Byrd head

[Andrew Fleck]

After lots of frustration over tear out I finally bit the bullet and got myself a Byrd head for my planer. I use a lot of maple for my projects and nothing would make me madder than sending a board through on the final pass only to find a fresh tear that was too deep to salvage the board. I read a lot of reviews on the Byrd and most people seemed to be satisfied with their decision.

Installation was fairly simple. (I have a Grizzly G0551) I pretty much just followed the directions that came with the head. For those that are considering doing this Grizzly has a video on their website that walks you through it. Most four post planers should be similar. I didn't have a deep well socket big enough to seat the new bearing on the Byrd head so I used a piece of 1.5" PVC to seat it. It actually worked great. Other than finding something to pound the bearing down the shaft the rest of the installation was easy.

Now, the new head does not disappoint. It is everything I hoped it would be. I've sent multiple pieces of maple through and my tear out has been virtually eliminated. I say virtually because I intentionally sent some pieces through against the grain just to see what would happen. It did tear some but not really that bad at all. The pieces I sent through correctly came out perfectly.

Hopefully this helps somebody out that is considering a spiral cutterhead. I used a Byrd, but I'm sure any spiral cutterhead would give similar results.

[Matt Mackinnon]

I have both a byrd helical head and a grizzly spiral head. The byrd was installed into my Steel City 12" jointer, and I will admit it works like a charm as advertised. But when it came time to upgrade my planer, I went with a stock 20" grizzly GO454Z that is more accurately a segmented carbide head with the carbide inserts arranged in a spiral pattern. Unlike the byrd, the carbide inserts are oriented in line with the head and cut parallel to the boards face.

I had a 3 blade big iron 15" planer, and I too had nothing but problem with maple with those hidden curls and tare-out that sneaks up on you. The new planer doesn't have any of those problems. So I don't know if you really do gain more from a byrd head. On paper it mathematically does make more sense but in the real world i have yet to find wood that my jointer can cut without tare-out but the planer cant.