Planer with knives or helical head

[Dustin Lorenz]

First off, WOW what a great site. :) I have been reading threads from here for about 6 months now and getting lots of good info. I've been building outdoor furniture for a while nothing fancy just real simple stuff with dimensional lumber. I got a job from my brother to build a rustic log bar in his buddy's basement. The guy was so thrilled with it I went back and finished his whole basement like it. :D Anyways, I'm looking at picking up a new planer (my first one). I'm getting sick of buying overpriced preplaned lumber. I have to many people I know that cut lumber and could be saving myself a lot I'm sure of that. My question though is how do the traditional knives compare with the ones with the inserts or helical style as some companys have called them. I'm looking at the one from Steel City the 13" Portable. That would be about as big as I would need. Is there others out there that compare? This one only seems to come with the helical head. I mainly work with pine and cedar so is it better to have the knives or inserts for different types of wood? How do the shavings seem to be in relation to how they are on a knife style planer. (When I used to go get all my cedar planed the guy would give me the shavings so my dad could use them for his hound's bedding in there dog houses. So he was hoping I would get the same shavings from whatever I decide to buy, not that that has the major influence on my decision.;)) Any insight would be much appreciated
Thank You

[Jason Hallowell]

Helical head planers make cleaner cuts with less tearout, especially in knotty or figured wood. They also run much quieter. The biggest downside to the helical head in my opinion is the much higher cost.

[David Romano]

I've not used a helical head, but I wish I had one for my jointer and my planer. One factor to consider regarding cost is that you will save money and frustration by wasting less wood because your tearouts will be less. I find that my straight knives cause me to take extremely shallow passes and despite paying close attention to grain direction, tearout is inevitable, If deep enough and if happening on the final pass or two, it can turn a nice piece of wood into scrap. This is even more true if the grain switches back, like at a knot. To be on the safe side, I end up buying thicker wood than'd be necessary to allow for unpredictable tearouts.

Then there's the chips that cause raised lines across the wood that must be sanded or scraped off, a further pain in th butt. The helical heads have rotatable carbide inserts


Dave

[Fred Hargis]

If I read the specs correctly, the SC planer has HSS inserts....first time I've seen that. But the advantages are there for those type of heads and in addition to what's already been mentioned, with the inserts you don't spend time fiddling around trying to get the blades set correctly. But for the noise reduction was worth the cost, I had recenly put a Byrd head in my Delta planer. Prior to that, it was the only tool in the shop that made me wear the muff type ear protetcion (the one I used when shooting). With the Byrd head, I can now be quite comfortable with just ear plugs. Even so, for your use in soft wood the knives may do just as good a job.

[Rod Sheridan]

Hi Dustin, you mentioned wanting a planer so that you can buy rough wood and plane it yourself.

A planer is 1/2 of the team required to do that, you also need a jointer.

A jointer makes wood flat, a planer makes one surface parallel to another surface.

To prepare wood you

1) Joint one face to make it flat using the jointer bed

2) Joint one edge at right angle to the jointed face using the bed and fence

3) Plane the second face in the planer

4) rip the wood to width you want

5) run it through the planer on edge if you want to make the ripped edge parallel to the jointed edge.

I've only owned two kinds of planers and jointers, the first were General machines that used knives that were adjustable, in a cutterhead. These were sent out for grinding, and re-installed, requiring precision adjustment.

The new machine I own is a Hammer A3-31 which use knives that are indexed into the head. The knives have two edges, and are disposable. They require no adjustment, just install and run the machine.

I've never considered purchasing a helical head, the knives give a good surface treatment.

Regards, Rod.

[Dustin Lorenz]

If I read the specs correctly, the SC planer has HSS inserts....first time I've seen that.

I never noticed that either. I assumed there were carbide, which is what most inserts are correct?

[Tom Hintz]

I changed from knife-type planers to the helical head (Powermatic PM15HH, link to my reivew with photos and video below) and wish I had done so 30 years ago or so. Of course this machine wasn't around yet but I can still wish.
The performance in terms of cut quality is remarkable. I have intentionally run highly figured boards through against the grain just to amaze someone in my shop. And they were amazed at the lack of chipping or tearout.
The sound reduction is so dramatic that when running the first board through the helical head planer I thought my table adjustment had missed the cutterhead entirely, until the board came out the other side freshly planed. I used to wait until later in the morning to do any planing, not my DC is louder than the planer.
These machine certainly do ccost more but I think my PM15HH is worth every penny.

http://www.newwoodworker.com/reviews/pm15hhrvu.html

[Jim King]

As with most everyone I started with knife planers and used them for many years. A few years ago I bought a 20" helical head General . I used to spend at least 3 hours a day changing and setting the blades. Now I go for up to a month before I rotate the helical chips.

I too, used to wory about shavings but not anymore. With 3 hours a day more working the finished product far out weighs the shavings produced.

I work with "hard" woods such as Bloodwood, Ipe , Kingwood and others similar from here in the Amazon. I now have a retro fit 40" helical head planer also and will never ever think of a knife planer again. They are great on crotch wood, high figure and twisted grain where a knife planer does not stand a chance.

My opinion.

[Fred Hargis]

I never noticed that either. I assumed there were carbide, which is what most inserts are correct?
The only ones (Grizzly and Byrd) I've ever seen are carbide.....I would think having them made out of HSS would make them a lot less useful. But that's just a guess. The HSS inserts should be quite a bit cheaper.....

[Cary Falk]

Byrd makes a spiral cutterhead with real carbide cutters for the Dewalt lunchbox. By the time you go that route you are pushing the price of a stationary planer with straight knives. I also agree that a spiral head with HSS cutters would be only slightly better than a head with self indexing knives.

[Chip Lindley]

Its true! Lookie here!

eBay item #390068408896

Hmmmm....HSS helical inserts! Might be a novel idea...IF....the price is considerably less than carbide! Some home hobbists will NEVER reset their helical heads with a new carbide cutting face! So? What if HSS inserts have to be turned once in a while? HSS can be honed sharper than carbide, but dulls 10 times faster. Somewhere in the middle there is a trade-off!

HSS is all I have ever worked with on planer/jointer knives! I know how long a sharpening lasts! Resetting inserts to expose a fresh new cutting face may be more fun than grinding knives and resetting them in the cutter head! It all depends on the PRICE! .....Hmmmm!

[Jeff Duncan]

The spiral vs straight knife argument has been beaten to death here and on every other website related to wood so I'll pass on that part. I can however tell you that in my experience the shavings from the spiral insert heads were much lighter and fluffier than those out of the straight knife head.
good luck,
JeffD

[george wilson]

I think the helical cutters plane smoother because they have a very steep cutting angle,and act like scraper blades. The Northfield planer in the millwork shop in Williamsburg had a different type of head,but it used regrindable carbide inserts that cut by scraping. I ran curly maple through it,and it did not tear out anywhere. Really quite amazing.

Before these heads came out,I know people who ground a bevel on the cutting faces of regular HSS conventional knives,so they would scrape. It worked quite well. Just takes more power,which you already have in a planer. Of course,the individual inserts would take less power since the cutters are small,and not all in contact with the wood.

[Larry Edgerton]

I am very happy with my Tersa head.