You want to try building furniture, but first, you need to fix the door that drags on the floor or the wooden window that won’t close properly now that winter is over. For these tasks, a cordless or electric planer is a great tool. Most of the time, though, this doesn’t work at first because of how hard it is to process wood. But you shouldn’t give up; you need to learn how to use the planner better. We’ve put together the best tips to ensure your next planer project is successful because sometimes the smallest things can have the biggest effects.
Planes are important tools for anyone who works with wood. You can use an electric planer to cut a piece of work shorter, try your hand at building furniture, or make the edges of your wooden patio slope. Planers are very useful when you need to:
Shorten and smooth
What do you mean the door is too long and scrapes the floor? Most of the time, the problem can be fixed immediately by moving the door just a few millimeters. This is all it takes to stop the door from scratching the floor. After taking the door off its hinges, moving it to the garage, and securing it with the planer, it doesn’t take long to cut it in half.
Surface work
You’d want the old wood to look fresh and new. You could also do the job with an electric planer instead of a grinder. Reduce the chip width to get smooth results with no visible scratches or color changes in the wood.
Furniture construction
There are many ways to build your furniture. If the wood is too thick, you can easily cut it down in thickness with the electric planer. The tool can also smooth out rough spots on the wood. As an analogy, if you plan how to use the wood ahead of time, you can use it even if it’s cut wrong or isn’t straight.
Edges, bevels, and chamfers
Beveled edges are not only nice to look at but also useful because they keep wood from splintering. This could be very helpful for wooden patios or furniture. Because of the V-groove, the so-called “chamfer” or “edge chamfer” is one of the easiest ways to use an electric planer. An angle stop can also help you figure out the angle.
Folding
The folding joining method is useful for making windows, doors, wooden ceilings, and wooden furniture. As the wood is folded, it goes through a process called milling, which creates small differences in color and texture that can be both decorative and useful. The depth and parallel stops that fold up out of the way are very helpful for this method.
How can I stop holes and cracks?
Using an electric plane on wood could cause cracks for several different reasons. When the cutting depth is too deep, too much wood is often taken out at once. We suggest that you keep the depth of the cut very shallow and go over the wood many times as you plan it out layer by layer. Also, the cut should be shallower the harder the wood.
It would help if you moved the planer along the surface in the direction of the wood fibers, but not too quickly and with light pressure, so that you don’t slow down the speed by pressing too hard on the wood. In a nutshell, here’s what you need to know to keep your workpiece from being “crowned”: At the beginning of the wooden surface, you should put light pressure on the front of the plane. As you get closer to the end of the surface, you should move the pressure to the back of the plane.
If none of these work, you should check your planer’s blades. Without sharp blades, you won’t be able to make smooth, even cuts.
