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I am working on thicknessing 3 necks down to 20mm. The neck blanks I'm using are actually a little thicker on one side, so as I run them through the planer, I continue to take off an even strip, leaving the neck blanks uneven. Is there an easy trick to straightening this out? The last time I tried to use a little wedge on one side and really dorked it up.

Thanks!

John

John, I think you should run one side over a jointer to get that one side flat then run the piece through your planer with the "flat" face down. That should get you a nice evenly planed board. If the board is not flat on one face you will just keep reproduceing the uneveness each time it goes thru the planer. Hope this helps.

Hi Paul,

My original post above is wrong -- I have a jointer, and the problem is exactly as you describe. The side is perfectly flat, just not thicknessed the same. Each time I run it across, I reproduce the error. You're right, a planer would fix that, however I only have a jointer. Any other ideas short of planing by hand?

Thanks!

John

A safety planer mounted in your drill press would work well. There is a a discussion somewhere below this one that talks about the safty planer. it's a handy little tool to have around and not too expensive. I think it will fit your needs nicely if you have a drill press.

John, Do you have a table saw to get the blank a little closer to the same thickness?

D.L.

have you checked that the jointer fence is square to the table? if yes,

have you run the thin edge over the jointer holding the square and flat wide face firmly against the fence? if yes,

when you run the wide unsquare face over the jointer are you holding the squared narrow face firmly flat against the fence?

one of these or any combination thereof will lead to your problem.

[QUOTE=crazymanmichael] have you checked that the jointer fence is square to the table? if yes,

have you run the thin edge over the jointer holding the square and flat wide face firmly against the fence? if yes,

when you run the wide unsquare face over the jointer are you holding the squared narrow face firmly flat against the fence?

one of these or any combination thereof will lead to your problem.[/QUOTE]

Good suggestion Mike, I misread the problem as thickness end to end. Not out of square.
D.L.

[QUOTE=John Elshaw] Hi Paul,

My original post above is wrong -- I have a jointer, and the problem is exactly as you describe. The side is perfectly flat, just not thicknessed the same. Each time I run it across, I reproduce the error. You're right, a planer would fix that, however I only have a jointer. Any other ideas short of planing by hand?

Thanks!

John[/QUOTE]

John,

Do you have a table saw? If so, you can run it through on end to get it close. I'm assuming that your tablesaw is 10" in diameter. This will give you the 3" or so you need to true while on edge. Another option is handplaning the stock to get it close and then trueing it on the jointer.

Good luck, Steve Brown

Thanks fellas, there's some good ideas here. I'm going to go try them in the morning.

Cheers!

John

most of us seemed to assume no table saw. given the size of stock that would have been my first option if the differencce were sizable, then the thickness planer.

but lacking those and only having a jointer(oddly equiped shop) one could try this: glue a softwood shim, which is the same thickness as the the difference in thickness between the ends, onto the thin end. remember that the shim has to be wided than the gap between the jointer beds.then pass over the jointer thick end first taking the thinest of shavings so as to not knock off the shim. when the shim is gone you should have an evenly thicknessed board.crazymanmichael38480.3621180556

I was just thinking about how to joint a 10 inch board on my 8 inch jointer. My conclusion is there isn't any way to do that.

i have seen it done but have not tried it myself.

the fellow merely removed the guard (gulp), set the fence so that just over half the board was passing over the cutter head, and made two passes being very carefull to keep heavy pressure on the portion of the board adjacent to the fence.

if you are thinking of doing this to thickness tops or backs i would not recommend it though. the wood would likely shatter because it would not be adequately supported.crazymanmichael38480.6848958333

I was thinking of how to flatten a large billet of wood so it can be resawn. I have some walnut that I want to cut into backs and sides.

didn't think about having to remove the guard. For some reason, jointers scare me more than tablesaws.

well justified fear/respect. the accident rate is just about as high as the table saw. may not amputate but surely will shorten limbs/digits in a hurry and they can't be reattached.

I asked a similar question a few weeks ago.

Here is what the consensus shook out as..

Get a flat piece of MDF or some other truly flat substrait. Tack glue the material to be "jointed" to the substraight. Plane it with a board planer, or with an abrasive planer (i.e. drum sander, etc.). Unglue the board, get rid of the substraight, flip it over and now flatten the other side.

This should give you 2 flat and parallel surfaces.

I am just beginning to experiment with the idea now, but it seems to make sense to me.

_________________
Brock Poling
Columbus, Ohio
http://www.polingguitars.com