Issue with table beds on Delta 6" Jointer

[mark ahlenius]

Hi

I have a Delta Model 37-190 Jointer and am having issues with the beds being out of level wrt the fence. I am the original owner. When I set the fence to 90 degrees wrt the in-feed table, the out-feed table is no longer at 90 degrees to the fence. I've attached a few pictures of this issue. The only basic adjustment I see is the height adjustment of the out-feed table.

The pictures show a square on the in-feed table with it set to 90 degrees (no gaps) and then I put the square on the out-feed table with a gap near the bottom. I did the same experiment with my Wixey digital angle gauge and zero'd it on the in-feed table and then it shows that the out-feed table is slightly tilted.

I am not seeing a way to resolve this and wondering if anyone knows how to resolve this. Are some sort of shims needed?

thank you,

'mark


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[Ken Fitzgerald]

Mark,

First, have you checked the fence to insure that it is straight, not twisted?

2ndly, there has to be somewhere one could place shims though, personally, I worry more about the fence being perpendicular at the outfeed table rather than the infeed table. I found a manual online, and unfortunately, they don't provide a lot of help in the actual parts for the jointer.

[John TenEyck]

Raise the infeed table up so it's the same height as the outfeed table and then put a really good straight edge on the tables. You should see no gaps. If you do, then you'll need to figure out why. Put your straight edge on just one table at a time. If there are no gaps when it's at the front and back edge, then turn it diagonally across the table. Any gaps? If so, the table may be warped. Remove it from the machine and check it again with the straight edge. If the straightedge shows it's flat in every direction, then it's getting twisted on the machine. But if you see daylight then the table is warped and will need to be reground flat.

If the tables are flat by themselves but the straightedge shows a low spot when mounted on the jointer, then the table with the low spot needs to be raised on that side. If it's a wedge bed jointer then there will be jibs and screws that can be adjusted. If it's a parallelogram jointer, then you're on your own; I've never worked on one of those.

Also, you want to adjust the outfeed table, assuming it's flat, to be parallel with the C/L of the cutterhead.

John

[Cameron Wood]

I have a jointer fence that is twisted. I drilled and tapped the cast iron to mount a thin wood piece which was shimmed with tape to make a flat face.

You need a pretty decent straight edge to improve the tables. If they are flat individually, the outfeed table can be shimmed to the plane of the infeed one, since it moves little.

Use feeler gauges under the straight edge to check, and then loosen the gib screws and slide in pieces of beer can or pieces cut from the feeler set to shim the ways between the table and the base, tighten the gib screws, and recheck.

[Richard Coers]

Those angle boxes are not known for accuracy, especially the ones that only display 1 decimal point. For it to move another .1 degrees, you could be talking 1/64" on the table. I don't understand your comment about level. What you need is parallel tables and a square fence. Level has nothing to do with it.

[Mel Fulks]

If you are gluing pieces together lay them out like you want, put lite pencil lines across the whole thing . Joint one face toward the fence,
next board face out , all will flat….except …your exuberance ! I always use spring joints

[mark ahlenius]

Richard,
The digital measurement was my 2nd approach to determining if the table is out of kilter. The first method was that when I have the infeed table square to the fence, the outfeed table is not square to the fence and conversely, visa versa. So that's when I turned to the Wixey. So "level" was a relative term that I meant. I was checking the angle of the infeed table and zero'd out the digital gauge so it shows 0 degrees. then placing it in the same orientation showed that it was tipped downward towards the left which concurs with my initial test with the woodpecker square.

So next, my plan is to get a decent straight edge and see if the fence is twisted or not.

thanks for all the replies.

'mark

[Mark Wooden]

You need a decent straight edge to set up your jointer, as said, level has nothing to do with it
Your beds need to be flat end to end with each other; your cutter head should be parallel to the outfeed table, but more importantly, the knives have to be parallel to the outfeed table (unless, in the case of a helical cutterhead, where the head itself must be parallel) and your fence should be set square to the outfeed table. Your outfeed table is the one that controls the flatness and squareness of the cut, the infeed only the depth of cut. A slightly bent or twisted infeed table may not interfere with getting a good cut from your jointer
If your fence is twisted or bent, there are a few options to straighten it. Older Powermatic manuals described how to straighten a fence by stepping on it, clamping handles to it and twisting it, etc.. All would be done slowly and gradually to avoid cracking the cast iron. A bent or twisted bed is another matter, some can be lapped or scraped by hand, some require machining.The outfeed table has adustment screws to move it into alignment and it can be shimmed if necessary.
I own that same jointer, purchased new over twenty years ago and I always set it up as described above and it always delivers a good cut afterwards
Adjustments are covered well in the manual for the machine, you can download it if you dont have one.

[mark ahlenius]

Thanks all for the replies. Will let you know how I resolve this.
best
’mark

[mark ahlenius]

Ok I went down to the shop this afternoon first made sure that all 3 knives are set to the correct height of the outfeed table and they were. Then I used the best straight edge that I own which just is a 24 inch level (no jokes pls) I placed it on my table saw bed which I believe to be flat and the metal level sat flat with no light coming underneath it (now of course my table saw bed could be off too!).
When I placed the level across the fence of the jointer, the fence is cupped outwards at least 1/32 of an inch (towards the front face of the jointer) at each end. So this is part of the problem I believe.

I am not sure if this fence can be machined, I am not willing to try to bang on it and flatten it (never worked before for me). Has anyone tried that before? Not sure if thereÂ’s enough metal there for that.

Or perhaps I can find a used replacement, but would need to make sure that does not have the same problem. The other idea I had which someone else posted was to put a board on top of my fence which is flat. Thanks again everyone for your advice on this.

Mark

[John TenEyck]

Did you check to see if the jointer tables are flat and coplaner? You may have more than one problem.

If the fence is cast iron, don't try to bend it. It needs to be ground to make it flat. The least costly solution is to add a piece of wood, plastic, etc. to the front of the fence and then face joint it flat. Of course you could look for a replacement fence, but there's no guarantee it will be any flatter than what you have.

John

[mark ahlenius]

Hi John,

yes I did check that just using my 24 inch level. All appears good throughout the fence region. How would you face join the added fence wood once it’s screwed onto the cast iron fence? Assuming you would remove the fence from the jointer and then run it freehand over the jointer?

thanks

mark

[John TenEyck]

Hi John,

yes I did check that just using my 24 inch level. All appears good throughout the fence region. How would you face join the added fence wood once it’s screwed onto the cast iron fence? Assuming you would remove the fence from the jointer and then run it freehand over the jointer?

thanks

mark

Countersink the screws, then face joint it. 1/4" deep should be plenty.

Before that, if the wood doesn't fit flat on the metal fence, and it probably won't since it's not flat, then relieve the wood where needed so it fits as flat as possible.

John

[Ken Fitzgerald]

Mark,

If the fence needs to be jointed, take it to a local machine shop. That is something they should easily be able to do.

[Cameron Wood]

What I did was start with a flat piece (~7/16" white oak) and used pieces of masking tape to shim the wood flat when the screws are tightened to the CI fence.

I had the same symptoms- square on one table but not on the other. I was quite hard to see or measure the twist in the fence by itself.

[Maurice Mcmurry]

I posted about this before.
I spent hours and hours on an old Davis and Wells 6 inch long bed. The former owner had given up on it after having the beds surface ground. It was still wonky. I eventually discovered that there was a tiny bit of casting on the gib ways that had not been properly milled away at the factory. When the infeed was raised for a fine cut it rode up on the casting blob and one side of the in-feed bed lifted. Unfortunately the P.O. had the grinding done when the infeed was sitting on the casting blob. I filed the blob off and shimmed the ways with brass and was able to get it working quite well, then gave it back to him.

A level is not as good as a machinist straight edge for troubleshooting a jointer.


from the old thread Last edited by Maurice Mcmurry; 06-16-2022 at 7:53 AM.
I was "gifted" a Davis and Wells 6 inch jointer. The previous owner said it was messed up. He had tried to "fix" it by having the in-feed and out-feed tables surface ground. It was indeed messed up. Unfortunately the problem was a manufacturing flaw. A bit of casting where the in-feed met the base had not been milled. The un-milled bump did not allow the two haves of the gib ways to nest. I eventually got it to function (in one spot) with a whole lot of shim stock. I was excited about the machine and could see that they are top quality.

[mark ahlenius]

Thanks Ken, will look around and see how much this will cost me.

mark

[mark ahlenius]

Thanks Maurice. Quite an involved repair but worth it in the end.

[mark ahlenius]

Thanks Cameron. I’ll see if I need to go down this path. Right now I’d rather not lose another ~1/2 inch of my jointer width. But this is far cheaper and easier than having to take it apart and find a machinist.

[Cameron Wood]

Thanks Cameron. I’ll see if I need to go down this path. Right now I’d rather not lose another ~1/2 inch of my jointer width. But this is far cheaper and easier than having to take it apart and find a machinist.

Yeah, I lost maybe 1/4" of width in the deal, but it works well now.

[Maurice Mcmurry]

Here is a link for the manual Ken Fitzgerald mentioned.

https://www.ereplacementparts.com/delta-37190-type-jointer-parts-c-3275_7655_13888.html

If the fence is warped you could glue 1/8 inch masonite to it with contact cement. Lap the masonite, then glue on formica. My homemade Biesemeryer fence copy for the table saw was faced with thin pine, then lapped and covered with formica. The pine and formica are glued on with Gorilla glue. It is dead flat.
For troubleshooting the Davis and Wells I used a feeler gauge, a bright light, and real good straight edge to check the infeed table, the outfeed table, and the fence, I did not find the flaw until I checked everything several times with the beds in several positions. There is also a way to check for flat with a dial indicator and math. That makes my brain hurt. Dan Gelbart starts talking about the reversal method for checking flatness at 22:45 in this video.


https://youtu.be/cwdoUjynpEk?si=xW5CcSxzJOKIwFmV

[mark ahlenius]

Mark,

If the fence needs to be jointed, take it to a local machine shop. That is something they should easily be able to do.

Hi all,

I wanted to give a quick update (and thanks for all the suggestions) to this post on the resolution. I did end up taking the fence to a few machine shops near me. Most of these places (Chicago suburbs) have a minimum fee to do work. I went with the 3rd place as their price was the lowest and what the described they would do seemed to make the most sense. The problem was that the back of the fence was not flat, so They first had to grind that flat to be able to put in on their large (and I mean large) grinder. The grinder had a magnetic base to hold the piece while the ground it.

I had detected that the fence cupped out towards the front, and the owner told me it did indeed but it also had a twist to it. He basically got it flat within a few thousandths of an inch. It now sits pretty straight to the outfeed bed, but there’s still a small deviation in the bed which I will live with. So for not its much better than it was!

Thanks again!

Finished product below.

[Cameron Wood]

Looks good- don't forget the paste wax.

[Ronald Blue]

Looks like they knew what they were doing. Cast iron has to be flooded with coolant to or it will do ugly things when grinding. As Cameron said wax it now and enjoy.

[Ken Fitzgerald]

Glad you were able to get it flattened Mark! As suggested, wax it and enjoy!