Wood Magazine Lunchbox Review

[Dave Avery]

Just received my first issue of Wood (couldn't pass up 3 years for $28, even though I haven't been that imprtessed with Wood in the past).

Anyway, they have a review of 10 small planers. Conspicuous by its absence is the Dewalt. Since that model seems to be in the top 3-4 usually mentioned by those considering a purchase, I'm surprised. My first thought is that, while I saw a couple of big Delta and Grizzly ad's, I did not notice any paid press from Dewalt. Am I being too cynical? Dave.

[George Summers]

If you go to the Wood website and look under forums for the tool review forums and then check the portable planer forum, you will see their reasoning and then a lot of responses from reader/posters. You might even recognize my name on a couple of the responses.

George

[Ted Shrader]

Both of you have valid points. While Wood denies it, there sure appears to be a correlation between advertising space and good review words. Also typical of a Wood "evaluation" is the mere repetition of the specs of the machine - as provided my the manufacturers. Really a "buyers guide" rather than an evaluation.

In order to move this away from a Wood "bash" - I recommend in the future they do objective evaluations of each machine then determine and publish each machine's specs themselves - even compare the specs as actual vs rated. The sample size (from each manufacturer) needs to be larger to eliminate the possibility of an anomaly.

Additionally, it would be nice to see how the new generation of a machine compares to its predecessor. In this case, would one be better off looking for an older version of the DeWalt planer?

Ted

[Bob Reilly]

I read that Dewalt declined to send a planer in for testing because they will be introducing a new model to compete with the Delta 22-580 in the near future.

[Tim]

Hi Ted,

Quality of cut and ergonomics are what it comes down to right? Why test against specs when "the big picture" is more imporant? Does it matter if a spec says the feed rate is X when it's actually a bit over X? I'm not saying that a test against specs wouldn't be a good idea, but obviously their review $$ are limited. I could pick it apart a bit (as could any of us) but I thought they gave some good user review type information. Although there is no way to tell how their score card ratings might have been colored by advertising dollars. The only way to remove that from the test is to test on a purely objective basis. Remember when FWW tried to do that with router bits?

Have a good weekend all!

[Bob Oswin]

I think It would be better for the readers if the surveyors noted who was contacted and who offered to be evaluated.

I remember being asked to submit a product to a high profile evaluator a few years back. (in another field)
I did so, and was shocked to find the product being sold in a company that the evaluator had shares in.
The only way they l could have sourced the product was from my submission to them.

I am mentioning this because it's a lot harder out there than we sometimes realize.
Personally, I do not submit products to third parties anymore.

Regards
Bob