DW735 Planer Head Not Parallel To Platen

[Leo Butler]

I purchased what is essentially a brand new DW735 planer from someone on Craigslist. He told me the planer head is very tight, and takes MUCH more oomph to raise and lower than it should. When I got it home and checked it out, I determined that the left side of the head is higher than the right which explains this pretty well. The seller is totally willing to take it back but gave me the go-ahead to try to adjust it before going that route.

After some searching here on SMC and via Google, it was suggested this shouldn't be a difficult thing to adjust. It was also said that this should absolutely not be like this from the factory. So anything I should be looking for while I see about correcting this misalignment? The seller feels certain he didn't lower the head in a way that forced it past the depth stop, but if it was hard to turn in the first place me might not have noticed. I saw a thread that indicated this could and likely would cause some damage.

Thanks for any insights!

[Barry McFadden]

Found this online...don't know if it will help you or not... https://www.lumberjocks.com/topics/25101

[Leo Butler]

Found this online...don't know if it will help you or not... https://www.lumberjocks.com/topics/25101

Barry, thanks a ton for tracking that down. I had located some articles on Lumberjocks but not that one. Two very good posts in there that have some good details which should save me some time this morning.

I'll post back with what I find once I give it a go.

[Leo Butler]

In that post, there was an initial write-up about how to partially disassemble the top of the planer so the adjustment chain could be removed and the gears turned by hand to adjust the four points. Later in the thread there was another method described that just requires loosening a bolt underneath the base and turning the screw(s) with a wrench. This latter method was piece of cake and worked just fine. I made an initial adjustment using the bottom of the feed rollers as the upper reference, and got the four screws adjusted pretty close. One of them was way out, 3/32 of an inch or so.

Unfortunately this hasn't made raising and lowering the cutterhead much easier, if any. Based upon some posts from others who experienced the same thing, it's probably due to some machining/manufacturing defect and the recommendation is to return it. So I think that's what I'm going to do. Too bad, this unit is 99% brand new and I saved about $285 off new after factoring in tax.

[Barry McFadden]

It was worth a try... too bad it didn't do too much for you.......