Anyone know if it is possible to face joint boards that are wider than jointer knives? Here’s an example… I have 10″ wide board, but a 6″ jointer. Can I joint one side and then turn board around to joint the other ‘half’?
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Replies
J -
There have been a few people comment here that it's possible but I've never tried it. I view it as an exercise in frustration, if not futility. But keep in mind I'm not an experienced jointer user.
That method doesn't really make sense. Say you have a cupped board. Think of it in the exagerated sense. If you only joint one side, then the other, you will wind up with a v-shaped face (when looking at it from the end grain). I have heard that you can surface as much as you can, then place that surface on a 1/4 sheet of plywood and run it through the planer to obtain a flat surface on the other side. Then turn it over and smooth the side you started on.
Now, I haven't tried that. It just seems like too much work to me. I go with the power plane method. I use a couple of winding sticks and a power plane to roughly flatten one face of the board. It doesn't come out pretty, but it's enough to keep the board flat going through the planer.
Tim
jpurban,
It is possible to use the jointer on boards wider than the length of the knives. Remove the guard. (If this makes you uncomfortable, stop reading here.)
Pass the board across the jointer, with the cupped (hollow) face down. If the board is badly cupped, you will joint a strip along the edge of the board. Turn the board end for end, and joint the other side of the same face.
As you continue, the jointer will finally machine a "rabbet" on one side of the face. Carefully turn the board so it is 90* to the jointer (its end against the fence), and gently lower the jointed side of its end onto the outfeed table, and the stepped side of the "rabbet" onto the infeed table. (Watch for kickback) Being careful to keep the board flat on the tables, slowly rotate the board so that its end is now on the outfeed table (unjointed edge against the fence). This will index the uncut side of the face with the jointed part of the face. Feed the rest of the board across the jointer. You may have to repeat a time or two, to get a flat face, but it works.
It is easier to do this with boards that are only an inch or two wider than the machine's capability, but it is possible to face a 12" wide board on a 6" jointer.
If the board has a twist, you'll have to joint the high corners off first, then proceed as above.
Regards,
Ray
Ray,
Thanks you!
If you have a thickness planer it is easier, and much safer, to roughly hand plane one side of the wide board flat and then pass the stock, with the hand planed side down, through the planer. Once you have the second face planed flat by the machine, flip the board over and finish the hand planed face with the machine.
You can make a jig to carry an unplaned board through the planer, but hand planing the first face is much more efficient for just a few boards. If you are interested in making the jig, Fine Woodworking had an article on building one a few issues back.
John W.
I agree with John. I don't own a jointer but do own a jointer plane and a thicknesser. I can face joint boards up to 12" wide with not much effort. You have to watch out for snipe though. I usually allow for about 3" of sacrificial ends on each board I run through my Makita thicknesser. One of these days I'll try to figure out how to elimnate the snipe but I've not been able to so far.
- Lyptus
snip______/You have to watch out for snipe though. I usually allow for about 3" of sacrificial ends on each board I run through my Makita thicknesser. One of these days I'll try to figure out how to eliminate the snipe but I've not been able to so far. - Lyptus_____Lyptus, As a board goes through a planer, it first gets held down by the infeed roller before it reaches the cutter head. If the board is longer than a few feet, or heavy, it can easily overpower the springs that press the infeed roller down on the wood, thus levering the wood up into the cutter head before the outfeed roller catches it; one of the major causes of snipe. Begin by lifting the tailing end of the board up from the table slightly until the board reaches the outfeed roller (and then held down to the table on both sides of the cutter head); you can then let the planer pull the board through on its own. Lifting up the other end of the board slightly as it leaves the planer can help minimize snipe on both ends of the board.Other things you can do to help tame snipe are to check the tolerances between the infeed roller, chip breaker, cutter head, pressure bar, and finally the outfeed roller. All measurements are referenced from the arc of the knives (also known as ‘top dead center’ or TDC). These measurements are a general guideline (refer to the manual for model specific tolerances): infeed and outfeed rollers at 0.030” below the knives, the chip breaker gets to live at 0.025”, and the pressure bar 0.003 higher than the knives. The knives themselves are referenced from the cutter head, unless they are of the indexing type.On portable planers, the head locks can also be worn, letting the whole head unit to pivot, causing snipe. Short of replacing bushings on the lock assembly, I'm not sure how you could fix this.Hope this helps…
-gw (spoken like smokey the bear) "You too can help prevent snipe"
I have tried that.. But never quite worked out for me.. Maybe the operator...
Anything is possible...but safe? smart? I lost a finger to a jointer playing games like this. Get a No 7 Jointer Hand Plane, tune it up,and joint the board the old fashioned way, or split the board into the size to fit your jointer and glue them back up after they are square and safe. its way easier than learning to do things with the other hand...
Trying to do this as always "seemed" to me to be unsafe, on the face of it (pardon the pun), but several people have related ways to do it, and last month the technique was even illustrated in one of the WWing mags. So, it seems it must be possible, and maybe even possible with safety. I'd suggest getting nitty-gritty details from those who've been successful at it, lessening your chances of an accident!
forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
Another proud member of the "I Rocked With ToolDoc Club" .... :>)
Can you rip the board in half,then joint it? Many times wider boards are prone to cupping, you might be better off ripping, jointing and glue back together.
mike
If you rip it then glue it back togather it will be just as likely to cup. Nothing will have changed except that 3/16" or so will be missing from the middle. If you flip one of the boards over so the rings alternate then you will lessen the chances of severe cupping, and ruin the whole point of using a wide board anyway. Having said that the kind of cupping problems you are refering to really only happens with lumber that moves a LOT or if it was not dry enough during the assembly.
Mike
Greetings jpurban,
Well, I for one can't bring my self to rip a wide board just to fit the width of my jointer. But on the other hand, I kind of am fond of all my fingers, the no guard on the jointer trick doesn't sound too appealing too me..
To answer your question, I would use a scrub plane and jointer plane to get one side flat (nothing too fancy), the rest of the work would be done by the thickness planer. Just feed the board with the flattened side toward the bed of the machine, the planer will clean up and flatten the non-flattened side for you. After the non-flattened side is cleaned up, flip the board over and run the side that was flattened by the hand planes. Alternate the stock removal from each side the board, till you reach the desired thickeness.
Best of luck
I would use a 3 inch electric hand planer. I have a Ryobi, and have been really happy with the results. It wasnt too expensive - under $75
I needed to plane a 12 inch wide beam for a mantle. I thought about how my 6 inch jointer would work, and decided it would be a disaster. The hand planer with a straight-edge worked well.
First, I used the stright-edge to locate the high spots, and planned them off, using really thin cuts. Once I got the beam generally flat, I planed it off smooth with fine cuts, going about 20 degrees of the grain of the wood. I smoothed out stray cut mark with a belt sander.
It took a while, but it did the job.
I was going to get an 8 inch jointer (which is still the best idea if you want to spare the room. They are more reasonable now than ever).
However... Assume you have an 8 inch board
Remove the guard on the jointer.
Joint the face on one side so it is flat over 6 inches and jointed no deeper than just shy of 1/4 inch, leaving, say, 2 inches of the 8 inches unjointed.
Build a jig consisting of a 1/4 inch hardboard the length of the board being jointed that is 6 inches wide with a stop at one end made of the 1/4 inch hardboard.
Lay the jointed side of the board on top of the hardborad and run the combination through a planer planing the opposite side you jointed so you have all 8 inches of that side jointed flat.
Turn the board over and plane off the 2 inches remaining of unjointed material on the side that was jointed. Just slightly more work than if you had an 8 inch jointer.
Eric,
Thanks for the advice. That sounds like the best way to make use of a 6" jointer and leverage the capabilities of a 12"-13" bench planer.
The method you describe seems to make the most sense of any I've heard. You don't have to reverse the board and run against the grain (risking tearout). And it sounds relatively easy to make the jig. If I understand the planer correctly, you can probably build one jig and reuse it (since the jig goes on bottom and doesn't contact the powered rollers). The jig just needs to be longer than your longest board.
Sure, your method requires removing the guard, but that doesn't sound too dangerous if you use push blocks. Correct me if I'm wrong...
Several postings recommended buying the bigger jointer or doing it by hand. Well, I'm a weekend woodworker and don't want to spend too much money or too much time. 8" jointers are twice as much as 6" jointers (and what happens when I have a 10" board?). Jointing planes (#7 or #8) are $300 for a new one (Lee Valley, Nielson), which is the same price as a 6" jointer (or close to it - The Ridgid at HD or the Yorkcraft). Oh yeah, a power jointer doesn't require an expensive workbench with vices too. (Yeah, I'd love to have a maple top workbench with vices and stops and all the goodies, but I'd rather spend that $700 or so on a jointer and a planer.)
Thanks again for the advice.
John
Looks like you understand completely...and you are welcome!
Eric,
One more question... Where do you find 1/4" thick hardwood that is of uniform thickness?
It seems the most critical variable to your method is obtaining material for the jig that is of uniform thickness. Heck, you might not even need hardwood - metal or plastic would probably work too (since it never touches the knives). UHMW plastic might even slide better than wood... What do you think?
John
Yes, any of those materials should do fine. The easiest and cheapest might be hardboard (masonite or the same material that pegboard is made from). That is what I used. Very flat and even.
That is a great idea. Can't believe I never heard it before. I can't see a reason why it wouldn't work. And it is safe.
Mike
Until recently, I did not own a jointer, but I used my 13" Delta thickness planer with a very simple sled to joint boards of all sizes.
Using a 13" x 38" (or longer) piece of plywood or MDF with raised cleats glued to each end, I use shims and hot glue to mount the workpiece to the sled. I then run the board through my planer until the planed face is parallel to the sled bottom. The glue comes off with little effort, and I then use my router table with a home-made jig to joint the edge.
(For those who care, The router table jig is like a vertically-mounted jointer table made of laminated MDF trued and clamped to my fence. The outfeed table is simply a second layer of laminate covering 1/2 of the jig.)
Both the sled(s) and the router-table jig are reusable, of course, and I've been using them for about 4 years. This method works like a charm, but the setup is a bit time-consuming.
I recently bought a 6" jointer to save me time, but I will likely use Eric's method for boards wider than 6". It seems similar to the way I'm accustomed, and has the added benefit of being (relatively) safer than some of the other methods described.
J
You are missing the opportunity of a life time.
Rule 1 If the board is bigger than the tool buy a bigger toy (I mean tool)
Rule 2 Refer to Rule 1.
This is the perfect time to take your spouse or significant other to the shop and show him/her how much bigger the board is compared to the bed of the jointer. Then explain how dangerous it would be to take the safetyguard off and make the machine do something it wasn.t supposed to do. Then you go back to the house and take out the brand new Grizzly catalog and show him/her how inexpensive a 12" jointer really is when you compare it to the hospital deductible and the rehab bill would be if an accident happened.
Two weeks latter the 12" jointer arrives. You have a party so your friends will come over and help you set the jointer up and your wife feels like a million bucks for being so concerned about your safety. Everybody wins.
Jack
Aside from the safety issues, I would think you'd get an awful lot of tearout trying to turn it around to run the board through on the other side of the face. One of those two passes is going to be cutting against the grain and probably putting a pretty rough surface on it. Might be OK just for getting things relatively flat for cleaning up eventually with a planer, but it wouldn't be my method of choice. For small amounts, handplanes can be a good way to go. The April/May issue of Wood had an article about a router sled on rails method that would work, and there are methods for using a planer that would work.
Waddaya mean it wont fit through the door?
J,
This makes me reflect on my teaching days of showing a movie in class called "Shake hands with Danger" , made in the 50's or 60's, pretty gross, but I still remember it today. As you have read, everyone here is concerned about safety and being able to pick up there tools with a hand that has five fingers attached.
When I run into a board wider than my tools capability, I take it to a local shop where they have a 48" wide belt sander (after I use my hand tools on it).
Safety First. We are working with tools that don't care if they are cutting wood or flesh. Guards are there for a reason. Sure accidents will happen, but why "Shake hands with danger" if you don't have too.
I really think is is the best reason you should buy a new tool with the capabilities you need.
Joe
Is it really saw dust or wood dust?
My old shop teacher had just three fingers.. He was so funny.. BUT a Excellent teacher.. He would put his hand by the saw at the start of ever class and hold it up.. We got the message..He actually lost the fingers on some Farm machine and not in wood saw...EDIT:: and not in wood saw... and not ON a wood saw.. I never can figures out English...
Edited 11/5/2005 1:00 pm by WillGeorge
Make a sled a little narrower than your planer. Cut yourself some small thin wedges. Put the material cup down on the sled, shim where nessesary, put a stop block on each end of the board, and run it through your planer. Fine woodworking had an article similar to this method but it seems quite elaborate. I have been using this method for a couple years now and it has worked well for me.
James
I've been a lurker for most of the year, but this discussion is drawing me out. I hope you don't mind if I joined in.
When I have a board wider than my jointer, I usually use a method similar to the one that joinerswork (post 4 of 22) uses.
Another method is to remove the guard, joint the right half of the board. Then take it to your bench and use a hand plane or power plane, on an angle from the freshly jointed portion, to the rough unjointed portion of the board. And then run it through your planer.
And still another method is one my father told me about. (84 and in woodworking since 14) He removes the guard, joints the right half of the board, then removes the entire fence assembly (Busy Bee/Grizzly type)leaving a flattop to the right of the cutter head. Then take a pass removing the left side of the board, while the right side registers and rides on the surface to the right of the cutterhead.
You have to decide if you're comfortable working on your jointer without the guard or fence and accept the risk that goes along with doing so, because these methods aren't for beginners.
Anyone know if it is possible to face joint boards that are wider than jointer knives?
yupp...... people have been doing it successfully for hundreds of years too...
Handraulics.... a.k.a. hand planes.... canna beat em..
Mike Wallace
Stay safe....Have fun
Probably not. There are legends about persons capable of doing such things, but I am waiting for the movie before I believe it.
I handplaned a table top, 24"x 48" once upon a time, just to say I did it, so I know that can be done once, although it would be difficult to get me to want to do it again.
Spell checker doesn't like my using handplaned as a word.
I hate when the jointer isn't wide enough. I recently had the same problem with some 22" wide walnut lumber and a 16" jointer. My 30" jointer is in storage.
DJK
LOL. I know what you mean.
Mike
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