Help Diagnose planing woes

[Tony Wilkins]

I'm trying to flatten 3 boards (about 6" x 18") to make up a table top for a small Shaker table. There was a degree of cup or bow in all the boards. I did just fine working across the grain with both the jack (LV 5 1/4) and the jointer (LV BU). I got some deep tear out when I started to try to go diagonal with jointer. Not what I wanted but at least I knew that I had to be careful in that direction.


My real trouble is getting the jointer going with the grain. On the board with the bow, I got what I expected with shavings at the beginning and end of the board. On all the boards, however, when I took the jointer along the grain I either got nothing or gouges. I just couldn't get it narrowed in to where I could get something in between. Thinking I might have misread the grain direction I tried to other way - big mistake - got the dig in and lift up showing I had got it right in the first place.


Any suggestions?

[Andrew Fleck]

Nothing or gouges seems like your iron needs to be sharpened. How deep of a cut are you trying to take?

[Tony Wilkins]

Nothing or gouges seems like your iron needs to be sharpened. How deep of a cut are you trying to take?

Not particularly deep. I'll definitely go back and sharpen and see if that helps.

[Jim Koepke]

Imagine your board being like the bow of a bow & arrow. The jointer is like the string. It can only touch the ends or maybe the edges.

You might be able to see this with a good light and laying the jointer on its side.

I get things like this all the time with pine that hasn't settled.

jtk

[David Weaver]

sharpening, sounds like. When the wear on an iron makes it so that the low point of the iron is behind the edge instead of at the edge, it will want to skate unless you present a lot of edge, which results in a catastrophic issue against the grain unless...you know...cap iron. Then it'll just stop in its tracks and not tear out.

[Tony Wilkins]

Sharpen and ​chip breaker check on the menu for tomorrow.