TS noise and Jointer ?

[Al Willits]

Having the night from he## and need some help please.

First maybe easy question is on the jointer, trying to make a flat edge surface on a 5 foot 5/4 white oak board and I seem to be making a wedge, seems to work better if I rotate the board between passes, I am pushing the board in, and as soon as the front passes the cutter I shift to the out side of the board to keep feeding though.
Reading the search section that seems to be the prefered method, but not sure about having to rotate ends to keep from making a wedge????

Next one might be a bit more difficult, hope not but...I just got the TS sled done, waxed and ready to go, the first test board went though ok and I tried some of the 5/4 oak I have, that wasn't so lucky, at the end of the cut the blade bound and stopped, probably my fault as I was hanging on for dear life, not knowing what to expect, anyway, I removed the board and the sled and checked the blade (a 24 tooth ripping blade) and it seemed ok, I removed the blade and checked for true and it seemed ok, when rotating on the saw it also seemed good.

Unfornately when I started the TS again I got about a short second of a chatter/screech/who knows sound from the saw.
I continued to ramp up and seemed ok after that, it does it every time it starts and being the newbie I am, I'm afraid to use the saw that way.
I tried a new blade and it still does it, if I remove the blade it starts quietly and the bearings and shaft seem to be ok
Wondering if the belt burnt and would that cause the noise or?
I wish I was a bit more familiar with the saw, but until I can figure it out, it stays off.
It's a Delta hybrid btw.
tia

Al...who has a noisey TS and a bad hard drive in his comp....not a good weekend so far....thank god cows don't fly....:)

[Paul Simmel]

Al,

As to jointing… you should not be putting any pressure on the board as you feed it. You should just push it through letting the knives flatten. If you push downward on a bowed board, you will not take the bow out. If you are pushing down more on one side than another, you will certainly not flatten your board. If you are squaring a board, after one side is flat, square the other edge by pushing the flat side against the fence… but no downward pressure on the knives.

Further, you do not use a jointer as a planer. It is very common to get a wedge or uneven thicknesses after your milled side is flat anyway. That flat side is only good for one thing and one thing only; a reference for the planer bed. Same with squaring. Just reference points for the final dimensioning of your piece/s.

As to the TS… I do not understand how this could happen on a sled, or how the sled figures in. Ripping a long piece maybe. I can’t imagine you locking the blade, but I suppose you could on a weak saw with no hp. In any event, sounds to me like you damaged the belt by over aggressively “hanging on”. A “screech” is more than likely a belt issue upon start up. Was the blade locked and the motor still turning? I’m sure you will have some better advice from others who may have experienced this.

Good luck.

[Greg Funk]

Al,

As to jointing… you should not be putting any pressure on the board as you feed it. You should just push it through letting the knives flatten. If you push downward on a bowed board, you will not take the bow out. If you are pushing down more on one side than another, you will certainly not flatten your board. If you are squaring a board, after one side is flat, square the other edge by pushing the flat side against the fence… but no downward pressure on the knives.

Further, you do not use a jointer as a planer. It is very common to get a wedge or uneven thicknesses after your milled side is flat anyway. That flat side is only good for one thing and one thing only; a reference for the planer bed. Same with squaring. Just reference points for the final dimensioning of your piece/s.


I'd have to disagree with you here. If you are getting a noticeable wedge out of the board your jointer needs an alignment. The infeed and outfeed tables need to be coplaner and the outfeed table should be level with the jointer knives.

When jointing, once the board is about 12" past the knives you should apply pressure to the outfeed table.

[Paul Simmel]

>>> When jointing, once the board is about 12" past the knives you should apply pressure to the outfeed table.

If you do that, then you are just pushing the bow down and not flattening.. just tracing the bow with your downward pressure. Trust me… just keep your fingers feathering on out feed table as you push, the knives will keep the piece down as it goes through. This is extremely safe and the only way to get a flat board.

I guess I’d only add, you WANT the board’s stress to stress as you joint it. To push against this stress on a jointer is to defeat the purpose of jointing.

If I have a twisted, bowed board (they all are) and joint it square as I have mentioned above, you will have two straight, flat sides with the stress milled out of the piece and a wedge (to be expected and planed out in the next operation). Your way, you might have a flat and square two sides, but it will be twisted and bowed. Not what a jointer is supposed to do.

Jointing is the first and most important phase, but only the first phase. The only thing a jointer does is make two sides straight, flat, and so long as your fence is square to the out feed table, square. Your planer, in phase two, takes the wedge out of the jointed material (which is always wedged and “weird” until) finished off.

[Gary McKown]

I have to disagree with Paul, too; why do we pay big money for a long, flat outfeed table, anyway? According to his method, a 4-6" outfeed (or maybe none at all) would work fine.

I do agree that pressure on the outfeed - too close to the knives - will tend to reproduce any bow/twist, but 'way out there on the table is the only *reference* available for flattening a board. Using the technique described by Greg, each pass will remove some degree of the irregularity. If it is that far out of shape, just expect to make multiple passes before it gets to the flat stage.

[Paul Simmel]

Gary,

>>> I have to disagree with Paul, too; why do we pay big money for a long, flat outfeed table, anyway?

You’re making my point.

If the out feed table is 10’ long, what I said is still valid.

If you have a long in/out feed table, all the better but not why you think.

We all know that when jointing, you do so with the board crown (bow) up. Why is that? Because we want to nibble the front and rear with each pass so the bowed underbelly gets eventually flat.

Edit >>> flat edge surface on a 5 foot 5/4 white oak board

I'm not talking about short boards... A long board can be pushed through as I have mentioned.

Take an extreme” example (not for me but for you). Take an 8’ board, crown up, and lay it on a flat floor. Crown up, you may have as much as ½” in the middle above the floor, right? Picture the floor as your in feed and out feed tables. Crown up, if you push the 8’ piece through the cutters you will ONLY nibble the first and last bits of the board because the belly (high portion) is still higher than the cutters/knives. As you repeat your passes, more and more of the front and rear parts of the board are milled off flat. As you push your piece through a few times, the under part of the crown eventually gets lower and lower as the ends get nibbled. Eventually your piece will have the lower portion of the crowned board (the concaved part) hitting the cutters… hence it’s FLAT. So you have milled the BOTTOM of the crown out and it is now flat. The upper part of your board, however, will retain the original bowed top, hence “wedge”.

The advantage of long in/out tables is that they are more like a floor (longer).

A short jointer with a long board will just produce an elliptical piece time and time again because the far front and rear of the piece hang over the front and rear of the short jointer.

The short jointer with a long board, even without any pressure at all, will stay concaved because it is not long enough to balance front and rear.

The reason you do not want to pressure the piece as it goes through is because you want the board to naturally pass through the cutters. On the out feed side it will lay flat if you allow this. If you push down, however, you will not allow the middle of the bow to come down naturally. You will be pushing the underbelly down! You do not want to do that. You want the piece as flat (straight) as possible.

If you don’t understand why forcefully pushing a board flat onto the out feed table as you pass it through your jointer, is defeating the purpose of your jointer, then I give up.

[Kyle Kraft]

Al,

The TS problem sounds like the board may have had a crown or bow to it, which may have been placed against the fence of the sled. This would have made a gap between the edge of the board and the fence. At the end of the cut the board could have pushed into the fence pinching the blade.

It also sounds like a belt slipping problem with the "chirp" sound at startup. Tightening the belts may help some, but don't tighten them up like a geetar string!! We have a 7.5hp Powermatic 72 at work with the triple belt drive and it gives a nice chirp at startup...has done it for years, with new belts or old.

As for vibration, it only takes a blade bore hole thats a thousandth or two oversize to cause a lot of vibration. I have a Freud blade that runs so true I can balance a nickel on my saw table. When I change over to my "beater" blade the saw practically walks across the floor!

[Mike Cutler]

I think we are confusing Al.

Al. Are you trying to edge joint the board? or face joint the board? It sounds like you are edge joining.

One thing that helps me with long board on a short jointer is to draw a reference line that I want to joint to. It's a visual aid. In any case, if you are getting a wedge shaped board while edge jointing. The most likely culprit is pressure applied to the infeed table. It is easy to apply pressure to the infeed side, because you are trying to steady the board you don't even notice that you are doing it.
5' is not an excessively long board. I have done 12' on a Jet 6" jointer successfully, so 5' can be done.
Steps for edge jointing. ( I use the same method as Paul, crown up. That way I can see more what is happening)

1. Place the material on the infeed side of the jointer. The jointer should be set to remove approximately 1/32" ( Mine is actually less)

2. Start the material into the cutterhead, concentrate on keeping the material flat to the fence at this point. Left hand forward

3. Push the material through the cutterhead and apply downward pressure,(not force, but pressure) with the left hand.

4. Continue to push, without applying downward pressure with the right hand while continuing to apply pressure with the left.

5.After approximately 18"-24" (for me) I bring my right hand forward and alternate pushing and applying pressure with both hands on the outfeed side of the table. You are kinda dragging the material through the cutterhead now. You still need to keep the material square to the fence.

The advantage of a longer table will be realized if the material is really long, or excessively bowed along the edge. The weight of the material can cause it to "drop off" the end of the outfeed table making it hard to control, but 5' of oak shouldn't be too much of a problem. The longer the outfeed table the greater the reference.

If you are face jointing. Paul is correct there is no downward pressure applied on the outfeed side. You are trying to "float" the board over the cutterhead and let the cutterhead do the work. You still have to control the material though. Ergo, some amount of slight pressure amy be needed on the outfeed side.just enough though to keep the cutterhead engaged.

Your tablesaw sounds like the belts slipped.

[Al Willits]

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I think we are confusing Al.
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Ah, no..not at all..I always sit at the comp with drool running down and muttering to myself....:)

OK, let me try and clear up a few things, I have a 8" York jointer so it has a long enough bed, I am just trying to get a straight edge on rough cut (s2s) 5/4 oak that's between 7 and 12" wide, the piece I started with was about 7" and is now maybe 5.5" on one end.
I'm just trying to get a straight edge on one side then I will run though the TS to paralell the other side.
Then I'll run though the bandsaw to resaw to 3/4"...band saw is working fine...thank you murphy for staying away for that..:)

I can see I am pressing to hard on the board so that's probaly one reason and I forgot about checking for a bow, that prob doesn't help either.

I can also see we have different approches to jointing wood here, but I'm getting a good idea where to start.
I'm having the feeling there may be more than one way, so I'll start with Paul's way and see what happens.

On the TS, Kyle I think hit the nail on the head, I had not run it though the jointer yet and I noticed the board was flatter on one edge than the other...and that wasn't the side I had next to the fence on the sled...more of that learning curve...:)

I'm thinking belt also, and will go find one today and see what happens.

Just wanted to say thanks again...unfortnately I don't have a mentor to teach me this new hobby,and my circle of friends includes mighty few woodworker, so I come here with my beginner questions, and I know they probably are tiring for you long timers, but I apreciate the hell out of the help I've gotten here.
Thanks for putting up with the old guy..

Al

[Jim Becker]

Al, the problem you describe is more indicative of misaligned tables than technique, although the latter is certainly a possibility. When the infeed and outfeed tables are not co-planer, your cut will tend to take off more material at the beginning or end of the pass and create the resulting "wedge". This is true even if you have the outfeed table set perfectly relative to the cutter head and knives.

That said, on the subject of "pressure", you certainly need to have "some" downward force on the board so that you have enough contact with the board to push it through the machining, but it should be minimal and not deflect the board in any plane. Paul is absolutely correct in that regard. The object of the jointing operation (whether face jointing or edge jointing) is to shave off the "high spots" and get you to a perfectly flat surface after a few passes over the cutters. Over-pressure will certainly give you a "smooth" surface, but it will not be flat since any curve, bow or twist will still be in the board. You will also find that with each subsequent pass, more and more of the board will naturally be in contact with the outfeed table.

Check your machine alignment carefully...and if it's correct, then we have to consider your technique a little more. And practice on scraps stock...jointing is a "feel" kind of operation. ;)

[Greg Funk]

If you don’t understand why forcefully pushing a board flat onto the out feed table as you pass it through your jointer, is defeating the purpose of your jointer, then I give up.

Paul,

Once the board has past the cutterhead it should be riding flat on the outfeed table. There should be no gaps anywhere. If there is a gap then you are not going to get a straight edge on that pass. If there are no gaps between the board and the outfeed table then you can apply all the pressure you want as long as it is directed onto the outfeed table.

In any case if Al is edge jointing 7-12" wide 5/4 oak boards I don't think he has to worry about taking the bow out of the board unless he weighs over 500 lbs. :)

Greg

[Greg Funk]

Al,

Here is an excellent article on edge jointing by Gary Rogowski http://www.northwestwoodworking.com/article_1/article1.html. The article was originally published in FWW #124.

Greg

[Mike Cutler]

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Just wanted to say thanks again...unfortnately I don't have a mentor to teach me this new hobby,and my circle of friends includes mighty few woodworker, so I come here with my beginner questions, and I know they probably are tiring for you long timers, but I apreciate the hell out of the help I've gotten here.
Thanks for putting up with the old guy..

Al

No way are your questions tiresome. In fact just the opposite. They provide an opportunity for discussion,and it's an odds on bet that someone else is trying to learn the exact same thing. Kudos to you for having the courage to ask the question. When we tire of answering question like this one, we've begun to lose the identity/reputation that Sawmill Creek has achieved.

[Al Willits]

Thanks Mike, and the rest of ya.

I'll check the beds again, I'm not so sure anything I have is accurate enough, so I'll round up a straight rule and check.

I'll also practice a bit on a few scraps and see what happens.

Can't seem to find a belt for the TS, so I'll wait till monday when the Delta service center is open.
Hopefully they'll have.

Al

[Bryan Lord]

HI Al,
Check the height of your blades on the jointer. If the knives are BELOW the level of the outfeed table it will always cut a wedge ... regardless of technique. If the knives are higher then it will cut an arc in the center of your board and probably have a little snipe at the trailing end.

There is a technique that in effect simulates the blades being too low used to create tapers like on table legs. You clamp a stop block on the infeed table at a position where the board you are tapering comes down at TDC (top dead center) of the knives where you want the taper to begin. Put the tailend of the board at the stop block and lower the board into the cutters. Move the board through the cutters keeping the the infeed side flat. The non tapered portion of the board will be above the outfeed table but everyhting from that point on will be flat on the outfeed. Then you rotate the board 90 degrees and repeat for all 4 sides. Continue until you have the taper you want. Extreme care needs to be taken because you have to remove the guard when doing this. BTW, this technicque is discussed in the DJ20 or the Powermatic 8" (don't remember which) manuals you can get off the their website. Works extremely well.

Both sides of this pressure argument are right and wrong. If a board is bowed then Paul is right you want to put minimal pressure (just enough to hold the leading end on the table) because you want to "nibble" the front and rear of the board without pushing the middle into the knives.

Once enough of the leading end of the board is flat on the table (not in 1 pass unless very little bow or hogging off a lot of material) you can begin putting pressure on that end. Your push block should not be behind where the board is flat if you are applying pressure.

[Al Willits]

Not sure about the tables as I haven't anything accurate enough, but I'm gonna break down and get a 4' straight edge.
I do remember I set the blades with the jig that came with the jointer, then the tables, then later reset the blades with my dial indicator, so it's entirely possible the out feed table is set wrong, I'll check tomm..thanks.

Also I found with a bit lighter pressure closer to the cutter gives me a much better result.
More of that darn learning curve...:)

Couldn't find a new belt for the TS, but everything looks good so I made a few test cuts with it, darn thing got quiet..go figure...
I still get a bit of noise when I push the saw, so I think it still needs a belt, but at least it doesn't appear serious.

So at least I can keep making saw dust, wife felt so bad about the last few honeydo's going bad and the this stuff today, she bought me a Kreg K3 pockethole set...gotta love that woman..:D

Hope everybodies weekend isn't as exciting as mine and all is going well...:)

Al

[Norman Hitt]

Al, one other thing you "Might" want to check on your tablesaw, (even though it is quiet now), is that it is possible that the pully slipped slightly on the arbor shaft when it locked down. Since some saws don't have a key to hold the pully aligned on the shaft and only use a set screw onto a flat on the arbor shaft, it is real easy for the pully to slip when something like you mentioned happens, and when it slips it usually digs a small groove in the shaft and then the setscrew can loosen up more letting the pully slip again. I would check first to see if the pully is keyed to the shaft and that the set screw is tight (and it doesn't loosen when you hold the blade and try to turn the pully backwards on the shaft). If there is any play at all, then loosen the set screw and remove the pully to check for any damage to the setscrew and arbor shaft and if not, then replace and retighten the set screw. I have had them get loose, and almost completely wear a key and key slot out without ever making a sound also, but those were mainly because of the poor quality Pot Metal pully they used.

Good Luck

[Al Willits]

Thanks, I'll check them first thing tomm, hadn't thought of that.

Al

[Paul Simmel]

Al,

>>> I'm just trying to get a straight edge on one side then I will run though the TS to paralell the other side.

Ok, so you’re edge jointing, and in this case you will certainly have a wedge when you are done because you are taking more off from one part than another in order to get a straight edge. This is very normal.

If your in/out feed tables are not co-plane, you will not get a straight edge, period. So if you can get a straight edge, then all is normal.

You will find that the knives themselves will pull the piece down. The majority, if not all, of your pressure will be to hold the piece against the fence to keep your edge square.

Also, don’t be surprised if after you rip your wedge off, that you have thus released opposing stresses that may have caused another slight bow. Again, this is normal, and depending on your application, you may have to re-joint the edge “one last time”. Such is the nature of wood.

Once you get the hang of this, the only real pressure you will be applying will be against the fence in order to keep your edge square.

Face jointing… just let the piece slide through and let the cutters pull the piece down. However, if you have a really twisted piece, you may have to apply pressure to the out feed side just to keep the piece from rocking. But once it is stable on its own, really all you have to do is feed with no downward pressure at all.

I’d be very interested in how you work this out and your results. I’ll bet you will have the straightest boards for miles around!

Good luck to you!

[Michael Adelong]

Al,

I went through the exact same excercise last year.

#1 - Since you are not getting the result you want no matter what you do, try adjusting your tables. When they are set up correctly, you almost need to work at it to get it wrong. When they are set up incorrectly, you can run stock through it until you are blue in the face :confused: (are we there yet?) and you will not get good results.

When setting my tables, I learned something neat. If the OF table is too low, you get a visible clue... Snipe. It looks like the last inch and a half or so of the cut is too deep. You can leave the board standing on edge on the OF table after the cut and look under the last few inches for light. If the OF table is too high, the edge will be straight, but the board will be tapered. It can be really difficult to measure. It is nearly impossible to make a small adjustment and determine without measuring if you are closer or further away from the correct setting.

Set your table low intentionally to start. Take a piece of expendable stock (I used an 8' pine 1x6 from the BORG - $3), run it through, and examine the results - you should see snipe. Mark the front edge of the snipe with a pencil (or cut the sniped portion off of the test board), raise the OF table a little (very small adjustments until you figure out how much difference say a 1/4 turn is) and run the stock through again. As you approach the correct setting, the snipe will get less deep. The pencil mark will also start moving towards the tail end of the board a little with each pass. Repeat this until the snipe disappears. As soon as you have no snipe, adjust your OF table stop screw and call it a day. My jointer has levers, so I used the stop screw as the fine adjustment (mine has been fine like this - yours may need an extra "smidge", depending on how your knives are set). I just backed the stop screw off 1/8 of a turn, and bumped the lever up to make the adjustment. It worked great, and allowed for very fine adjustment. (I tried for 3 hours to get it set up and I was really regretting my choice of a jointer with levers until I figured this out. I haven't moved the OF table since, so I'm OK with the levers again.

Trying to sneak up on the correct setting by measuring the taper of the stock is a no go. I'm sure it would work, but what a PITA it would be.

Pressure - I use the rule that I can apply all the pressure that I want on the OF table, as long as I am not changing the shape of the board as it moves through the jointer. If I'm jointing something flexible like 3/4" pine, it doesn't take much force to press a bow flat. With 4/4 oak you need to press much harder to change the shape of it. Again, no "correct" single answer. Use whatever pressure you need to move or hold the stock down, but do not alter the natural shape of the stock by doing so.

Two helpful hints to prevent your parts from changing shape after you mill them:

Measure the thickness of the board before jointing one face. Once you get a flat face on one side, measure the thickness again and then take the same amount off the opposite face with the planer. Once equal amounts of wood have been removed from each side, start alternating faces on each planer pass to keep it balanced.

When doing the initial milling of stock, try to leave it oversize by 3/32" to 1/8". This allows you to let it set for a few days (stacked, stickered, and weighted on a flat surface) before trying to use it. Make sure that air can flow completely around all of the parts. If the wood moves a little, you will have a little extra to take off with jointer and planer to correct for it. If it didn't move, just make a couple more planer passes before going to work. I made quite a few projects with undersized parts before I started doing this... It's amazing what a few days of drying out can do to freshly milled stock that is already "dry".

Good luck,
Michael

[Al Willits]

Whew!!
Lots to think about here, today's honeydo list is finally gone and I'm off to see what mischief I can get into now, I'm gonna print this whole thing out as I'll never remember it all..

I am doing only edge jointing btw, I'll maybe I'll try the face side as soon as I can get edge jointing figured out...:)

Between the TS and the Jointer, looks like my dance card is full for a good part of the day, but at least I'm a lot happier about it, after all your help..:D

Al

[Greg Funk]

Whew!!
I am doing only edge jointing btw, I'll maybe I'll try the face side as soon as I can get edge jointing figured out...:)


Al,

One other thing to remember. Normally, you would face joint first and then place the face jointed surface against the fence when edge jointing. That way you will have two true surfaces at 90 degrees.

Greg

[Al Willits]

Little update, and I need a break anyway...

Turns out on the TS Norman was right, it appears they never put a key in the key slot so when the saw blade locked up, the shaft just turned.
I say appears, because I couldn't find any, and I looked for over 20 minutes, sifting though the saw dust with a magnet...it could be hiding from me though...:)

Anyway, I made another key and reassembled it all back together and the saw seems to work fine now, not the friendliest piece of equipment I've ever worked on..not even close I think..

I'm gonna order a 4 foot straight edge and start at the beginning of setting up the jointer, once that's done hopefully it'll work better for me, I tried some of the suggestions and the results were pretty nice, so I think I'm headed in the right direction.
New word for today...finese :)

I'm gonna take a break from all this, and make a CD cabinet for the basement, I think I deserve a break today...:)

Once again, thanks.

Al

[Norman Hitt]

Al, glad you got your Saw going again. It's a good idea to check that setscrew occassionally, and also the one on the motor as well as pulleys on other tools too, as some of them do tend to loosen up occassionally for some reason, and then the key will come out, (DAMHIKT):rolleyes: :D (I didn't find mine either).:D