A benchtop planer is an essential part of the woodworking man’s workshop. Nothing beats owning a planer instead of having to travel to the nearest mill or cabinet workshop. Now a man or woman that loves to work with wood can find an inexpensive planer at their nearest hardware store. However, to make the most of your benchtop planer you need to understand how to use it. These machines are quite dangerous but they are the absolute best tools when it comes to woodworking.
Getting the Most from your Benchtop Planers:
So when you start looking up benchtop planers on our site, here are great ways to use a benchtop planer correctly to make the most of your investment.
- Reclaim Old Wood – Before you start tossing out that old wood, use your benchtop planer on it. The first step before you get it near your benchtop planer is to make sure you get out any old nails or screws that may be in it.
- Avoid Tear-outs – What happens when you put your wood the wrong way into the benchtop planer? You get tear-outs. Remember to feed the wood through the benchtop planer going with the grain, this way the cutter can work with it smoothly and you won’t get any tear-outs.
- Rid Saw marks – If you use 2X2 or 4X2 and such deck spindles then you must be tired having to smoothen out edges having saw marks on them manually. With a benchtop planer you can do this in a matter of minutes. Just gang feed the spindles into the planer to remove saw marks and reduce snipe.
- Reduce Snipe – The uneven thickness associated with either the beginning or end of a board is called snipe. This happens with all planers and the only way to really reduce this is to either use a sacrificial board with the actual board stacked immediately after it or to use a 5 inch longer board than required and then cut off the sniped ends once it has been planed.
- Clean Knife Chip Marks – Ultimately a benchtop planer will start losing its knife edges and that leaves marks or chips on your planed wood. Instead of replacing the knife heads you can use a 120 grain sandpaper and sand out the marks along the direction of the grains. There is no need to instantly replace cutter-heads the moment you observe a knife mark.
Best Benchtop Planers on Amazon
| # | Preview | Product | Rating | Price | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 |
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DEWALT Thickness Planer, Two Speed, 13-Inch (DW735X) | from $642.51 | Buy on Amazon | |
| 2 |
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CRAFTSMAN Benchtop Planer, 15-Amp (CMEW320) | $289.00 | Buy on Amazon | |
| 3 |
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DEWALT Benchtop Planer, Single Speed, 15-Amp, 12-1/2-Inch (DW734) | from $425.99 | Buy on Amazon | |
| 4 |
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DEWALT Thickness Planer, Two Speed, 13-Inch (DW735) | from $558.22 | Buy on Amazon | |
| 5 |
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WEN 6552T 13 in. 15 Amp 3-Blade Benchtop Corded Thickness Planer | $338.88 | Buy on Amazon |
Our Top Benchtop Planers:
Steel City Tool Works 40200H Review
Protected by a 5 years long warranty, the Steel City Tool Works 40200H actually has got what it takes to flatten wood boards of varying thickness and size. It is blessed with a 15 Amp powerful 120V motor that operates the helical cutter head at 9000 RPM managing an excellent 13 inch wide board through its mouth and a thickness of up to 1/8 inch. The feed rate is at about 26 RPM which isn’t bad at all either.
Steel City Tool Works 40300H Review
Steel City Tool Works 40300H is possibly the best benchtop planer in the market. Ok so maybe because they are the only ones who makes this kind of planers makes them naturally the leaders but the 40300H is definitely well worth looking into with its 26 indexible HSS 2 sided helical head inserts that provides longer cutting time, superior finish and quieter operations. It comes with a superb 10000 RPM cutting speed with a decent thickness and depth cut.
DEWALT DW734 Review
Large, impressively efficient, and packed with a great deal of power, the DEWALT DW734 is one of the best wood planers you are going to find.
DEWALT DW735 Review
Offering fantastic build quality, power, accuracy, and cut quality, the DEWALT DW735 is a great example of the best wood planers currently on the market.
DEWALT DW735X Review
Wood planning is fun, engaging work. However, without a good wood planer, it can also be very difficult. This is where the DEWALT DW735X is going to prove to be a real lifesaver.
For a few hundred dollars, you can purchase a benchtop planer for your workshop. If you learn to use it correctly you can save money be reclaiming old wood or smooth out rough boards for that perfect woodworking project. We provide unbiased benchtop planer reviews of the best planers available on the market today. If you’re doing research and trying to figure out which is the best benchtop planer to buy, we hope you find our reviews useful in your decision making.
Last update on 2021-08-16 / Affiliate links / Images from Amazon Product Advertising API
