Planer Upgrade (DW735 + Shelix)

this is my DW 735 planer from Dewalt this is the three knife cutter head that comes with it and the blade life has always been my number one complaint since day one with this planer and this is the she licks cutterhead upgrade made by bird tools now I have no affiliation with bird tools this was actually a gift from a longtime community member derik jones but as you can see the she licks head has a series of smaller carbide inserts and each insert has for cutting faces so if they get dinged up or just lose their sharp cutting edge they can be rotated by 90 degrees to show a new cutting edge I've got a bunch of Hickory cutting boards that I glued together some time ago I never planed them because Hickory seems to build these straight knives really really quick these will be a good sacrificial material to run through the planer before and after the upgrade should not only see the cut surface how that comparison but also to measure the noise output for the planer each of these cutting boards is about 10 inches wide and for consistency's sake and made sure to mark the face and direction for the straight knife and she licks cut this is my set up to measure the noise output I have a sound meter app downloaded on my phone and used a clamp in my leg vise to hold the phone in a constant position about 5 feet from the planer and I'm not sure if this is you know the correct or standard distance to measure audio and I'm not sure how accurate the sun meter app is but in this case I really don't care because I'm not trying to get an absolute reading instead I'm just trying to get a relative before and after reading in the same environment it's also important to note that one revolution of the depth wheel on this pointer will remove 1/16 of an inch of material thickness to document the noise levels I have the camera positioned so that the planer depth wheel sound meter app and whatever cutting head that is not installed can be seen with just the air conditioner running in my shop I'm getting a reading of about 19 decibels with the air conditioner and the air cleaner cart running the meter reads about 54 decibels with the planer running at no-load the meter reads about 69 decibels with a 1/4 turn or a 1/16 of an inch depth of cut of the meter is reading about 70 71 decibels with a 1/2 turn or 1/32 of an inch depth of cut the meter reads about 68 decibels [Music] what the factory set up readings done a friend and I started disassembly and I'm not going to cover the entire process for installing the new head as it's incredibly easy and already well documented online it would have taken us about an hour or less if we didn't have to run to the store and get a socket for the drive pulley it's it's really really easy to do there's two different diameter she looks cutter heads for this machine the larger diameter is the same size as the factory head and it requires each carbide insert to be removed prior to installation and the smaller diameter one is 1/16 of an inch less than the factory head and it can be installed with the carbide inserts already installed and as you can see this one is the smaller diameter now I can't speak for the performance of each one but just in theory this one being just a slightly less or slightly smaller diameter the motor should have an easier time removing material with this one than the larger one once the new head is in everything is repeated in Reverse with the new head installed and one half turn or 1/32 of an inch depth of cut the meter reads about 62 decibels and with one quarter of a turn or about 1/16 of an inch depth of cut the meter reads about 64 decibels and you can pause here to see the chart of all the readings that I took so when it comes to the upgrade there's there's three main things that you're upgrading number one is the longevity of the blades that was my biggest gripe with that planer for since day one really is the inconsistency in the blade life some blades you'll get last a reasonable amount of time and then others they Nick on the very first pass of relatively clear wood so there's a big inconsistency with the original straight blades and while I did just install this she looks the helical head upgrade I don't have a lot of experience with it obviously I have heard a lot of feedback from other people who have had that same machine with the same upgrade for over a year and they're still on the same cutting edge they haven't rotated the blades at all so just like my jointer which also has a helical head I expect a lot of life out of those blades I've had my jointer for about three years and haven't rotated the heads on it either so the longevity of the blades is definitely a huge upgrade the noise it is a slight reduction it's not a huge reduction but it is a it's a measurable amount of Audio reduction from the machine and then the final thing which is really hard to show on camera is the the surface finish the the finish right off the machine and I can definitely tell like I said it's hard to show on camera but I can definitely tell which side is the helical head and which side was the straight knives on this Hickory and because those knives were relatively new the straight blade knives I did get a good surface off of the Hickory with the straight knives but I wanted to really test the helical head so I ran a piece of curly maple through which is it's guaranteed to tear out with the straight knives it's it's impossible for it not to it seems like with the helical head I was able to take normal depth of cut and it's just crazy how I mean there's there's there's no tear out absolutely none I cannot find any bit of tear out on this piece of curly maple which is incredible so longer knives are longer blade life quieter and better surface finish anyway hopefully this helps if you want some more information check out my website article for this video you guys take care have a great day and I'll catch you on the next one

Channel: Jay Bates 2 - Vlog and Non Project Videos

Views: 649,881

Rating: 4.856708 out of 5

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Id: eHvupT08k0Y

Length: 6min 51sec (411 seconds)

Published: Sun Jun 10 2018