Jet 12" Jointer/Planer Combo Unit - Comments

[Jimmy Powell]

I am setting up a "small" shop area in my wife's garage. I am looking at the Jet 12" Jointer/Planer as one of my tools. I would like to here comments from anyone who has one or has had experience with one. I would also like to hear whether you al think the Helical head is worth the extra money.

I am new to wood working basically building small boxes, cutting boards and such now. I am looking to graduate to large projects down the road. I hope in a feww years to be able to build a dedicated shop, but that is a ways off.

Thanks in advance for your assistance with a newbie.

Jimmy

[Jon Stinson]

Wood magazine did a review of Jet, Grizzly, and MiniMax's 12 in combo unit. Grizzly came out as the winner. It was two publications ago I believe.

Grizzly also makes a decent looking 10" combo unit which is on sale right now for 995 with free shipping, dunno if that makes any impact on your decision.

[Barry Vabeach]

John, there have been a couple of posts on these. I think the Grizzly is better on price, but Jet has a small edge in convenience . I bought the Jet because I got a good deal. The conversion is pretty easy in both, the Jet advantage is that the fence doesn't have to be removed. I have the straight knives, for a hobbyist they work great. For small boxes, you would be better off using the extra money not for helical but on other tools.If you don't already have one, you will want a good sized dust collector, planing generates tons of shavings and a 1 1/2 hp would probably be a minimum size. I haven't heard much on this size jointer, but understand that typically the helical heads are quiter, which would be welcome and of course you don't have to set knives, but as a hobbyist you shouldn't have to be that too much. If you are really lazy, like I am, it would be nicer to have free standing units, but they take up a lot of space. If you are upgrading from the 12 1/2 lunchbox and 6 / 8 inch jointer, you will love having a 12 inch jointer. The great news is that jointer planers, unlike a lot of other machines ( bandsaws, tablesaws ) don't need a lot of extra blades or accessories to make them work well, so you don't get hit with a lot of costs later on. If you are anywhere nearby, send me a pm and you can see the Jet in action. If you are interested in the Grizzly, call them and ask if they will give you contact info on customers with that machine nearby so you can see it in action.

[Jeffrey Makiel]

I would also like to hear from folks that bought the JJP-12HH with the helical head.

During the weekend that Woodcraft had the 20% discount on all Jet tools and accessories, Jet released the JJP-12HH on the Friday just prior to the weekend sale. Although, the Woodcraft website was not updated to include the new model :(, I know some folks were able to purchase a JJP-12HH through their local Woodcraft store. If you were one of the lucky ones, please share your thoughts. :)

-Jeff :)

[Danny Burns]

Wood magazine did a review of Jet, Grizzly, and MiniMax's 12 in combo unit. Grizzly came out as the winner. It was two publications ago I believe.

Grizzly also makes a decent looking 10" combo unit which is on sale right now for 995 with free shipping, dunno if that makes any impact on your decision.
http://www.woodstore.net/12jo.html

[Curt Harms]

and would buy it again. Mine has straight blades; the helical cutterhead was not offered when I bought mine. I don't use highly figured woods and so far tear-out has not been an issue. Here's a Jet video for the non-helical head machine-- http://www.jettools.com/products/jointer_planer/default.html

I installed a digital readout and would recommend one. One of the downsides of the combo machine is that you may not be able to leave the planer set up to final thickness for a project. The DRO makes it easy to plane stock, switch over to jointer then switch back to planer and return to the previously set depth.

HTH

Curt

[Rod Sheridan]

and would buy it again. Mine has straight blades; the helical cutter-head was not offered when I bought mine. I don't use highly figured woods and so far tear-out has not been an issue. Here's a Jet video for the non-helical head machine-- http://www.jettools.com/products/jointer_planer/default.html

I installed a digital readout and would recommend one. One of the downsides of the combo machine is that you may not be able to leave the planer set up to final thickness for a project. The DRO makes it easy to plane stock, switch over to jointer then switch back to planer and return to the previously set depth.

HTH

Curt

Good point Curt, I have a Hammer A3-31 with the digital readout in the planer elevation handle.

With a good readout, you simply set the planer to the correct indication and the wood comes out the same as the last time.

I really like having a combination unit, I went from an 8" General jointer and 14" planer to the Hammer.

It's great to have a 12" wide jointer, and I have more space in my shop, and more machine capacity than when I had separate machines.

regards, Rod.

P.S. One other item to possibly consider is whether the cutterhead is available with Tersa, or other quick change knives.

My Hammer has the quick change disposable knife system, and believe me it's great to change knives in 5 minutes with no adjustment required. In addition the knives are aproximately the same cost as the sharpening was for my General planer.

[Kendall Stokke]

does anyone have a source for the digital readouts.
sound like a great upgrade to my planer

thanks

kendall

[Matt Benton]

My shop is half of a two car garage, and I sold my JJP12 and am in the process of buying separates. While it is convenient with respect to not having to move the fence, I found that I had a few issues maintaining the table positions after switching to the planer and back.

I also felt the machine is a little light for a 12" J/P. I did have mine on casters, which probably contributed to the problem, but it just didn't seem to be stable enough when jointing. If I did it again, I would look at the extra 100 lbs of the Grizzly.

[Rod Sheridan]

does anyone have a source for the digital readouts.
sound like a great upgrade to my planer

thanks

kendall

Hi Kendall, what planer do you own?

Regards, Rod.

[Paul Johnstone]

does anyone have a source for the digital readouts.
sound like a great upgrade to my planer

thanks

kendall

I have a Wixley digital readout on my planer. It took a bit of jerry rigging to get it to work, but I think they can be adapted to most planers. Not sure how well they'd work on a combo unit, since I have no experience with combos.

[jason lambert]

I had a jet jointer, it had issues went back for warntee so I had a credit went to buy the combo machine a year ago and one I looked at it decided not to. These where my reasons, not sure if they redesigned some of them.

1. no easy extension on the plainer outfeed tables. or any table.
2. I didn't feel the thing would stay in perfect alignment and was a pain to adjust anything on it. for example if you need to change the knives you must align them to the plainer table below since there is no adjustments on the plainer table for tilt or anything. Try aligning knives up side down and guessing how far they are from the table. If you are lucky enought to get that right you then need to adjust the jointer tables to match. Just seems like to much of a nightmare to me.

[Curt Harms]

I had a jet jointer, it had issues went back for warntee so I had a credit went to buy the combo machine a year ago and one I looked at it decided not to. These where my reasons, not sure if they redesigned some of them.

1. no easy extension on the plainer outfeed tables. or any table.
2. I didn't feel the thing would stay in perfect alignment and was a pain to adjust anything on it. for example if you need to change the knives you must align them to the plainer table below since there is no adjustments on the plainer table for tilt or anything. Try aligning knives up side down and guessing how far they are from the table. If you are lucky enought to get that right you then need to adjust the jointer tables to match. Just seems like to much of a nightmare to me.

True, I don't see an easy way to add bed extensions. I typically cut my stock to rough length before face and edge jointing and can process stock up to 6' long without a problem. Rule of thum is max length of stock to joint is twice the length of the planer beds. The beds are 55", so max length of stock to joint would be 110". That's longer than I need. I have also set roller stands using a 4' level off the jointer beds which helps with longer stock if necessary. If I needed to joint 8'+ boards on a regular basis it'd be a PITA.

Another consideration is that the planer bed moves, not the cutterhead. Any infeed or outfeed supports would need to be kept the same height as the planer bed. This would be true of any planer on which the bed moves, as well as drum sanders of similar design. I typically don't plane more than 3/16" or so off so I don't adjust infeed & outfeed supports and haven't had a problem with snipe.

There absolutely IS a way to adjust the planer bed to the knives. There are 4 bolts, one in each corner of the cast iron base of the planer bed. Beside each bolt is an allen screw. Loosen the bolt, turn the allen screw to align the planer bed with the knives then tighten the bolts. The procedure is the manual available here (http://content.jettools.com/manuals/708475_m.pdf). Bottom of page 17. The manual & video on Jet's site should answer quite a few questions. I haven't had to change knives yet and the thickness of planed 11" boards are within .02" side to side from the factory so I saw no reason to mess with it. I guess with every knife change i'd have to set the knives to the jointer beds then check them against the planer beds. That seems like a good argument in favor of the helical heads--no knife adjustment. Once the jointer & planer beds are set, they shouldn't need to be readjusted.

HTH

Curt

[jason lambert]

They must of changed that then, thank god. When we called jet on the one we have on the show room floor there is no adjustment but it was one of the original units.

[Curt Harms]

does anyone have a source for the digital readouts.
sound like a great upgrade to my planer

thanks

kendall

Wixey has DRO's for planers that will measure a bit more than 6". The Jet J/P bed will lower 8" below the cutterhead and has to be lowered to 6.03" in order to flip the dust hood. Wixey is working on a DRO that will measure 12". They're trying to have it available by the end of the year. It did take some "engineering" to adapt the Wixey to the Jet J/P but with some help from SMC friends I was able to get it to work.

[Barry Vabeach]

I agree with Curt on most of what he said, except on changing the knives, which I have done once, you don't need to check their alignment with the planer bed. Once you use a dial indicator to confirm the outfeed table is parallel to the cutter head, you then set the knives to the outfeed table and you don't have to worry about their alignment with the planer bed, it won't change since the cutter head doesn't move. I also agree on the Wixey, it took some time for me to figure out how to mount it, with help from pictures from others, but it works fine and mine lowers about 7 inches to clear the dust chute. As to stability, mine rocked a little while on the mobile base, so I took it off and it is resting on the floor and is pretty stable. I think it would be nicer if they added outfeed rollers to the planer table, but I am using an stand alone roller table, and that has worked pretty well.

[Kendall Stokke]

will this wixley work on a rigid 13"
i think the max depth if 6" on mine.

where is the wixley available through?

all help appreciated

thanks

kendall

[Barry Vabeach]

Kendall, Woodcraft, Hartville and others sell the Wixey planer gauge. Go to the Wixey page and you can see how it is installed on various planers. It is ideal for a 12 -13" lunchbox planer with 6 inches of range where the base is fixed and the head goes up and down. http://www.wixey.com/planer/fit/index.html#ridgid