If anyone is looking for one... I am selling a new material removal gauge for portable planers on ebay. I find them indispensible. I made one from a bent spring years ago that I used all the time. I made one that looks better and is more accurate and decided others might be interested.
item # 160025731230
How does it work?
The wood surface hits a sheetmetal foot that is part of the circumference of a cylindar which rotates and has a scale on it. You have graduations from 1/64 through 3/16 on the cylindar circumferance.
what about mm graduations? do you supply those?
Keep in mind that this is a gauge just to indicate how much you are removing in each pass, not the present thickness of the board. Therefore you are usually looking for a consistant amount, say 1/16 inch of wood to be removed in each pass. My old indicator was a spring that I just wanted to ensure rose up a set amount in each pass. It has no scale at all. I was just looking for a certain amount of movement so I could tell how much the planer was going to remove each time I changed the height. This is a much improved method, but not intended to have dual scales or anything like that.
Fri, Sep 1, 2006, 4:19pm (EDT-3) snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com (eganders) doth offer for sale: The wood surface hits a sheetmetal foot that is part of the circumference of a cylindar which rotates and has a scale on it. You have graduations from 1/64 through 3/16 on the cylindar circumferance.
OK, seeing as how mine has that very same feature, alleady bult in, telll in, keep on trying to convince me why I should buy one of these gimmicks from you.
JOAT Justice was invented by the innocent. Mercy and lawyers were invented by the guilty.
A device to fix a non problem. The planer is adjusted by a screw. Measure the TPI (threads per inch) of the screw. You now know how far it moves in one revolution.
You would be stupid to buy one from me. Don't do it!!
Not really a non-problem. First of all, there are many planers that have this solution to the "non-problem". See Joat's comment below.
Also, when you first start planing the wood, it is hard to know how much you are going to take off on the first pass. If you are planing a number of pieces of wood and each one starts at a different thickness you will have to have the planer ajusted at a different starting level for each one. This device makes it easy to determine that level. Also, it is comforting to have this gauge show you the thickness you are going to take off each time. Of course after the first pass, you can use the amount of crank to determine the amount of removal for each subsequent pass, it is just a nice additional way to confirm that amount.
This may not peak the interest of every woodworker, and that is why I am checking out the interest. Who knows, maybe it is limited.
Yes, it is a non problem. You stated yourself that the gage is not an absolute, just an indication of how much you are taking off each pass. The screw will do that and go one better. It will let you set an absolute value.
Sun, Sep 3, 2006, 7:37pm (EDT-3) snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com (eganders) doth sayeth something: Not really a non-problem. Also, when you first start planing the wood, it is hard to know how much you are going to take off on the first pass. If you are planing a number of pieces of wood and each one starts at a different thickness you will have to have the planer ajusted at a different starting level for each one.
Yep, a non-problem far as I'm still concerned. Dunno what the rest here do, but this is how I do it. My planer's got a scale, but I don't use it. Dunno if it's accurate, wouldn't use it anyway. I just crank.down, till ijust barely touching the wood, then start shoving it thru, cranking down a bit each pass, then measure the wood when it starts looking close to what I want, measure each pass until it's what I want. Quick, simple, accurate. If I'm planing more than one piece, doesn't matter if they're different thicknesses or not, if they're close to the same. Damned if I'd be adjusting some gimmick for each piece just because of that. I just start with the thickest, then run the others after it, crank down a bit, repeat, until I get all of them being planed. See above on measuring. No prob. And, just for general information, I'd be measuring the wood thickness, even if I knew for a fact the scale was 100% accurate. Always the chance it might get knocked off plumb. No prob.
JOAT Laundry room - drop your pants here.
This only needs to be figured once, for the thickest board. After that, the operator simply feeds all the boards through until they are uniform, or the planer hits a limiting stop. If a board is too thin to feed, it skips passes until it feeds. There is no need to recalculate for each board. A set of simple $5 4" brass slide calipers work great for measuring final thickness.
To set up the first board, I simply lower the carriage until it ever so slightly grabs the board. All of this is so quick and easy, I probably wouldn't even be inclined to go to the roll-away and look for the device.
That said, there's LOTS of woodworking do-dads on the market that _I_ think are silly wastes of money, but others happily buy. I say go for it!
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