Thickness planer not pulling wood throug
JasonWhite
| Posted in General Discussion on
I’m trying to reduce the thickness of some 3/4″ hard maple but the rollers won’t “grab” the wood. I’ve tried raising & lowering the cutter height — nothing. I’ve also tried pushing the wood through manually — nothing. Both rollers are definitely turning. I have the 13″ portable Delta. I tried cleaning the rollers “with soap and water” like the manual recommends, but that doesn’t do anything.
My only other guess is that mayble the rollers are too cold, making the rubber less pliable. It’s about 43-degrees out right now (Boston area). Could that be causing the problem?
TF
Toolfanatic (a.k.a. The man formerly known as “Toolfreak”)
Replies
Have you tried putting a thicknesser under the maple, say a bit of chipboard, to make the springs work harder?
Toolfanatic,
That's just one of the issues I had with my Delta. In the end I sold it and bought a Grizzly staionary type and put it on wheeels.. Now that is a Piece of machinery!
30,000+ bd.ft and virtually trouble free!
What model Grizzly did you get? Thanks-
I dont want to steal the original posters thread but It seems solved.
Frenchy, does your Griz feed rollers mar your work piece with too much pressure?
Mine does out of the box, and I have not got to adjusting the pressure yet ?
Joe P
joepez,
It really depends, mostly on the wood type (it marks more in softwoods than hardwoods (DUH!) but also on the amount I cut or remove each pass. A light cut and it leaves no marks but if I really get to hogging off the wood at high speed it tends to leave more definate marks.. My method because I'm lazy and demand speed is to hog off a lot and make a final cleanup pass with light pressure.. when I shift to slow speed I've noticed a real change.
Toolfanatic,
I HAD THE SAME PROBLEM. I called Delta and they told me to wax the bed and clean the rollers. I did. Sometimes it worked. Sometimes it didn't. The wood just wouldn't pull throught.
THEN I FOUND THE SIMPLE ANSWER. It worked for me. Please let me know if it works for you.
Here it is. The Delta has two speeds and a switch to move between the two speeds. I wish they would have used only one speed. The problem is that there is some "dead space" in the switch.
I raised the cutter head all the way up to see why the wood wouldn't pull through. It was disengaged!! I moved the switch and it engaged and it worked fine. I learned that I could stop it or start it by moving the switch. Unfortunately the dead spot in switch "moves around." Fortunately it is easy to fix. If the wood is not pulling through, just move the switch to the other side, and mine worked.
Hope that solves it for you. Please let me know.
Thanks,
Mel
Measure your output in smiles per board foot.
I see what you mean about the switch. If you catch the "dead spot" just right, the rollers stop moving. This seems like a product defect to me.
So I put some Slip-it on the bed and it's pulling through just fine now.
I'm really surprised that the Delta doesn't work much better, though. I've barely used it. Geez!!
TFToolfanatic (a.k.a. The man formerly known as "Toolfreak")
TF,
You are absolutely right. It is an obvious product defect. It took me a long time of coping with it, until I figured it out. It is the dead spot in the switch. Your has it. Mine has it. There was one more person in this thread who had it but got rid of the planer. Mine is out of warrantee. If yours is in warrantee, you should contact Delta customer service. Let them know about the three of us on Knots with the same problem with the same planer. Tell them to fix yours or to give you a replacement. I will contact them also. Up until today, I didn't know that anyone else had this problem. I hope they will do something fix my switch. I'll let you know. Please let me know what they do for you. Let's keep in touch on this. Together we may have a bit more clout than alone.One more time, Knots has proven its worth.MelMeasure your output in smiles per board foot.
I have had the same problem with my unit in the past. tried pushing and pulling - not fun.
I was told to try spraying the rollers with the spray-on developed to make fan belts on cars grip (available at auto supply shops). I have not tried this yet as my unit is going well at the moment but it may be worth a try.
Dear Tool,
I had the same problem with several Deltas over the years. (All single speed) Almost always the failure was in the feed mechanism. As a contractor, I can't have any down time, so analysis is not important to me, just performance. My final solution was to buy a Makita. I used to kill a Delta a year, now it's been at least seven years and that little Makita just keeps going!
Best,
John
I keep a 15 pound sledge hammer beside my planer for just such a situation. I also leave at least 6 inches of extra wood because sometimes the ends mushroom out. I also keep a handplane and angle grinder on hand to bring down the mushroomed ends so they will pass thru the planer. For really tough boards I have a threaded hook handy that I can thread into the end grain of the board on the outfeed side.The hook is attatched to a heavy cargo strap that goes thru a special hole in my shop that allows me to feed the strap to my tractor. I have a megaphone handy to holler at whoever is on the tractor (usually my 8 year old neice)so they can hear my directions over my screaming 36 inch crescent planer.There has never been a board I could'nt feed.
Count me as another Delta 13" planer owner who has had the feeding problems with the rollers. I've waxed the table and cleaned the rollers with mixed reviews.
One thing I've done when cleaning with soap and water is using a scrub pad. I'm not sure if you're using just a rag. Give the scrub pad a try.
If all else fails......upgrade the planer ;)
I tried cleaning the rollers with soap and water and a scrubbing pad. The problem there is that I can't get the rollers to turn by hand so I can clean all the way around. I can turn the knives with a special wrench, but not the rollers. I don't see any way to disengage them and make them spin freely.TFToolfanatic (a.k.a. The man formerly known as "Toolfreak")
Again. I had the same problem with being unable to turn the rollers by hand. I would wash a section, turn on the planer (to move the rollers), turn off the planer, unplug it and hope the section showing is a section I haven't cleaned yet. Most of the time I wasn't successful. Very frustrating!!
Maybe there's a product that can be sprayed on the rollers to make them tacky without affecting the wood?
Make that one more Delta planer that has the same problem. I've had short term success (i.e., 10-25 board feet before it happens again) with simply brushing the debris off the rollers using a dry rag. Then it's back to the push-and-pull method. That's the last tool Norm will ever convince me to buy!!
try a product called top coat on your planner bed bob
Been there, done that. It's the rollers.
TFToolfanatic (a.k.a. The man formerly known as "Toolfreak")
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