lunchbox planers with helical head?

[John Piwaron]

Which companies are making lunchbox planers with helical cutters?

With shelix type cutting heads the coming thing it occurs to me that manufacturers are or should be putting them into their machines. I haven't see DeWalt do that yet, but surely someone is. My question is which ones currently do that? And of those, which machines are good?

[Mark Kornell]

AFAIK, Steel City is the only one that makes a lunchbox planer with a spiral cutterhead installed. Don't know if it is a true helical, but should be easy to find out if you want to.

I put a Shelix in my DW735, and it was pretty easy to do. Certainly an option if you you want a DeWalt with a helical.

[Dan Barber1]

Has anyone here had experience with the Steel City spiral cutterhead one. They have two versions, one for about $500 and another heaver duty one for between $600 and $700. I had just about decided to get the Steel City cheeper version when I saw a review of lunchbox planers in one of the magazines recently and they rated the Rigid lunchbox ($399) above the more expensive Steel City one even though the Steel City had the spiral cutterhead. Any thoughts on this?

[Joe Angrisani]

I have the first generation Steel City spiral, and I'm VERY HAPPY with it. I would guess it is the same as the current $500 model with one exception: The inserts on mine have four cutting edges, whereas the newer version has only two-sided inserts. It hogs away material if I ask it to, but also leaves a very good surface if I take a final skim cut. I am the second owner (bought used for $300) and it's still on the first side of the inserts. Let me know if you have any specfic questions.

[Joe Spear]

I have the older Steel City machine, with the four-sided cutters. They are steel. It works well. The newer one has two-sided carbide cutters.

[Alan Bienlein]

I bought the same helical head thats in the Steel City lunch box planer and installed it in my Ridgid TP1300. Best investment I ever made.

[John Piwaron]

Joe (both of you) and Alan,

It sounds like your satisfied with the cutting performance, how's the noise issue? I assume you've got experience with lunchboxes with straight knives. They're plenty loud.

When it comes down to it, that'd be one of the other reasons to spend the money on a new planer.

[Joe Spear]

The Steel City helical head may be a little quieter than straight blades, but not enough to leave off the hearing protection. I got a good pair of ear muffs at Harbor Freight for $12: reduces sound level 34 decibels.

[Shawn Pixley]

I have the older Steel City. I'll probably upgrade to the carbide cutters when the steel ones dull.

[Alan Bienlein]

It's definitely quieter when running wood thru the planer. I never took readings of before and after but when I had the straight knives I wouldn't run my planer after 8pm and now that I changed it to the helical hed it's quiet enough that I wouldn't hesitate to run the planer up to 10 or 11 pm where I live at.

[Joe Angrisani]

In my opinion, the noise is like any other lunchbox (except for the super-loud, vacuum-assisted DeWalt which is even louder). All lunchboxes are going to scream because of the universal motor. If noise is a serious issue, you have to make the jump to a "real" floor-unit planer.

[Tai Fu]

But what do you do when you don't have enough shop room for both a jointer and a planer? A lunchbox planer would fold up and hide away and I can use a stationary jointer for most needs...

[John Piwaron]

But what do you do when you don't have enough shop room for both a jointer and a planer? A lunchbox planer would fold up and hide away and I can use a stationary jointer for most needs...

How about a combination unit like a Hammer A3 41?

[Mark Kornell]

But what do you do when you don't have enough shop room for both a jointer and a planer? A lunchbox planer would fold up and hide away and I can use a stationary jointer for most needs...

This is what I did to conserve shop space:
13 - Jointer Planer.jpg

The jointer is on a mobile base that rolls in and out. The table was made entirely from dimensional lumber, plus a couple of melamine scraps for the planer infeed/outfeed.

The setup works so well that I will keep it when I move into a larger space later this year. It is really handy having a spot to stage stock when using a machine - the planer infeed/outfeed serves as a holding area for the jointer, and vice versa. Plus, stock coming off the jointer is oriented perfectly for running though the planer - no thought needed to figure out grain direction.

And on forum topic - With they Byrd head in the DW735, I have not noticed any difference in sound level compared to the stock cutterhead. The pitch is slightly different, but it is still screaming loud. The fan on the 735 is probably the reason for this. What you don't see in this pic is my cyclone, maybe 5 feet out of the frame. It is even louder than the 735, so hearing protection is pretty much mandatory anywhere in the shop when any machine is running.