Thicknessers

[Fred]

Hi,

There's plenty of 18mm wood everywhere but in our house the floorboards are 16mm thick. I found a local timber merchant who will plane the wood at no extra charge but he doesn't always have what I want in stock. For example, they have run out of 2.7m and 3.0m lengths and will have no more for another fortnight, meaning I would have to buy 3.3m lengths instead. It seems silly to pay for an extra 30cm that will only get cut off and thrown away. And then there's "bank holiday emergencies" when the merchants are closed and there's only B&Q. So I was wondering is it worth getting a budget thicknesser, so I could buy

5x1 wood from anyone who had it and then plane it to 16mm myself?

I have googled and found woodworkers who have £600 machines. I am sure these are wonderful but I was looking more at the cheap Erbaurer and Macallister levels of machine. I also keep getting invitations to VAT free weekends at Machine Mart. So are the £100ish machines any good?

What width is most useful? For floorboards a 6" machine would be plenty but once I had a thicknesser, would I find other uses for it and would I need a wider table?

TIA

[spamlet]

I kind of accumulated one in my garage when the brother in law couldn't be bothered to sharpen it, and wanted an upgrade anyway. It is very handy, bar nails, which it always finds no matter how carefully you check over any old floorboard you may say, want to get varnish off... In view of the nail issue I would say that 6" would not be plenty, as with more width you have more chance of avoiding the grooves created by those B nails.

The other issues are the noise: defenders definitely necessary as some boards act like very powerful resonators and can practically blast your brain clean out through your ears. And then there's the sawdust to pick up.

Mine - a Bosch I think - also has a chuck on the end of the drive shaft. This puzzled me for a while, then I got an arbour and some grind wheels, and I probably now use that more than the thicknesser.

These days, I fancy the 'pros' tend to get multi purpose machines rather than stand alone thicknessers, so you might be lucky and find a cheap second hand one that just needs a sharpen or some new blades.

S

[dom]

Small portable thicknessers tend to "snipe" the board compared to planer/thicknesser machines.

(snipe is the overcutting mostly at the start of the board, but also at the end, because the board is only under one roller and the cutter)

Also bear in mind the amount of shavings produced - mine (a scheppach planer/thicknesser) would foul without a dust extractor.

However if you only need to have one good face on floorboards, these things may not be problems.

[spamlet]

Small portable thicknessers tend to "snipe" the board compared to planer/thicknesser machines.

(snipe is the overcutting mostly at the start of the board, but also at the end, because the board is only under one roller and the cutter)

Also bear in mind the amount of shavings produced - mine (a scheppach planer/thicknesser) would foul without a dust extractor.

However if you only need to have one good face on floorboards, these things may not be problems. _____________

Mine's not a portable but thanks for giving me a new word, as indeed, it requires a steady hand - and knot free ends - to avoid that 'snipe' groove at start and finish. Being cowardly, I tend to shave tiny amounts with each pass and do a lot of running round from one end of the board to the other! It is marvellous to be able to make nice boards, and shelves, out of even old packing case slats though.

On your 'one good side' point though, it is probably as well to point out the grain issues. Ideally the growth rings should go straight across the thickness of the board. Then you get a good finish on both sides, and a good strong board. These days, wood is rarely from big enough trees to get many boards like this, and we tend to get growth rings in a curve across the end of the board. Then you get a reasonably good side with the outside of the grain curve upwards, but with the inside of the grain curve upwards, the inner layers can rip off, no matter how finely you try to skim.

S

[John Rumm]

Yup, I saved myself a fortune when doing all the door linings and door stops etc on my loft conversion. I borrowed a mate's machine and just ripped down and thicknessed some spare 8x3" joists to get what I needed.

They are ok to be fair. They have rather short in and out feed tables which can make them a bit snipey - not too much of a problem if you cut boards to length after thicknessing. A pair of roller stands also goes a long way to reducing that.

I will assume we are talking about "portable" machines here rather than fixed workshop ones. (although note that some portables are 30kg+)

Most of the dedicated thicknessers are wider than that. Things to look for are decent length tables (Axminster has one that is not bad in this respect), and also look at the number of posts. The 4 post machines with lock will give a better final finish than the two post ones. Also have a think about blades. Some come with re-sharpenable HSS knives, others use carbide disposable ones. Resharpenable ones can cost less to run if you can sharpen them. Double sided disposable knives make it easy to get back to a dead straight edge.

Finally, you will be in the market for a chip collector shortly after getting one. Planing up a few boards and collecting two or three bin liners worth of shavings is not unexceptional!

I have a DeWalt DW733 which I have been very pleased with. It creates a very good finish. IIRC that is now superseded by the 734 which uses disposable knives rather than sharpenable ones like mine, and also has three making for a very fine cut spacing.

[pete]

Snipe shouldn't be a problem for the OP, if he only planes the underside of the floorboards. (Which is recommended if the top side is already varnished). However, in cold, hard proactical terms I'd be surprised if you would save the cost of the planer in the difference between 3.3m lengths and 3.0m boards. Maybe it's just time for a new toy?

[spamlet]

Actually I used the thicknesser because I had exactly the same problem as the OP except that our old boards are also all different widths as well as being thinner than modern boards. The OP, as I understand it, wants to plane new wood to the thickness of his old boards. The underside of *old* boards - ours are >100y old and have been up numerous times in those years - will be a mass of splits and very roughly sawn, and to get a smooth surface on that side would lead to a wafer thin floor. The top side has a nice black 'patina' on, so I have tended to repair boards as much as possible rather than trying to match up new ones.

Incidentally there is a wide range of types and prices on them on ebay:

OP might even be lucky with his local 'Freecycle' or 'Freagle', as I bet there are quite a few of them out there gathering dust...

Cheers,

S

[spamlet]

Which also reminds me: it was the discovery that most of the places selling 'recycled' floorboards, were actually selling ripped down joists, that led me to make my own boards via the thicknesser. In joists the grain goes the other way, so boards made from them tend to be v bouncy. In fact someone did our living room like this - before we bought the house - (we can tell from the sideways nail scars). Didn't really notice this until went to lift one and found they had all been 'designer' tongue and grooved together with strips of iron! This, supreme effort may well have reduced the springiness and the draught, but it sure was a surprise to an unsuspecting extra socket fixer!

S

[andrew]

[The Other Mike]

Other way?

Like how?

[Man at B&Q]

So you need exactly 3m lengths? If 2.7m *were* available how would you make up the extra 30cm?

Just use the 3.3m but cut into two shorter pieces and join with pieces from other planks in such a way as to minimise wastage.

MBQ

[spamlet]

The flexibility of the board depends on the number of growth rings: closer together (ie slow growing) means stronger and less flexible. If you look at a board and it has straight growth rings running parallel the length of the board, then it has been cut to give maximum rigidity as a board. If you look at a board and the growth rings are wider apart and wandering, and even complete joined up contours in the central parts, often so bad that layers of it peel off when you try to work with it, you have a board that has been cut for flexibility rather than strength (This is also a good way of choosing an acoustic guitar: more rings per inch on the top boards is usually a better guitar - assuming you've checked inside the sound hole to make sure it isn't ply first!)

Nowadays we often don't have much choice, and most of the wood we are offered is from fast grown young trees with wide growth rings and loads of knots, but in older houses you can find much better wood. I noticed, as I said, from looking at the nail marks, that joists had originally been cut for rigidity with the maximum lines per inch on the narrow side - to give you as strong a floor as possible. But when you rip them to use the wide side upwards, you are maximising the flexibility rather than the rigidity.

As it happens, it is probably not so important for joists to maximise lines per inch as it is for boards, as they are much deeper and also gain (rigidity once boards are nailed - or even better nowadays, screwed - to them. I've noted elsewhere that I think it was only the boards that were holding the floor up in one room I worked on where the ends of several of the joists had been burned or rotted!)

So it generally pays to go to a proper timber yard: I was impressed by the quality of the timber in Travis Perkins - Luton - for example, which was beautiful compared with the utter tat generally found in the 'sheds'. Though my 'environmentalist head' shudders for what this probably means for old growth forests... so, better to reclaim if possible, but make sure to use the right grain for the right purposes: strength = more lines; flexibility = fewer wider spaced lines.

Hope that clears it up.

S

[Fred]

LOL but sometimes plumbing emergencies necessitate creating floorboard emergencies, but perhaps you are right, there probably is an element of wanting a new toy. Thinking about it, I think the sheds only sell

2.4m wood anyway, so you've got to go to a merchant for anything bigger.

[Fred]

Sorry, the 2.7 was a red herring, it was out of stock but I hadn't intended to buy it; I was just meaning to show he was out of stock of quite a few sizes.

I didn't want to do joins. I thought that one plank the right length would be much quicker than two halves. I had thought that using two halves would involve hammering a batten to the joist to support the second half, but I realise now that if you cut correctly, you can have the two halves meet over the centre of the joist, saving that hassle. That is what I have now done, thanks. it worked fine for a couple of boards but if you had to calculate the best way to do a whole room, I think calculating lengths to minimise waste would be a headache and I would still go for the one long plank option. Thanks again.

[Fred]

Thanks. I wasn't expecting that. I thought I'd be told to buy a £400 one. Someone mentioned using one to make shelves, but I couldn't find his post to quote, sorry. Would even an 8" thicknesser be enough for shelves? I just measured my contiboard shelves in the garage and they are 9".

[John Rumm]

I would probably go for a better than entry level one - something with 4 posts and a head lock since you will get a better finish (better than shop bought PAR)

At risk of stating the obvious, you can only process boards up to the width of the machine - its not like using a hand held plane where you can do multiple passes in different places to cover the full width. Having said that, most small machines are at least 10" - and many up to 12"