WATCH THIS before buying a carbide helical (spiral/segmented) jointer/planer cutter head

hi I'm James Hamilton from stumpy nubs woodworking Journal and today we're going to talk about the pros and the cons of upgrading to a helical jointer or planer head here on the stump enums woodworking journal main workshop we upgraded our jointer and planer heads to helical cutter heads from my wood cutters calm I know a lot of people have been wondering if this is really a worthwhile upgrade to make especially considering the cost so in this video I'm going to give you a list of the pros and - the cons that you should consider before investing your hard-earned money let's start with the pros and then we'll get to the cons a standard cutter head typically has two or three straight knives on it as it spins those knives strike across the face of your workpiece one at a time in quick succession this causes a scooping action as each knife strikes the board it scoops out a strip of wood one at a time all the way down the length of the workpiece this leaves behind kind of a washboard effect which can be very noticeable especially on your finish those cutters striking straight across the surface of your workpiece can cause an even bigger issue wood fibers can be torn out rather than cut off smoothly especially when planing against the grain and as every woodworker knows grain direction can change on a given workpiece particularly with figured wood so it isn't always possible to avoid Tarot by just changing the direction that you feed a board through the machine with some woods like figured maple or crotch grain I cringe when I run it across my jointer because I know that those straight cutters are gonna cause problems a helical cutter head on the other hand features smaller cutters which contact the wood and an angle shearing the fibers rather than tearing at them and because these little cutters wrap around the head in a helical pattern you may reduce or even eliminate that washboard effect theoretically I say theoretically because some helical head manufacturers still mount their cutters straight so they still scoop at the wood fibers the she licks heads that I have in my machines have cutters mounted at an angle so that they sheared the fibers skewing the cutter has been a practice among hand playing users for centuries because it produces a cleaner cut especially on tricky grain that same principle is applied to the she'll X helical heads where they have angled cutters joints are some planers create a lot of wood shavings and any small shops find it difficult to keep up with the dust collection demands the problem isn't just the large volume of shavings created it's also that these shavings come off in long strips remember how we talked about how those straight knives scoop out strips of wood well those strips can tangle up and quickly clog the dust ports especially if those ports aren't designed correctly as sadly is the case with many small shot machines my jointer was a nightmare when it came to dust collection it clogged up quickly even though I have a powerful dust collection cyclone because the internal path between the cutter and the dust port in the machine just is not designed well on those small shop machines but that problem disappeared the moment I installed a helical cutter head why because the little cutters remove little chips of wood rather than long strips so they don't tangle up and clog my machine that pays off even more on the planer as compared to the jointer because normally a planer would remove strips up to a foot long instead a heel hook cutter head turns that wood into fine confetti which requires less dust collection power to remove it believe it or not another noteworthy benefit to a helical cutter head over a standard one is that your machine will be less noisy when those long straight blades contact the wood they make more noise than the little cutters make how much more well that depends on your machine but I've read about tests showing a reduction as much as 50% that doesn't mean that you won't have to wear hearing protection but I throw some formerly upset neighbors who are much happier with the noise produced by the same machines after switching to a helical cutter head I hate changing the knives on my jointer I've tried all sorts of jigs it doesn't matter it's all day long pain in the butt to get all three knives aligned and then keep them in position as you tighten them into the cutter head my planer isn't as bad because those knives are indexed but it's still a hassle especially when I get those brand new knives installed and then I end up nicking one right away I have to endure having lines down the surface of my board until I changed the knives the next time helical cutter heads on the other hand are more convenient for one thing the carbide cutting edges last about ten times as long as the high speed steel knives so you won't be changing them nearly as often and when you do you don't have to remove the cutters you just loosen them and rotate 90 degrees there realign automatically no hassles and if you do hit a staple or something that's hard enough to Nick the carbide you only have to rotate two or three of the cutters to correct the problem sure beats destroying the whole set of knives F which is the case with the standard high speed steel ones and after rotating the cutters four times you do have to replace them but even that is a much simpler process yes you read that right some woodworkers will even save money by installing a helical cutter head take my 12 inch planer for example my old steel knives were double edged my new carbide cutters have four edges each of those edges will stay sharp about ten times as long as the steel knives that means I would have to buy 20 sets of high speed steel knives to do the same amount of work as one set of carbide cutters now the manufacturer of my planer charges about 50 bucks for those steel knives 50 times 20 equals a thousand dollars compared to 150 bucks for a new set of carbide cutters that means the initial investment in the cutter head will more than pay for itself before you buy your first set of replacement carbide cutters so our five reasons to upgrade our improved cut quality improved Us collection sound reduction convenience and cost savings it's a pretty good argument for buying a new cutter head but if you're gonna make an informed decision you need to know the negatives as well and there are a couple you should consider for one thing a helical cutter head requires more power to drive it the reason is simple a head with two or three straight cutters gives the motor a split second to recover between each instance that the cutter contacts the wood but with a helical cutter head there is less time for recovery between rotations so smaller machines will bog down easier this can be avoided by taking a lighter cut with each pass but it was still noticeable on my machines not enough to make me regret the decision but still noticeable another potential downside is the startup cost while we discuss the potential for cost savings as being a pro when making your decision that really only applies if you use your machines regularly I know some woodworkers that change their planer knives once a year or maybe twice at the most so it would take them a lot longer to go through those 20 sets of knives that would equal one set of carbide cutters that may mean that the large initial investment in the head itself will take a very long time to recoup so if you only use your machine a few times a year that's something to take into consideration I should mention that we originally got a seelix helical cutter head for the planer and a Titan V shear head for the jointer the plan was to compare these two different styles from different manufacturers and see which one worked best but since then we've swapped the vichy red out for another seelix helical head for the jointer as well the V share heads are still in development and when the new versions become available we'll take a look at them so is a helical head upgrade right for you if you decide to do it plan ahead bird to the company that makes the she looks cutter heads does them in batches one machine model at a time so there may be a significant wait time to get yours if they aren't already made I recommend going over to my wood cutters comm which I'll also link to in the notes below this video and check them out if you don't see your machine listed send them an email they can most likely get it made for you in the meantime be sure to check out the latest issue of stumpy hubs woodworking journal for more tips tricks and other woodworking goodness you can read and subscribe for free at stumpy tubs calm happy hilux thing

Channel: Stumpy Nubs

Views: 546,043

Rating: 4.8931141 out of 5

Keywords: woodworking, stumpy nubs, jointer knives, planer kinves, jointer blades, planer blades, carbide cutter head, cutterhead, shelix, helical

Id: UurAyAOfzGs

Length: 8min 45sec (525 seconds)

Published: Wed Mar 01 2017