Jointer or planer

[BigDog]

OK, I know this is a tired subject here, but, I can only buy one. I have all the other basic goodies except a bandsaw, so which do I need first? A joiner or a planer?

[Jim Stuyck]

Jointer. You can always purchase lumber that's surfaced, but you'll need a tool to smooth, flatten and square the edges of boards you run thru your saw(s).

Jim Stuyck

[Edwin Pawlowski]

A lot depends on the quality of wood that you buy.

I don't regret buying the planer first. I can get a good edge by using a sled on the table saw if needed. In my case, I can get a good edge and flat surface from my wood supplier now also. If you are cutting and drying your own wood, it may not be as good as what I'm buying, making the joiner more necessary.

I use the planer to get wood to the thickness I need and a jointer is not made for that. I can glue up a panel (up to 13") and run that through the planer to get it perfect.

I've seen some really nasty looking boards that were tamed on a jointer. I've seen some for sale cheap, but I pass on it for now. Ed [e-mail]

[Andy Dingley]

What are you making ? How much of it ?

I use my jointer a lot, but it doesn't give a much better edge than a good cabinet saw and it does nothing that I can't do more slowly with a hand plane.

My thickness planer (and chip collector) pays for itself, because it lets me buy cheaper hardwood timber as-sawn, rather than planed. Planed timber isn't much cheaper than sawn (from the same shop), but the much cheaper suppliers are those who only sell it as sawn.

-- Smert' spamionam

[Tim Mueller]

I've dealt alot with rough-sawn hardwoods, either stuff we had milled ourselves or purchased as rough sawn from the mills. Yes, the saw mill that doesn't surface wood is the cheapest, even cheaper is green and you dry it (oak for $1/bf or less).

And we have a good 15" planer that makes lots of chips. But man, when the board isn't straight, nothing beats a jointer with a nice long bed (Delta DJ20 or such) for getting a straight edge. Yeah, you can snap a line and saw it, and saw it, and saw it some more, or get out the trusty 'ole jointer plane ... hm, I wonder why it's called that ....

The other thing, and this has been noted already, is that to flatten a board and have one true face the jointer wins out. The feed rollers of the planer can (not always but can) press the board flat so that it springs back once out of the machine. On small planers this isn't such an issue, but big ones with heavy agressive cuts will do it. The kiln/planing mill we used 25 years ago had a machine they called a "surfacer" which was really just planer with rough feed rollers that would grip and thus didn't need lots of pressure to feed the stock. Yeah, it left marks on the stock, but the next stop was the finish planer.

Tim Mueller

(To ward off spammers offering everything from meds to oriental girls, my e-mail address is distorted. Edit to reply.)

[Jeff Cochran]

Absolutely. :)

The real question is "What fits the projects you do?" In my case, the planer was most important, I use it to thickness the material. For me that's much more important than a jointer.

Your situation may naturally be different.

Jeff

[Glenn de Souza]

You won't like this answer, but you need them both, and they work best together. The edge jointing isn't the main thing. Flattening warp, bow and twist from the face of boards is my biggest use for a jointer, and after doing so, the faces are never parallel, thus the need for the planer.

If you absolutely could only get one, then get the planer, and learn to flatten boards with a hand plane, make the faces parallel and establish your thickness with the planer, and do your edge jointing with the plane or the tablesaw w/a good blade. If you do this, save your money and add the jointer as soon as you can.

Good luck,

Glenn de Souza Scottsdale, Arizona

[George M. Kazaka]

If you are buying wood that is bowed and twisted find a better supplier That eliminates the need for the jointer for flattening You can get a straight edge on the saw actually better and faster than a jointer, SO its the planer first Now you will more than likely get just the opposite opinion from others. This is mine, I'm outa here and will not visit this thread again

George

[Montyhp]

I started with a planer. I learned how to edge join with a jointer plane. There is a local millworks that will run panels through their wide sander for a (not so) nominal charge. Since I bought a jointer, I get much squarer wood and can work much faster.

It is true that you can buy wood that is already surfaced so you really don't need the jointer. However, if you let the wood sit around any length of time, it will warp. In addition, the surfaced wood costs 5-10 times unsurfaced wood if you scrounge, have logs milled yourself, recycle, etc. With hurricane Isabel logs, my jointer has/will pay for itself 10 times over.

Montyhp.

[Dave Mundt]

it depends on what you want to do. However, in terms of order of usefulness, get the jointer first. You can always get wood thickness planed to the appropriate thickness from the dealer for (essentially) no extra cost. However, a jointer is the ONLY painless way to end up with boards that will glue up into a panel without gaps or dents from the pressure needed from the clamps to get them together. The thickness planer is simply the OTHER half of the toolset needed for preparing lumber. You HAVE to have the jointer first, bcause a thickness planer cannot produce a flat surface. It can only produce a surface that is parallel to the other face. Joint first, and get flat, then, thickness plane to the final thickness. Having said that..I would also seriously recommend getting a good bandsaw. It is an amazingly useful tool. I will often use it as a cut-off tool or a ripping tool, instead of firing up the tablesaw. A well-tuned bandsaw can not only cut curves...but it can cut laser-stright lines too! Regards Dave Mundt

[Ray]

Food for though.

[Montyhp]

That might work if you don't have a table saw.

>

[Randy Chapman]

No....... All you have to do is get one surface reasonably flat, and a thickness planer can do the rest. Last I checked, a couple used planes are way cheaper than a jointer. (Note that I did NOT say it was faster). Or, so says the person who's planes are in the mail. I'm pretty certain, however, that I'd prefer to flatten (mostly, no need to be perfect) with hand planes and thickness by machine, than flatten by machine and thickness (perfectly) by hand.

--randy

[Fred MacMurray]

I would suggest a jointer. As a cost saving measure I buy rough lumber and as such a jointer is indispensible. Buying rough wood also allows me to create projects that are not limited to

3/4" thick wood. :-)

Fred

[Tbone]

Why would a jointer be indispensable for this? I would think that a planer would be more indispensable with rough sawn lumber. I can get a clean straight edge with my table saw and a good blade but it is not going to plane down the wood for me and neither will a jointer unless I get one of those 16 inch monsters from Grizzly. I would go for the planer and make sure to get a good one.

[B a r r y B u r k e J r .]

A jointer will give you one _flat_ face and a straight edge that is 90 degrees to the face.

You can straighten an edge on a tablesaw and you can flatten a face with a planer. That is, with a whole bunch of futzing around.

The straight edge created on the TS will not be a perfect 90 to the reference face, unless the face is flattened first. Any twisting, cupping, or bowing will cause the edge to vary from the face by random measurements.

Barry

[Tbone]

Ok, now I see where you are coming from. I am still fairly new to serious woodworking and learning new things all of the time. I guess that in order to seriously work with rough sawn wood, you really need both. A good jointer to get 1 flat surface and a precise 90 edge to it, and a planer to get the other side both flat and parallel to the other side. That makes sense. You could do it with a tablesaw and planer alone, but would probably waste a lot of time and wood doing it. Thanks for the info.