Face Jointing large width boards

[Ron Wright]

As a new woodworker, I have a question for all of you more experienced. I have a 6 inch jointer, and have some lumber that is more than six inches wide. I want to face joint these boards but they will not fit on the 6 inch jointer. The boards are not straight enough that I would feel comfortable running them against the fence on the table saw in order to cut them down to a size that I could use on the jointer. How do I get these to a managable size? Also when face jointing, I have the jointer set for 1/16th of an inch. Should I set the infeed/outfeed for a deeper cut in order to get the boards flat?
Thanks in advance for your assistance.

[Mark Pruitt]

If you have a circular saw, simply clamp a straight board to the one that you're wanting to put a straight edge on. Position it so that you will cut off just enought to create a straight edge; then you can go to your TS and rip boards that you can flatten on your 6" jointer. You can buy something called a jointrclamp (http://woodworker.com/cgi-bin/FULLPRES.exe?PARTNUM=829-106) that enables you to do this on the table saw, but frankly it's easier to me to do it with a circular saw and a straight-edge guide.

Jointer depth--1/16" is too much IMHO. I would go for 1/32".

[Mike Wilkins]

If you have a bandsaw, this is the best and safest tool to use for ripping stock without a straight edge to reference. If not, use the method suggested by the previous poster. Clamp or screw a straight edge to the board and cut one edge to use as a reference. I have used this method and it works.
Or you could just wait for some winning lottery numbers and get one of those 20" jointer/planer machines.
Good luck and watch those fingers.

[John Gregory]

If you have a surface planer, you can make a jig to joint wide pieces. FWW magazine had an article about one last February I think. The issue number is #175. They have a video online, but FWW-Online is now subscription and I do not subscribe to it.

[Jim Becker]

John has one of the solutions I'd go with...use a planer and a sled that you can shim the stock "flat" to make a few light passes to flatten the face and then process normally with the planer. The other option, depending on the material, is to use a router bridge to flatten the piece...it can even be used for both sides of something very wide and natural.

No way do I ever want to rip down a beautiful board just to flatten on a machine that is narrower than the stock needing the attention when there are other ways to accomplish the task.

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

This is what he does in his own words:

"use the jointer to surface plane as much as you can, but make sure you make a dent in the wood of a little less than 1/4" (if you have an 8" jointer and a 10" board you will end up with 2" not sufaced at all, right?).

ok, if you cover the part you just surfaced planed with a piece of 1/4" ply, it will and has to for this to work, stick out of the surface a little bit, this is what you want, this will ride on the rollers of the bottom of your thickness planer. and the little strip of 2" unsurfaced material will be face down and will touch nothing

so, now for the planer, assuming you knives are on top, the ply will ride on the bottom rollers providing a flat surface, enabeling the knives on top to cut a flat surface parallel to the ply on bottom, which is parallel to what you surfaced earlier with the jointer.

next flip the board over, take the plywood away, and plane the side wit h the little 2" of unsurfaced material left."

[Scott Banbury]

I regularly face joint up to 10" on my 8" jointer. The trick is to use a block or jack plane to knock off the unjointed strip remaining after each pass. Once it's flat hit both faces with the planer.

[Michael Conner]

IMHO If you have very many to do, the table saw is much faster. Of course, I don't have one the dedicated ez guides.

Mark, thanks for that link. I have been looking for a set of those clamps to help clean up some warped boards. I had almost decided that I would make my own but for that price, I think I'll just order a pair.

[Jim Becker]

The method that Cliff mentions will work with many jointers (but not all), but does require complete removal of the guard. One must take great care because of that! For that reason alone, I would never recommend it as the "first choice" when there are so many available. I used this technique a couple times when I had a 6" jointer and it works, but it was very uncomfortable for me... ;)

[Steve Clardy]

I don't normally face joint anything. I use my jointer to edge joint glue joints.
But when the ocassion arises, and my 6" jointer isn't wide enough for the board in question, I rip it in half with tablesaw, or EZ guide, face joint, then glue it back together.
I never remove the guard from my jointer. Its there for a reason.
I've got too many friends that have nipped the ends of their fingers off doing that.

[Deirdre Saoirse Moen]

As a new woodworker, you might also consider using a hand plane for those situations, either for the entire face or, as Scott suggests, for the part not jointed by machine.

[Ron Wright]

Thanks for all the advice. I was planning on buying a low angle smoother plane and an addtional 38 degree blade for smooting face grain. Will a low angle smoother work in this situation?
Steve, I would cut this stock, then smooth it on the jointer and planer and then glue it back up. I do not want to waste any fine wood.
Thanks again.

[glenn bradley]

Around here, you can have a lumber yard do it for you but the quality and cost varies widely.

[Michael Keating]

You can take the guard off of your jointer and run one face across the jointer. Then flip the board around and the face joint the section that is left. There was just a great article in Popular Woodworking on this methos. Or if your were in Havertown yesterday, you could have watched me do it.

Mike

[Jim Becker]

Ron, no matter how you choose to flatten your boards, cutting them down to component length after a quick "skim plane" (so you can judge the figure and grain) and then flattening will give you the best results with the least amount of wasted material. Make them a little over sized in length. You can cut to final length after fully dimensioning them in cross section. This method may also make it possible to face joint some components on your existing jointer for parts that will be 6" or less in width, reducing the amount of work you need to do along the way. But the skim planing step is quite important so you are using your stock to best effect.

[Michael Adelong]

IMHO If you have very many to do, the table saw is much faster. Of course, I don't have one the dedicated ez guides.

Mark, thanks for that link. I have been looking for a set of those clamps to help clean up some warped boards. I had almost decided that I would make my own but for that price, I think I'll just order a pair.

Michael, you do not need to buy the fancy jointer clamps. Use a scrap of plywood about the same length as your board. Rip it down to about 2-4" wider than the board. Do NOT change the setting of the TS after you cut your plywood strip.

Flip the board bottom side up, snap or draw a line down where you want your edge to be, and screw the plywood to the board. If the board is relatively flat and not prone to wobble, 2 screws close to the ends near the cut line may be all you need. Use more if required to keep the board stable.

All you need to do now is to use the TS to joint your board by using the plywood edge on the fence. (Be sure to countersink the screws to keep from scratching your TS top.)

3 pics are worth 3000 words, so I drew it up in Sketchup. :D

Michael

[Steve Clardy]

Michael, you do not need to buy the fancy jointer clamps. Use a scrap of plywood about the same length as your board. Rip it down to about 2-4" wider than the board. Do NOT change the setting of the TS after you cut your plywood strip.

Flip the board bottom side up, snap or draw a line down where you want your edge to be, and screw the plywood to the board. If the board is relatively flat and not prone to wobble, 2 screws close to the ends near the cut line may be all you need. Use more if required to keep the board stable.

All you need to do now is to use the TS to joint your board by using the plywood edge on the fence. (Be sure to countersink the screws to keep from scratching your TS top.)

3 pics are worth 3000 words, so I drew it up in Sketchup. :D

Michael


I've got a 12 footer similar up in the lumber rack I use when my wood supplier screws up and sends me lumber not edged one side.

[Jim Becker]

I do the same as Michael to straighten a wavy edge, but use an old piece of 1/8" hardboard and pin nails to hold it to the stock...

[Michael Conner]

Thanks for the tips on squaring-up boards. Would you recommend the countersunk screw or pin nail approach if you had a lot of wood to straighten? I have access to an endless supply of rough cut, and I was thinking that edge jointing using the TS would be faster than using the jointer. Especially since much of the wood is pecan which can dry sort of WaVeY.

[Steve Clardy]

I use screws

[Jesse Cloud]

First of all, don't do anything on your machines that doesn't feel absolutely safe. Steve is right, that guard is there for a good reason.

Secondly, flattening a board with hand tools, IMO, is much more fun than doing it mechanically. The problem is that it takes a little longer and in the end, you can't tell whether it was done by hand or machine. So, those of us who sell our work use hand tools only when it shows and adds to the value/price of your piece, e.g. handcut dovetails. Having said this, if you have an occassional wide board, don't hesitate to spend an extra 10 or 20 minutes with hand tools. You will gain an appreciation for this particular piece of wood, how the grain runs that you just don't get with a power jointer.

For what its worth, I use a Delta DJ-20 for boards up to 8 inches, or a combination of a Lee Valley jointer plane and a Steve Knight smoother plane for wider or ornerier boards.

Hope this helps, just my two cents worth, lots of ways work well, pick the one that is safe and brings you joy.

[Deirdre Saoirse Moen]

Cut it and glue it back up? ::sigh::

All that work to avoid using a plane simply doesn't make sense to me.

[Art Davis]

Michael, you do not need to buy the fancy jointer clamps. Use a scrap of plywood about the same length as your board. Rip it down to about 2-4" wider than the board. Do NOT change the setting of the TS after you cut your plywood strip.

Flip the board bottom side up, snap or draw a line down where you want your edge to be, and screw the plywood to the board. If the board is relatively flat and not prone to wobble, 2 screws close to the ends near the cut line may be all you need. Use more if required to keep the board stable.

All you need to do now is to use the TS to joint your board by using the plywood edge on the fence. (Be sure to countersink the screws to keep from scratching your TS top.)

3 pics are worth 3000 words, so I drew it up in Sketchup. :D

Michael

Michael: That was a superb rendering of sketches with Sketchup. And it offered a great explanation.
Art

[Jim Becker]

I have access to an endless supply of rough cut, and I was thinking that edge jointing using the TS would be faster than using the jointer.

The technique is great for getting a "relatively" straight edge on a board, but IMHO, you still need a pass on the jointer to get it truly straight and perpendicular to the faces once it's planed to thickness. (And this is after you have a flat board...)

[Michael Conner]

The technique is great for getting a "relatively" straight edge on a board, but IMHO, you still need a pass on the jointer to get it truly straight and perpendicular to the faces once it's planed to thickness. (And this is after you have a flat board...)

Jim, I completely agree. Problem is with some of these boards, I'd be on the jointer for a good while at 1/16 per pass. This should speed things up.

[Jim Becker]

Michael, I agree...shave the edges off to "relatively straight" on the TS and then do a pass or two on the jointer to "fine tune them". You can actually do that last pass once you have componentized things and are fitting for glue-up.

[Tom Hoffman]

I was taught years ago in 9th grade shop class to rip the wide boards, joint, plane, and then glue up in order to relieve any internal stresses that may be in the boards, thus resulting in a more stable surface. Maybe this only applies to wide table tops or maybe it's hogwash. Anyone ever heard of this?

[Alan DuBoff]

Cut it and glue it back up? ::sigh::

All that work to avoid using a plane simply doesn't make sense to me.Remember that some folks don't own a hand plane to function as a jointer. I know, I know, it's hard to imagine, but there are folks in the world that don't know about anything except power tools.

Not me, but there are folks like that! ;)

[Norman Hitt]

Remember that some folks don't own a hand plane to function as a jointer. I know, I know, it's hard to imagine, but there are folks in the world that don't know about anything except power tools.

Not me, but there are folks like that! ;)

Annnnnnnd.......there are folks with handplanes AND Carpal Tunnel problems that severely curtail the use of those handplanes for any extended period.:( Yeah, I know, I'm one of those.:rolleyes:

[Alan DuBoff]

Annnnnnnd.......there are folks with handplanes AND Carpal Tunnel problems that severely curtail the use of those handplanes for any extended period.:( Yeah, I know, I'm one of those.:rolleyes:Sorry to hear, I think one day my hands will act up, but have my fingers crossed.

However, no reason why using a power tool can't act as the means to get you to the end.

I'm not adverse to power tools. I have quite a few of them actually. I want to use them mainly for dimensioning lumber and timbers though, so that I can focus on the joinery by hand.

Maybe an odd way of thinking, but owning a large rip handsaw doesn't attract me when a table saw can do that in a seconds.

This thread is in regards to face jointing, and anyone who has squared a board up by hand (faces and edges) knows that it is quite a bit of work. I did a piece of 4/4 oak that is about 8" wide and about 16" long. It's not perfect, but close enough to use on a project. I spent about 2 hours on it and quite a bit of sweat. I could do the same thing in minutes on a power jointer and benchtop planer, both of which I do own.

With that said, having a hand plane to use when the board is too wide isn't a bad option, IMO. :) (providing your arms and hands can handle it :( )

[Jim Becker]

I was taught years ago in 9th grade shop class to rip the wide boards, joint, plane, and then glue up in order to relieve any internal stresses that may be in the boards, thus resulting in a more stable surface. Maybe this only applies to wide table tops or maybe it's hogwash. Anyone ever heard of this?

Tom, a lot of people were taught that. And there are a lot of people (including myself) that don't agree with the advice. A stable board is a stable board, no matter what it's width, especially after you construct your project. For example, let's say you have a very wide board that is perfect for the top of your table. (Or maybe two that match up so they even look like one wide board) If you use appropriate methods for milling the boards and attaching them to the table framework with wood movement in mind, you shouldn't have any problems with the boards. They are held flat by the framework, even as they are allowed to move seasonally.

I really cannot bring myself to rip up a beautiful board and re-glue it. It will NEVER look as good as it was in its original state as there is no such thing as a "zero kerf" cutter in woodworking. If the wide board is already unstable, than it just shouldn't be used for anything that keeps it wide.

I feel the same way about "alternating" growth rings. Ok, if you can do it without messing up the look of the grain, figure and color matching of a panel, great. It may add some additional stability. But I go for looks first...my goal for panel glue-ups is that it LOOKs like one board and any glue joints are as invisible as possible.