Thicknesser accuracy??? - Now with Pics

[Anonymous]

I had this on my Delta Thicknesser

A new set of blades cured it 100%

 

[woodbloke]

She only drinks latte's, which is mostly milk, so I think it's okay

Mark - good to hear you got it sorted...and as for the coffee - Rob

 

[TrimTheKing]

Mark - good to hear you got it sorted...and as for the coffee - Rob

You don't like Latte or you don't like coffee? She's a baby, she needs the calcium

Personally I take it Italian stylee, double espresso with sugar. Mmmmm, buzzing! :shock:

We have a proper bean grindy barista so I buy in the beans. Current favourite is these bad boys, 6 bags in the larder, mmmm.

 

[Karl]

Personally I take it Italian stylee, double espresso with sugar. Mmmmm, buzzing! :shock:

The only way to have it !

We went to the lakes for SWMBO's big 40 birthday this weekend, and the hotel we stayed at did fantastic food. Finished the evening meal with a large espresso with sugar and a large Amaretto. Excellent.

Cheers

Karl

 

[wizer]

I had this on my Delta Thicknesser

A new set of blades cured it 100%

Did you even bother to read the thread?

Get some new knives Mark that'll do it :roll:

 

[OPJ]

Well, I bought a spare set of knives and have had both my sets sharpened several times. The problem has remained thus far (for me - I'm still waiting to see photos of what Mark did! :wink.

 

[jlawrence]

I have a similar problem with my P/T, perhaps I'll try taking it apart and see what adjustments I can make.

 

[TrimTheKing]

Well, I bought a spare set of knives and have had both my sets sharpened several times. The problem has remained thus far (for me - I'm still waiting to see photos of what Mark did! :wink.

On their way mate, just need to put the baby to bed and have some dinner then i'll get them up here.

 

[stuartpaul]

As the owner of the same machine an interesting read (well, - most of it!).

Haven't yet put much through the thicknesser so will be measuring when I do with this in mind. Your photo's much anticipated Mark as I may need to consider similar work depending on the results.

This also leads me to another question not really answered in relation to is half a mil over 250mm acceptable? As a true amateur to me it probably is fairly close to my tolerances (and would I really notice apart from a loose fit in a rebate?).

I have difficulty working to much less than 1mm with 0.5mm probably my absolute limit and have often wondered about accuracy in woodworking. It's a moving material yet there is often much exercising of minds over these issues. I don't blame Mark for wanting such accuracy but wonder if it's really necessary?

I know there are many engineers on this forum who will howl in agony at such suggestions but just how accurate can you be with wood? And just how accurate do you need to be?

 

[jlawrence]

I don't know how accurate you need to be, but I can tell you that yes you will notice 0.5mm.

 

[TrimTheKing]

And just how accurate do you need to be?

In this instance Stuart it is purely down to my personality.

If it should thickness equally across the full width then that's what I want it to do, and I will pull the whole thing to pieces to find the problem if that's what it takes.

I've always been like this, it's a curse :lol:

 

[jedmc571]

I've always been like this, it's a curse :lol:

No it's not, it's a gift, that's what makes you a perfectionist :wink: I'd do exactly the same, otherwise you might as well use an axe :lol:

Jed

 

[TrimTheKing]

Okay, here we go.

Firstly I needed to conjour up some kind of device to measure the discrepancy twixt thicknesser bed and cutter block. So in true Blue Peter fashion, few swishes with a handplane to square up a piece of oak, some BluTack and a 6" ruler, I present the patent pending TrimbleMeasureMatic v1.0

With the bottom of the rule resting on the bed (I left about 1/4" below the stick so as I was sure of getting the same measurement each time) i wound up the bed until it touched the cutter block on the 'low' side...

Then on the 'high' side...

After confirming my suspicions I wound the table all the way up and loosened the hex screws holding the bed to the rise/fall column. I had found some suitably sized washers to fit between column/bed and spent a while on the wet and dry getting them flat and sized (2 of them being .5mm thicker that the other 2).

I didn't have anything .5mm thick otherwise I would have just shimmed one side, and it took an age to remove the amount of material I did from the washers so no way I could take a washer down the required amount.

Next, one at a time I removed the hex screws, placed the shims and replaced the screw (loosely), until I had this...

Then tightened up the screws.

Wound the table back down to test my handiwork and lo and behold...

WooHoo!

So with that out of the way and the cutter block almost spot on parallel to the bed, as I said earlier the issue was now worse than ever.

I took off the panel inside the thicknessing...erm...cavity(!?!)...

...and saw these little bad boys...

Now there is a spring loaded pin for both the in and outfeed rollers so I tightened up the outfeed one a few notches and fed the stuff through and the outfeed roller grabbed it hard on one side and spun the stock until it hit the side of the bed :shock:

I figured that this must mean that my tweaking had had an effect so I loosened the outfeed spring off again and tweaked the infeed roller spring until I found the balance between it pulling the stock in properly and leaving marks on the surface.

Turned my attention to the outfeed with the same technique and once I had it pulling the stock through straight I did a test cut. This was still out of whack but not by so much.

So I tightened both springs by the same amount and tried again...and after a few goes it was good to within 2 thou, and repeatable

So there you go Olly, now you know what you need to do. To be honest, now I've done it I'm not sure that maybe just tweaking the rollers would have fixed it on its own, but now it's working I'm loathe to touch it.

If I was you I would start with just the rollers and see if they have enough effect on the stock to fix yours before going down my route. It worked but it took about 5 hours in total of faffing around, I trapped my fingers more than once, and my back is killing me!

One last tip, just below the outfeed spring to the left there are two little microswitched boxes with wires coming out of them. Whatever you do, don't let the back of your hand touch one of them, while holding a spanner to the spring, with the machine plugged in...

Hope that helps.

 

[OPJ]

That's brilliant, Mark - thank you! I'll try to have a look at this over the weekend but, I never would've thought to look for those panels inside the machine; I'd have been trying to get the back cover off!

Five-hours' work doesn't sound too bad... In the past, it's taken me longer than that the get the planing beds aligned correctly! :x :wink:

The tension on my machine is definitely a little 'slack' on one side and it seems to be the infeed roller. I doesn't feel like it grabs the wood as well as it does on the other side and I get a slightly uneven finish...

I'll give it a go and see what happens - thanks also for the tip on not electrocuting myself! :wink:

 

[TrimTheKing]

I'd have been trying to get the back cover off!

Did that too...

The tension on my machine is definitely a little 'slack' on one side and it seems to be the infeed roller. I doesn't feel like it grabs the wood as well as it does on the other side and I get a slightly uneven finish...

Yep, that's what I was getting. As I fed it in the end nearest me would fly to the left and slide along the raised edge of the bed, sometimes missing the edge of the cutter block.

I'll give it a go and see what happens - thanks also for the tip on not electrocuting myself! :wink:

No probs, certainly got a fair belt off the bl00dy thing :lol:

 

[stuartpaul]

And just how accurate do you need to be?

In this instance Stuart it is purely down to my personality.

If it should thickness equally across the full width then that's what I want it to do, and I will pull the whole thing to pieces to find the problem if that's what it takes.

I've always been like this, it's a curse :lol:

Mark, - please believe I'm in no way having a pop at you doing what you're doing and perhaps I should have started a separate thread. It's not a curse so much as a way of life!

I do however continually wonder why some people talk about woodwork in almost engineering tolerances when it is after all wood and it moves around quite a bit!! Maybe that's just my excuse for not being as accurate as I'd like to be.

That's not to say that making the machine side accurate isn't well worth while and I can assure you that some time in the not to distant future I will be using a version of the TrimbleMeasureMatic v1.0 to carry out similar checks (just got to get this Florida holiday out the way first!). And if necessary follow your excellent guidance to tweak the beast.

I will be particularly weary of the micro switches :shock:

 

[Boatfixer]

One last tip, just below the outfeed spring to the left there are two little microswitched boxes with wires coming out of them. Whatever you do, don't let the back of your hand touch one of them, while holding a spanner to the spring, with the machine plugged in...

The thought of putting my hand in any machine, let alone one with spinny blades whilst its still plugged in makes me shudder......

Graham

 

[TrimTheKing]

One last tip, just below the outfeed spring to the left there are two little microswitched boxes with wires coming out of them. Whatever you do, don't let the back of your hand touch one of them, while holding a spanner to the spring, with the machine plugged in...

The thought of putting my hand in any machine, let alone one with spinny blades whilst its still plugged in makes me shudder......

Graham

Plugged in, NOT switched on, but your comment is very valid. I unplugged it in between every test after this, and will continue to do so...

 

[TrimTheKing]

Mark, - please believe I'm in no way having a pop at you doing what you're doing and perhaps I should have started a separate thread. It's not a curse so much as a way of life!

Absolutely no offence taken mate.

To go back to your original question, I only really became affected by the issue when I was working on some very thin stock for a small box I am making. The thickness of the sides is only 5mm, so a difference of 1/4mm across the width of these made a noticable difference when planing up, and because I always use a very finely set plane to get the best finish possible it was taking me an age to plane away the 1/4mm.

I do agree though that on bigger components we can get a bit hung up on the accuracy, but then again I suppose that's part of why (some) of us got into this hobby in the first place, GEEKS! Me firmly at the top of that tree

 

[Anonymous]

I had this on my Delta Thicknesser

A new set of blades cured it 100%

Did you even bother to read the thread? :roll:

No I didn't. I had no interest in the thread and no time to read it all.

However, upon reading the original post, it resembled an issue I had and fixed. Unlike some people on here, I thought I was posting something useful backed up by a real experience (yes, I actually make things and use the tools to do it and so have experienced issues along the way) - not just a guess or opinion!