15" Planer upgrade options - advice please!

[ed vitanovec]

Congrats on the PM15, it is a nice machine especially at $400. These machines are usually made by one manufacture that private labels them, not sure if this one is made by Gee Tech. Post some pictures, I would like to see what the head looks like on this machine.

[Rob Lee CT]

If you want a Byrd cutterhead, it costs less to buy it from Grizzly than ordering it from Byrd. And Grizzly has 3 different cutterheads that fit the 15" planer. One looks like a Felder silent power cutterhead, has fewer cutters, and is their most expensive. My guess is that it runs with less power than the other 2 heads. Fewer cutters, less power.

I knew that Grizzly's price for the Byrd head was almost $100 less than Holbren's price, but I have no experience with Felder. Does their head design result in a better/flatter surface than the Byrd head?

[Rob Lee CT]

will do - it landed in my shop this morning, but other projects are a little ahead of it (running electrical and drywall this weekend!)

[Jim Andrew]

You can't buy a Felder silent power head to fit a Grizzly planer, it is fairly new on Felder machines, I just saw a pic of the new head available from Grizzly, and it looks like the pics I have seen of the Felder silent power head. It is a fairly new design, and appears to use fewer cutters than the Byrd, hence my idea that it takes less power to run it.