Delta Planer

Not much going on this morning.

I gathered up all of the left over sweet potatoes and put them in this old kettle and cooked them until they were tender.  I gave some to the chickens.  They quite liked them.  I gave the rest of them this evening.

I started to make a pedestal for a potted plant.   I ripped a 2x4 lengthwise to make the top of the pedestal.  I planed them so the three piece would have the same thickness.  The planer did not work very well.  It made some deep gouges in the wood.  I run them through the planer again to get them out.  They would not feed very well  and I had to push them with a smaller piece of wood.

I did get three pieces glued together.  I wasted some wood on the malfunctioning planer.

I decided to fix it.  I watched several You Tube videos which didn't help very much.  I found the manual which had some instructions of things I could do.  There is one video that had six twenty minute sessions.  The presenter took the whole thing apart cleaned it, and then put it together.  I watched the first three sessions.

Above I removed both ends and the wood shaving reflector.  There are seven bolts to loosen to remove the cutting blades.  I loosened them but couldn't take out the blades.  I use a needle nose plyers to pull them out.  there are two blades and each one has two edges.  The second edges had not been used.  I turned them over and set them properly.  I put everything back together and started it going.  It made an unusually loud noise.  I fed a small piece fir and it was badly gouged and shavings were going all over the place.

I turned it off and reset the blades.  It sounded much better and sent shavings out the back and did some gouging.  I was fairly well pleased.

Richard came this evening.  He will stay the night and go to a funeral in the morning.


Comments and questions are welcome.

Garage Organization and Thickness Plainer

I was in the garage a big part of the day organizing and cleaning.  The work bench is so covered with nuts and bolts and some tools that I can't do any work there.  It seems if there is a flat surface anywhere, ie, table, bench, table saw, plainer, and radial arm saw it soon gets covered with junk.  I was able to get most off the workbench and radial saw.  Next week  I will finish up and do a little more.

I have had this Delta Thickness planer for 25 years.  I used it to most for most of the finish work on our house.  I replaced the blades once, but it never did work right.  I removed the saw dust in the table saw.  The gear that raises and lowers the blade it hard to turn.  I cleaned it up.  I would help if I lubricated the gear, but that catches the dust. There may be some way to wax it, which would make it easier to crank.  Under the extended saw table, I found the out feed support.  There was not enough room on the plainer base.  Whenever I planed a board the planer blade gouge the end.  I deliberately cut the board longer and then trim the gouged end. 

I removed the planer.  I found a 3/4 inch piece of plywood that was wide and long enough to make a larger base.  I trimmed it to the right size and with grabber screws attached firmly to the original base.   There were a lot of paper staples in the wood that I pulled out.  With my belt sander I smoothed off the top.  Before the plainer would slide to the west side.  I fixed that problem also.  There four small scraps of wood.  two on the near side and two on the other side.   Below you can see the black out-feed table on the right.  I shouldn't call it a table, because it so small.  I put several pieces of wood of different lengths.  It worked perfectly.

Carol interrupted me for a short ride around town.  On second west and about third north there are some old out building and manger for cattle.  When cattle eat, the dominant cow will push the other animal out of the way.  The manger in the picture is just like the one my dad had.  It is made out a 2 inch 2 by 12 cut diagonally from one corner to the opposite corner.