planer vs jointer

[Joe Mioux]

I'm new to this group and to woodworking. I have built some things over the years and have watched/subscribed to various wood working publications over the years. My question is, what comes next after the table saw, a jointer or a planer. I already have CMS, Drill press, router, drills, sanders etc. My first project (which is still in the works) is a work bench. Future projects include more cabinets for the garage and basement and an entertainment center which will more than likely be made out of oak or ash. Eventually, I will have both the jointer and the planer, but I would value your expertise as to which I should purchase first. I will probably go with General brand equipment but have not ruled out Grizzly or Delta. Any insite is appreciated.
Joe

[Jim Ketron]

I would get the jointer first. you can use it to plane also
I had my jointer for about a year and then got my planer.(I wanted to do wider stock)
And welcome to the Creek!

Jim

[John Weber]

Joe,

Welcome, you'll hear both sides, but I think a jointer is the better tool to get first. Edge jointing will help with your glue ups, and give you a square corner. Without a planer face jointing doesn't buy you much. Another reason to get the jointer first is they are typically more expensive. A average woodworker might have an 8" jointer at $900 - $1500, and a portable planer at less then $500. Much easier to come up with the next $500 then the next $1000. Both General (made in Canada), and General International (imported Asian tools) are well respected, the Canadian built tools are some of the best in class. I love the General 14" planer - a real dream. I'm not much of a fan of Grizzly, but have always had great experiences with Delta, Powermatic, and Jet/Performax. Best of luck. If you give us a budget, I'm sure we can give you plenty of options.

John

[Mike Cutler]

Joe. My opinion is the jointer should come first. When you begin the process of milling your own stock, the jointer is generally the first machine put to use. With the jointer one edge is made flat and straight, and then one of the faces is referenced to this edge. This gives you a board ready to be thickness planed or put thru the tablesaw for initial dimensioning.
Buy the biggest jointer that you can afford, or fit into your existing shop. This will allow for face planing wider stock, prior to thickness planing, and it will have an longer overall infeed/outfeed table length to accomodate longer material easier
It seems that alot of people start out with a 6" jointer only to upgrade to a larger unit eventually. I find myself in this position now. I'll be looking at an 8"-12" jointer to replace it.
If it hasn't been said yet, welcome and pleased to meet ya'. Good luck and have fun picking out a new machine, be it a jointer or a planer.

[Christopher Pine]

While what the others have said are all valid points that I have no desire to debate :) I had a planner first and I used it to death, still do. I have a jointer now and it is used a lot also for jointing boards to be glued up primarily. I was able to use my table saw with much success to get an adequate joint surface for glueing up for many years before I had a jointer.. anyways either one will be a very welcome addition to your shop.. be sure to post pictures after you decide and make your purchase.
Chris

[Joseph N. Myers]

Joe,

Welcome to SMC, I'm sure you'll spend many hours here.

There are tons of things on this and other forums about planers vs jointers so you may want to spend some time doing some searching.

Which one you get depends greatly on whether your are going to purchase rough or finished lumber (or rough and having the mill finish it). (This is another subject the deserves a search).

Most lumber you purchase will be somewhat flat on the face (top and bottom) so a jointer is not really required for that. The edges on the other hand, almost always require some "straighting" but can be done by other means, i.e., circular saw w/ straight edge, table saw, router table, etc. A 6" jointer can be gotten in the $300 - $450 range but 6" is very limited. No problems with edge jointing but really have to go to 8" plus to do face jointing and with that, at least doubling the price.

The lumber faces, although somewhat flat, almost always needs some dressing up and/or made thinner. Also if one is "resawing", a planer is almost a necessity to cleanup the "cuts". As far as size, 12" planers can be purchased in the $250 to $400 range and can handle almost all ones requirements.

So I'd go with the planer first.

Regards, and good luck, Joe

[Todd Franks]

Joe,

I'm fairly new to woodworking also, so I'll run down my recent experience. I bought a benchtop planer first, but only because it was on sale. I bought hit & miss planed stock, hand picked so I didn't have to worry about face jointing, although my quality of work probably would have been higher if I did. I picked the straightest face to reference against the planer bed and started from there flipping until I got the desired thickness.

I used a router w/straightedge to edge joint on wider stock and a #7 handplane on narrow stock. When handplaning I only edge jointed good enough to be used as a flat reference against my TS fence, not glue line quality. I ripped oversize then turned around and trimmed the "edge jointed" edge. To get to final width I always found myself going back to the planer, running the stock through on edge. It only works for 3/4" or thicker stock and stock narrower than 6", I'd think thinner stock would be to unstable running it through the planer that way. I've never heard or read about anyone doing this, but maybe others do this all the time, or maybe it's not OK to do this, but it seems to work for me.

In the end after doing the handplane and router method I found myself really wanting both a planer and jointer. I did not want to have to face joint using a handplane. A came across a good deal on a used 6" jointer and snatched it up. I have a small basement workshop and have no room for an 8" jointer. If you have the room definitely get the 8". So my advice would be get the planer first and buy the jointer as soon as possible.

Hope this helps,

Todd

[Joe Piotrowski]

here is my take on it.

Jointer.

reason #1. it can create a 90 deg intersection on 2 adjacent sides allowing for precise and safer ripping.

reason #2. the jointer is used to remove CUP and BOW. the planner can not safely. and is limited if possible at all.


reason #3 the jointer can do more that then planner right out of the box. bevels, rabbits,tapers to name a few.

reason #4. 1 jointed face is more important in many things. you can belt sand, hand plane, the the insides of a table apron if you have to until you can get a planner.



tips. Get the biggest Jointer you can afford and have space for. You won't know what you did without one once you hvae used it and after spending 400 for a Jointer I'm in no hurry to upgrade so I dream about a 8" or bigger cutterhead.


also, see it, feel it, touch it. if not ask very spaecific questions. if you don't get the answers then don't buy it.

here is my reason for that statment. I have a JEt 6" closed stand jointer. the main bolt(arm) that hold the fences angle is too long. it will amke contact with the belt when you move the fence to close to the outside edge.

this is annoying for to reasons. if your edge jointing a lot of boards you can move the fence around to get even wear on the blades.

it limits my rabbeting to 1/4 or 2". that leaves out alot of area!

if you like metal working you can save some csah buy buying cheaper tools like a Jet. I hate machinist work :(

[Gary Whitt]

You will need a planer and a jointer eventually.

Based on the items you will be building....

It seems you will be using a lot of plywood for cabinets (sides, bottom, top).
Plywood is already set to a certain thickness.
Planer not needed. Jointer not needed.

You will be using solid wood for a face frame. This could be any hardwood; poplar is probably used the most.
Rough poplar can be bought around here for about .30 - .40 bf.
Jointer would be needed. Planer would be needed.
S4S poplar at Lowes/HD is sold by the lf - an 8 ft. board is around $8.
It is usually pretty fair on thickness and edges.
Planer would be used to make the thickness thinner.
Jointer not really needed; edges can be cut/ripped on TS.
It is expensive to buy S4S lumber.

I bought my planer first; about 5-6 months ago.
I had some rough red oak, poplar and cherry (about 100 boards) that I needed at 3/4". A jointer would not have done me any good with that.
I straightened up the edges with my TS.

I just bought a jointer last week.
I will be using it a lot for rough lumber.

If I had it to do over again, I would still get the planer first.
You can not thickness plane a board with a jointer.
You can get decent edges with a TS or router until you can afford a jointer.

Just my .02.

[JayStPeter]

I'm with Christopher and Gary. I bought the planer first. If I had to get rid of one of 'em, I'd probably keep the planer.
I bought my rough wood from a slightly more expensive place until I got my jointer. That place had a 12" jointer and would do a face and edge for me.
I did use a bunch of s4s material then as well.

You'll want both for sure. While I agree that an 8" jointer is the way to go. Look for someone selling a nice 6" to upgrade. Then, you won't lose much when you resell it to get an 8" later. It's tough to keep spending down as you ramp up your shop.

Jay

[Joe Mioux]

So far it is a tie. Four responses say go jointer and four responses say go planer and I think I have reply on the fence. You all have very good a valid reasons for your responses. Thank you. Who is going to break the tie?:)

[John Miliunas]

Joe, I am, by no means, an authority on this, so I can only reflect on my own experience. That said, I ran a real early model Ryobi "lunchbox" planer for a number of years before I even *knew* exactly what a jointer was for! :rolleyes: There are a number of workarounds for prepping rough lumber for planing and then on to actual use. Yeah, very often these tricks are more time-consuming and complicated and are only near replacements for a jointer BUT, solutions exist! At the same time, if you use a jointer to accomplish the same tasks, but don't have a planer, you're kind of dead in the water. Mind you, today I feel blessed in having a decent capacity jointer and planer. At the moment, my jointer is a much more substantial unit than my planer, but if I were forced to give one of them up, I'd have to hang on to the planer. Good luck in your quest for choosing the tool best for you! :cool:

[David Klink]

I'm no authority either, but I would probably go planer first. There are alternate methods for jointing an edge on a board, including a router or TS. There are also methods for putting a clean face on a board with a planer such as piggybacking it on a board that's already flat by using shims.

Just my 2 cents.

[Joseph N. Myers]

Joe,

You never told us what part of the country you're from. The availability of wood and its cost sometimes dictates the equipment you buy (first).

It looks like the planers now out vote the jointers by two. That said, I have to say that I'm doing a special project where a jointer is really helpful. But I also had to use a planer. Which one did I need the most? Again, I have to say that I could have used other means to get around the (edge) jointing function, but not the (face) planing function.

The end results were thin pieces of wood that were the same thickness on all four sides which I wanted the same and smooth so I turned to my 16/32 Performax drum sander. Slow but does one heck of a job and it is a lot faster and more accurate than ROS, hand sanding and the likes. Just shows that there is always "one more tool" to buy.

And it really doesn't matter which tool you buy first because it will be the wrong one (at least that is what happens to me).

Regards, Joe

[Joe Mioux]

Hi Joe

per Joe Myers post, I live 50 miles east of st louis. I do have a cabinet shop/woodworking supply store only 18 miles away from me. So lumber and tools are readily available. Check out kunzcarpentry.com. They are located in Trenton Il.

Joe

[Steven Wilson]

Get both a jointer and a planer. An 8" jointer and a lunchbox planer will serve you well for quite a while without tempting you to upgrade. You always need to four square stock so you need the capability of both. If that's a bit much then get a lunchbox planer and a decent jointer plane (Stanley #7 from WWII or earlier).

[Joe Mioux]

Ok, from what I have read, I should get both, which is my intention. With that said, the concensus is buy the largest jointer possible that fits the budget and forget about a 6" jointer. Tha means at least an 8" jointer with as long of infeed/outfeed arms as possible. My next question regards the planer. Several posts from you have indicated buying a less expensive planer, i.e. 12-13 inch bench top model. Should I buy the largest jointer (minimum 8") and a smaller benchtop planer or should I buy a more substantial planer like General's 13" three knife combo planer/moulder model. The price on that is around $900. Any responses are appreciated.

Also thank you all for the good advice.

Joe

[Joseph N. Myers]

Joe,

Yes, it is best to purchase both a planer and a jointer and the jointer is best if it is at least 8" and long infeed/outfeed tables are the best. I still feel that unless you plan on doing a lot of face joining, the planer should be the first to buy.

The first picture I've attached is one that I posted about sealing the ends of boards once cut. I had gotten a bunch of walnut 10' - 12' long and had to cut off from 12" to 20" off each end. As I needed 8' boards, many of the resulting boards ended up too short.

I bring this up because I used my planer to clean up the tops/bottom of the cutoffs to 3/4" for another project (see second picture). Granted I took the resulting pieces to the jointer to get a straight edge before heading for the table saw. I could have used other means then the jointer for putting on that edge but we've gone through that.

And I could have used a joiner (a wide one) to surface the face (top or bottom) of the cutoffs but that would have left the other side un-surfaced. And on and on.

Let us know what you finally decide to do and whatever it is, best of luck with it.

Regards, Joe

[Kelly C. Hanna]

I agree with Jim...I bought teh planer first last time around, this time the jointer came first (I am sloooowwwly retooling the shop). The jointer is a prerequisite to the planer according to most people I've talked to.

[Alan Turner]

I will weigh in on the side of the planer. I lived without a jointer for many years. A PITA, but you can get good work out of the planer alone. At the start every project, I would dig out the sled form my planer, and put the rough stock on it. Where the stock was not flat, I would wedge it so that any down pressure from the planer would transmit diret to the sled, throgh the wedge. You can secure tehe wedge to toe stock with hot glue, or a nail through to the sled, and run it till the top is flat enough to register correctly. Take it off the sled, flip it, and you will have a truly flat board. So, a planer can be made to do the work of the jointer, although no very efficiently. I waited on a jointer till I cold get a big boy, and now have a very heavy 12", which is wonderful.
So, planer, then jointer.
If you can afford it, the European combo's make a lot of sense, although the beds on some seem a bit short. Great space savers. I did not go this way, although perhpas should have.
Alan