Adventures In Tool Repair: No Pain, No Plane
Planers. They plane wood. They make heaps of wood chips that could be used for mulch. They were also potentially designed by chiropractors. The latest planer weighed about 500 pounds, and my back is not happy.
This particular planer was brought to us with the complaint that it was “popping”. In the tool repair world, that could mean a gear problem, but with this machine, we noticed the drive chain wasn’t exactly ‘factory’. It was flopping around like the chain on a bicycle that had been constructed from parts from lesser bicycles. Chains need to be the correct spacing to match their corresponding sprockets. If the chain spacing is slightly off, it can get out of sync, causing the chain to ‘jump’ a tooth on the sprocket. This in mind, we tested the planer with a standard 4x4 and then a 12 inch-wide piece of oak, taking off the maximum amount of wood the machine would allow.
Just as suspected, the chain would jump after several rotations. We could not get the chain to skip a tooth on the sprocket, but we were able to determine that it was in fact a problem with the chain, and not the actual gears. Gear problems are much easier to diagnose, and more difficult to repair in some cases. But that’s another story for another time.
Planers are very useful tools for anyone serious about woodworking. It’s always best to replace worn or damaged parts with the correct parts from the manufacturer. It might save you some trouble in the future, and perhaps someone's back.
- David Furlong