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Q What are a few questions customers should ask themselves when they are considering new planing technology?
Karl Ogden, president, Ogden Group: The questions customers might ask themselves when they are looking to purchase a planer can vary depending on the application the customer plans to use the planer for. For example, is the customer looking for a planer to calibrate thin components or to calibrate short parts?
Is he looking to plane parts that are to be further processed such as face gluing?
In the case of the customer who is looking to plane thin components he should ask: Will the planer plane these parts without breakage of the part? Without sniping out on the leading and trailing ends? Will it generate a smooth surface?
In the case of the customer looking to plane short parts: Is there a danger of kick-back of the parts? Will the parts feed through the machine smoothly? Will there be snipe-out? What type of finish will I get?
In the case of planing parts that will be further processed, such as face or edge glued, the customer should ask: Will the machine generate a surface that is conducive for edge- and/or face-gluing?
The Rotoplane is a unique planer that planes material in a manner completely different than any other conventional planing systems on the market. Those who purchase this machine, can't ever see going back to the other method of planing. The machine is popular in the flooring industry because of its ability to run thin parts while maintaining tolerances and a smooth finish without any snipe. When thin parts are run through a conventional planing machine, there is always a tendency for the leading and trailing ends to have snipe. This is due to the distance between the chip breaker in front of the head and the hold-down shoe after the planner head.
The Rotoplane has the capability of planing parts as short as 4 in. without any danger of kickback. With other planers, the distance between the chip breaker and the pressure shoe on sanders and knife planers can be as much as 8 in. This makes it virtually impossible, not to mention dangerous, to run parts shorter than 8 in.
The shearing action generated by the disk's milling rotation creates a porous wood surface, which allows the glue to penetrate the wood surface, and results in a superior glue-joint. Knife-planing can create a surface that is glass-like, and this type of surface does not allow the glue to penetrate the wood resulting in a poor quality of the glue-joint. Several glue companies have conducted tests, which are consistently conclusive in finding the Rotoplane method to produce a surface that is the most conducive for glue absorption, thus producing a stronger glue bond.
Jeff Machacek, vice president of sales, Northfield Foundry & Machine: Selecting a planer configuration can be a daunting proposition for both the experienced and inexperienced. The first question that needs to be addressed is whether the customer requires a single-head planer or double-head planer.
After the type of planer has been determined the next question that needs to be answered is how wide of a planer does the customer need. I normally recommend using the narrowest width machine that can get the job done. In the long run, it will be the most cost-effective production and maintenance wise.
One must keep in mind that you cannot effectively process 24-in. panels through a 24-in. machine. A 30-in. model would be more appropriate. I stress the narrowest width in light of the fact that wider planers have inherent feeding problems when running multiple pieces due to the length of the upper outfeed roll.
The next question that must be answered deals with the style of cutterhead; for softwood planing, a straight knife M-2 HSS cutterhead may be appropriate. If the customer is running a mix of hardwood and softwood panels, a helical carbide cutterhead with a 23-degree hook angle would be my choice. If the customer's product line is exclusively hardwoods like maple or oak, a helical head with a 7-degree hook angle would significantly reduce pickout and extend the time between grinding.
After the cutterhead style has been determined, cutterhead speed must be addressed. If the planer does not have to match the feed rate of other process machinery at a given knife hit per inch criteria, I let the head run at a standard rpm of 3,600. This extends bearing life and keeps noise levels down.
Horsepower is the next issue to be addressed. The most popular choice for 24-in. planers is 15 hp. Twenty horsepower on 30-in. and 25 hp on 36-in. are the norms for those size planers. If the planers are to be used exclusively for full width hardwood panel processing, increasing the horsepower by 5 hp would be appropriate.
These questions will determine the basic operating and performance characteristics of the planer. Options such as power table elevation, digital readouts and onboard fused disconnects will be determined by customer needs and policies.