing the wood through the planer, two dewalt Hand tools or three high-speed blades inside the machine cut off tiny layers from the surface of the workpiece. By adjusting the cutting height, you can remove a layer at a time until the wood meets your specifications.

Because snipe is a matter of leverage, it can be complicated to avoid. Planers use overhead rollers before and after the cutterhead to hold the workpiece as flat as possible while giving the cutterhead something to register against the board. These rollers work incredibly well in the middle of the board, but not so well at the leading or tail end when only one roller is touching the wood. Due to gravity, the long end of the board can cause enough leverage to lift the section inside the planer into the cutterhead just slightly, removing more material than you intended. Your planer’s capacity, or allowance, is the major factor determining its capability.

It’s hard to notice at first but here you can see the outfeed side of the melamine auxiliary bed. At the planer the melamine is slightly more than 1/16” higher than the original bed. Something must have settled because I just noticed on the infeed side the melamine bed was bottomed out on the planer bed. That means I just need to shim the 2×4 support block on the infeed side and snipe should be reduced or eliminated again. Because the auxiliary bed is essentially suspended a slightly greater force is needed by the rollers to push the material through. I’ve never had any problems with the rollers not feeding the material through as they should with this setup.

Unlike many planers, the entire machine is sturdy, supported by metal posts that can raise and lower it, and lock in place. It also boasts a powerful blower motor to minimize wood-chip mess. I don’t normally take time to write reviews but I am very impressed with this device. I have some very rare American Chestnut that I am re-sawing for some projects and “micro planing” preserves as much of the wood as possible and is easy on your planer blades. Set up was not too bad the instructions leave a little to be desired but being mechanically inclined helped.