Sheilix cutter wear

[Bernie Kopfer]

I in the last six months installed a new Byrd SHEILIX cutter headin my DeWalt 735 planer. I have no time used it too much and have been pleased with its performance. Recently I have planned a good deal of African mahogany for bookshelves . About halfway through the project I noticed a slight ripple/steak in one area on every board indicating a chip in a tooth or something like that. Very minor. Thinking to turn thr offending cutter I opened the case and could not find any sort of nick. However upon closer examination I noticed that every blade on its leading edge was showing distinct wear compared to a non-used side. Just a slight rounding but obviously it was being worn down starting at the corner that starts the cut.
Using the back of my fingernail as a testing method I could feel that the blade was still sharp. Not as sharp as an unused edge but still it really scraped the back of the nail off very easily. And the quality of cut on the wood I am still very pleased with. But the wear after not much use is causing me to wonder how to know when the cutters need turning. Inside the planer they are hard to visually inspect as compared to a jointer. Which by the way, I inspected also. The jointer shows similar wear pattern but much less so and they have been used much more than the planer cutters.
How do you guys know when to turn the cutters? Is it an art or is there some science that can be used as a standard?

[Steve Peterson]

Is the ripple caused by just the corners wearing down or chipping? It seems like this would not happen if the cutters had a small amount of overlap. Of course, this would require a couple of extra cutters to fill the 13" width. I wonder if other brands have different amounts of overlap?

I have a Byrd Sheilix head on my jointer, but it is only a 6" width. Never noticed any issues.

[Andrew Hughes]

I think many woodworker run the inserts way past the point of sharpness.Carbide doesn't start out very sharp to begin with. Do your planer a favor and rotate them if you where hand feeding my point would be obvious.

[Jim Andrew]

I just clean my cutters. Pitch makes them seem dull, but it is just pitch. A toothbrush and some LA Awesome cleaner will make your cutters cut like new. I do rinse them with water after getting them clean.

[Jeff Duncan]

You should probably be able to tell by the sound and feel of the machine working. If it seems to work harder to feed material through then it's probably time to rotate. I say probably as I had an insert head on my planer for about a year in my shop and never came close to wearing the blades dull, but that's one symptom on my straight knife machine. I also have a 3" head for the shaper which has seen a fair amount of wood and I've yet to rotate those knives as well, though those ones are probably about due. Carbide lasts a good long time as long as you don't abuse it.

good luck,
JeffD

[Geoff Crimmins]

I have a friend with the same planer and Shelix head. He shares his shop with several people so the planer gets a lot of use. He finally rotated the inserts after four or five years because he was starting to get some tearout with figured woods. He hasn't had any problems with ripples or streaks, which doesn't sound like it would be caused by dull cutters. If none of the inserts is chipped, have you checked to be sure there isn't a loose screw on one of them that would allow the insert to move just a little?

--Geoff

[Andrew Hughes]

See I knew lots of woodworkers runs their inserts too long it's the same with bandsaw blades. How many threads have started with my bandsaw cuts weird. Then ok I bought a new blade after using this one for 7 years and everything is fine.

[Wayne Lomman]

It can be art or science to know when to turn your tips. Art requires knowing your machine, the finish you usually get, how much work it is taking to push the timber through, what the shavings look like and how much noise you are making.

Science either installs an hour meter or at least keeps note of hours in use and rotates the tips to a schedule. The tips get replaced on schedule, at a known time when the cost can be budgeted.

Keeping tools sharp is an unavoidable and routine cost that has to be attended to on time to maintain the quality of your work. One kind of gets away with it at home but to the cost of effort, accuracy and output. Commercial shops have to sharpen and reset tools regularly or else dimensions change, cut quality drops, work takes longer, customers pick defects and managers start shouting about diminishing bottom lines. Cheers

[Jeff Duncan]

Wayne, you forgot to add wood species under your "science" category. Some woods will quickly kill blades while others will cut like butter forever.

[Wayne Lomman]

True, some species are much more abrasive than others. However we are talking about replaceable carbide tips which are significantly more durable than brazed carbide tips which are astronomically more durable than any grade of steel, so this is of less importance. Still, every wood machinist needs to be aware of the timber used and adjust their thinking accordingly. Cheers