Official Luthiers Forum!

Hi everybody, I'm as green as they come at this new hobby. I've read that some of you use a wagner safte-t-planer to thickness the back and sides, does anybody use it to do the tops? thanks, Red

I use the Safe T Planer and love it. I also have an Orbit sander that I use along with the planer. Between the two and a thickness guage (dial or digital) you can do all of your thicknessing without any problems. Take little bites. If you order one, you will get some instruction along with it for constructing your work table that will bolt on to your drill press and fence. The fence is the edge guide. Once you get set up and level, make sure that when you start your wood into the planer that you go slow, but donot stop, it will create little rings on the wood. Go slow and steady all the way through. If you do get some rings on the wood, dont worry, your sander will smooth them out and finish. I bring my tops down to about 1.25 and then Orbit sand down to the 100-110.

Good luck and enjoy

Mike Spencer
White Oak, Texas

Also, welcome to the OLF!

Mike
White Oak, Texas

Yeah, what Mike said. It works great on Spruce. Proper setup and you can take it down to almost final thickness and will have next to no tools marks left. Hardwood leave quite a bit more cleanup to do.

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Scott Thompson
Port Townsend,WA

"In a perfect world we'd all sing in tune
But this is reality so give me some room"
-Billy Bragg

I've been using one for 30+ years, on tops, backs and sides, and would not be without it. A few tips:
1) Keep it sharp, and set it up carefully.
2) Keep it cutting. As with routers and all such tools, the heat produced in cutting is carried off in the chips, so if you stop cutting it will heat up. That dulls the tool and marks up and glazes the wood.
3) You can hold the wood down with your hand right against the lip, but keep your fingers pointed out, away from the cutters. It's not easy to get your fingertips under the lip if you're using it right, but it can be done if you aren't careful, and these things bite _hard_ when they bite. :(
4) In using them for so long I've worn one out, and bought another. I had to do some tune-up on the new one. The casting was not milled out flat where the cutters go, and the cutters themselves were not flat. The combination caused the cutters to rotate in use, and to cut unevenly. This is the recipe for shooting wood across the shop, catching fingers, and so on. Scraping the bottoms of the cutter pockets flat, and lapping the cutters themselves, fixed the problem. That was a few years ago; maybe they've gone back to doing it right.
5) Make sure your drill press table is perpendicular to the quill. A bent-coathanger crank rotated in the chuck will indicate if you have problems. On my old drill press I used a secondary table of plastic countertop material on plywood, which I could shim up to be right. This makes a world of difference.

With everything tuned up well you should be able to make half millimeter veneer out of almost any wood with a Wagner planer.

Mr. Carruth...for us non-woodworking types, could you expand a bit on the bent-coathanger crank concept. I "think" I understand, but wouldn't mind a bit of extra info. Thank you.

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Eagles may soar, but weasels don't get sucked into jet engines.

If Alan isn't around soon,I'll describe it for you.

Do you feed the wood under the planer with your hands only, or do you use some sort of hold-down? I'm thinking mostly about a top or back that's a slightly cupped or twisted, keeping it down flat on the table to get a consistent thickness.

Thanks.

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Todd Rose
Ithaca, NY

https://www.dreamingrosesecobnb.com/todds-art-music

https://www.facebook.com/ToddRoseGuitars/

Take a piece of welding rod, or the ubiquitous metal coat hanger. More or less straighten the hanger. Bend about a 1" 90 deg.-then at a length near the size of the perimeter of your press table bend an opposite direction(180 deg)leg down about 4-6". Chuck the short leg. Set table so long leg just touches table. BY HAND-NO POWER- slowly rotate the quill and observe change in clearance from tip of rod to table. Shim work,or even better attach an additional table to the cast iron one and shim that to no tilt. As before, on another topic-go to Stew-Mac-look up free instructions-article- they detail all of this including making and setting the fence.PS- Todd, either the S_M tutorial or the Wagner instructions tell how to deal with cupped surfaces and other common problems. It is a proven unit, although I think it is fair to say that Mr. Carruth can make about anything work for anything-kind of a Luthiery icon( and I think a bit of an iconoclast(said with great respect).Miketobey38787.8407638889

Thanks greatly Mike. I would never have thought of that on my own.   

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Eagles may soar, but weasels don't get sucked into jet engines.

Todd,
Here's a ball=bearing hold down that I made for my Wagner.It works very well.You just adjust the bearing to roll on your wood piece.

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Anderson Guitars
Clearwater,Fl. 33755

How clever!

Great idea Alan on the second table top, thanks.

Todd, cupped wood can be a little challenging, but most of the time your woods come in with enough meat to get it straightened out. I generally get my woods set up the day before I plan to plane. By this I mean I take my two sides and place them on a piece of matting board, then place some 2X2 plywood or MDF board, two or three to compress and give it some weight. When I get ready to plane the next day they should be flatter, I start by making my first passes with the cup down or the bowed part up, little bite. After I have finished and have done a little clean up sanding, and if I am not going to immediately brace, I again compress the finished plates under weight. Also, I plane to thickness before I glue the two sides together glue, let is sit overnight and then do my Orbit and finish sanding and thicknessing to desired.

Mike
White Oak, Texas

Thanks Serge,but I can't take credit for it.I seen this photo and just made one like it. I'm thinking of adding another bearing on the right side.

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Anderson Guitars
Clearwater,Fl. 33755

Along with the Wagner I would suggest the Gilbert sanding disk.

I use the Wagner SafeT planer for most of my thicknessing jobs, tops, backs &sides, necks fingerboards. If it's wood and needs thicknessing out comes the Wagner. I then finish off with a drill press sanding disc to final thickness. But, if you keep the Wagner sharp (very easy) and the table level then superb results are possible. In fact I have recently sold my 16-32 as it never got used. If you buy from SM they enclose a leaflet (also available from their site) that shows how to make the extra table that you will need and the hold down together with the bent coat hanger to check that the table is level. I can take any wood down to < 1mm with no problem.

This is my setup:


These are my Wagner's little friends, the drill press sanding disc and the large spindle sander, together they make up the most used set of luthery tools in my shop.



The drill press family tools are only limited by your imagination.

Colin

Colin S38788.2186921296

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I don't believe in anything, I simply make use of a set of reasonable working hypotheses.

Makes me want to sell my drum sander, buy a bigger new drill press and the wagner jig, my drum sander takes so much space!

Good Morning Serge.

Colin

_________________
I don't believe in anything, I simply make use of a set of reasonable working hypotheses.

Thanks everybody for the great info, Red

[QUOTE=Colin S] I use the Wagner SafeT planer for most of my thicknessing jobs, tops, backs &sides, necks fingerboards. If it's wood and needs thicknessing out comes the Wagner. I then finish off with a drill press sanding disc to final thickness. But, if you keep the Wagner sharp (very easy) and the table level then superb results are possible. In fact I have recently sold my 16-32 as it never got used. If you buy from SM they enclose a leaflet (also available from their site) that shows how to make the extra table that you will need and the hold down together with the bent coat hanger to check that the table is level. I can take any wood down to < 1mm with no problem.

This is my setup:


These are my Wagner's little friends, the drill press sanding disc and the large spindle sander, together they make up the most used set of luthery tools in my shop.



The drill press family tools are only limited by your imagination.

Colin

[/QUOTE]



I presume you mean this information

StewMac Info Sheet

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

That's the one Brock, though I use a bolt in both ends of the fence so that it moves straight rather than swings.

Colin

_________________
I don't believe in anything, I simply make use of a set of reasonable working hypotheses.

Good morning Colin

One other thing that makes this safety-planer work better...if you shim the feed side of your table so the board is hits only the entrance side of the safety-planer. Just fold a piece of sandpaper and put it under the feed side of your handmade table. This will stop the safety planer from catching the piece of wood on the exit through the safety planer. Hope this makes sense.
Tracy

Thanks to both Mikes, Dave, Colin, and Brock for addressing my question. There's something I'm not getting, though, about planing wide pieces (tops and backs).

The hold-down is attached to the fence, and therefore holds down the _edge_ of the board. I don't see how that keeps the board down firmly flat on the table when you're planing the middle, for accurate thicknessing across the whole width. I don't mean to doubt what any of you are saying, I'm just trying to understand it.    

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Todd Rose
Ithaca, NY

https://www.dreamingrosesecobnb.com/todds-art-music

https://www.facebook.com/ToddRoseGuitars/

Todd, My hold down is adjustable, simply by putting it through a different hole in it's support, it can move to about 3" from the fence. With another 1-2" between the hold down and the planer and the planer being nearly three inches across that gives a fully suported distance of about 8" or so. Plenty enough for the plates. Even when joined they get turned around so that the 8" is plenty. In practical terms this has never been a problem and I thickness joined plates very easily.

Colin

_________________
I don't believe in anything, I simply make use of a set of reasonable working hypotheses.