need to hire planing at New Orleans shop - two 18" wide walnut planks w/snipe

[Caleb Crosby]

I took two walnut planks out of town to a shop with a wide ShopFox planer and just noticed they have noticeable snipe in last 3 inches- abt .020 They are clean and have been scanned for metal. I need to strike a deal to get these re-planed flat. Can anyone provide potential resources in the New Orleans area that can be contacted?

[Kevin Jenness]

At this point a wide belt sander would be a better choice.

[Caleb Crosby]

Kevin I'm not a pro woodworker so don't know all the tools you might be referring to but I can't see how you'd workhold an 18" wide slab to any belt. But more important, to my eye sandpaper wrecks figured wood, I did A/B tests with figured cherry and found that planing leaves much better clarity, chatoyance. I want to stay with planing. My 735 PLaner is delivering today but 13" ain't gonna cut it!

[Caleb Crosby]

I took two walnut planks out of town to a shop with a wide ShopFox planer and just noticed they have noticeable snipe in last 3 inches- abt .020 They are clean and have been scanned for metal. I need to strike a deal to get these re-planed flat. Can anyone provide potential resources in the New Orleans area that can be contacted?

Sorry Jim, I'm new should have done a better job of reading policy. Thanks for correction instead of removal!

[Kevin Jenness]

Kevin I'm not a pro woodworker so don't know all the tools you might be referring to but I can't see how you'd workhold an 18" wide slab to any belt. But more important, to my eye sandpaper wrecks figured wood, I did A/B tests with figured cherry and found that planing leaves much better clarity, chatoyance. I want to stay with planing. My 735 PLaner is delivering today but 13" ain't gonna cut it!

A wide belt sander is a feed-through machine configured like a planer, standard in commercial work for refining machine-planed surfaces, and unlike many planers they are unlikely to snipe the material. If you have further machining done on your planks it would be a good idea to run a sample first to confirm the results. Running figured wood through an unfamiliar planer is always a crapshoot. .020" snipe is excessive but some snipe can be expected on most planers and should be planned for. I am assuming you are not expecting a finished surface from a planer and will be doing further work with a hand plane, scraper or (god forbid) sandpaper. You could fair out the snipe with a plane, though it will take care and considerable elbow grease to get good results.

I have found that sanding figured wood to a high polish gives a satisfactory result (to my eye) and getting a good result with edge tools with no tearout can be difficult but that is just my $.02"

[Mike Henderson]

I agree that a wide belt sander is a better option. You're going to have to sand the planks no matter what you use (planer/wide belt). A wide belt sander is a much safer choice.

Mike

[Jamie Buxton]

.02” of snipe for three inches, on the end of a big long plank?! I understand that could be aggravating, but I wouldn’t bother taking the planks somewhere to take it out. I’d sand it out, or hand plane it out. The task would take me 10-15 minutes, and $0. If you’re making a ding table, the corrected snipe would be completely unobservable.

[Christian Hawkshaw]

Kevin I'm not a pro woodworker so don't know all the tools you might be referring to but I can't see how you'd workhold an 18" wide slab to any belt. But more important, to my eye sandpaper wrecks figured wood, I did A/B tests with figured cherry and found that planing leaves much better clarity, chatoyance. I want to stay with planing. My 735 PLaner is delivering today but 13" ain't gonna cut it!

If you are worried about maximizing chatoyance, you may just need to sand to a higher grit. See below entry as there is a link to an article on chatoyance and sanding.

https://sawmillcreek.org/showthread....58#post3269658

[Caleb Crosby]

Couple photos, these replies are a big help! The snipe line is 3" from top running across both planks. Backstory here is I'm 62 and tore my rotator cuff a couple years back on 30 bf of figured cherry and a hand plane- talk about a hard stop! I planed it bc I tested what sanding did to the cherry figure and have never touched sandpaper to figured wood since - but my shoulder is still sore as the tax. I'm going to approach this snipe line with a sharp jack plane- and want to try blending it in- don't want to hand plane the whole board tho. Plan to get the feel of the wood on the underside and get the depth of cut figured out but if anyone can offer tips for how to blend this in... please.


Screen Shot 2024-04-04 at 9.14.38 AM.jpg
Screen Shot 2024-04-04 at 9.14.25 AM.jpg

[Caleb Crosby]

.02” of snipe for three inches, on the end of a big long plank?! I understand that could be aggravating, but I wouldn’t bother taking the planks somewhere to take it out. I’d sand it out, or hand plane it out. The task would take me 10-15 minutes, and $0. If you’re making a ding table, the corrected snipe would be completely unobservable.

Jamie it's for a coffee table - I'm only concerned with fooling the eye. I know most skills are not 'explainable' but if there's anything you can tell me about how to make this a short job of work with the hand plane - start talking ! ;-)

[Caleb Crosby]

If you are worried about maximizing chatoyance, you may just need to sand to a higher grit. See below entry as there is a link to an article on chatoyance and sanding.

https://sawmillcreek.org/showthread....58#post3269658

Christian, thanks I clicked thru to the link and learned a lot- but I always like to see it and also found this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yC45Cb-p89I&t=1s which exactly squares with my own experience. I'm sticking with slicing wood as opposed to scratching bc I can't argue with my eyes. This video reminded me it's not all abt chatoyance- it's also about contrast- but that's just me. I have not sanded to 10,000 grit and this walnut does not have a lot of contrast so maybe I could just take some 220 and orbital sand the wave down ? I'm chasing my tail. No idea what to do!

[Caleb Crosby]

I agree that a wide belt sander is a better option. You're going to have to sand the planks no matter what you use (planer/wide belt). A wide belt sander is a much safer choice.

Hi Mike, Pls let me know if you can point me to a shop w/ belt sander in town. I'm not a pro but I sand Poplar to 220 but figured nicer hard woods I finish with a plane- never sand.

[Caleb Crosby]

A wide belt sander is a feed-through machine configured like a planer, standard in commercial work for refining machine-planed surfaces, and unlike many planers they are unlikely to snipe the material. If you have further machining done on your planks it would be a good idea to run a sample first to confirm the results. Running figured wood through an unfamiliar planer is always a crapshoot. .020" snipe is excessive but some snipe can be expected on most planers and should be planned for. I am assuming you are not expecting a finished surface from a planer and will be doing further work with a hand plane, scraper or (god forbid) sandpaper. You could fair out the snipe with a plane, though it will take care and considerable elbow grease to get good results.

I have found that sanding figured wood to a high polish gives a satisfactory result (to my eye) and getting a good result with edge tools with no tearout can be difficult but that is just my $.02"

I am fearing that everything you say is true. Thank you for the info on belt sanding machines, good info. Let me just ask this - when you say a high polish are you talking 400 grit? I had hoped to finish this with rubio monocoat and their spec is around 150 grit. I guess I should sand the underside to 150, wet it out and see what I got.

Also you surprised me when saying after planing with a machine - you'd hand plane again? So a hand plane still leaves a better finish that a sharp machine? That's depressing, my Dewalt 735 delivered yesterday.

[John Kananis]

The dw735 is a great machine and I still have mine in the back room (just in case I guess). Imho, machines are for dimensioning and prepping material only (talking real wood here). But they do excel at this. Also, I prefer a hand planed finish but there's nothing wrong with sandpaper if that's your thing (many of my hand planed pieces get a fine sanding or two). 150 sounds... rough but I've never used Rubio so can't comment there.

I am fearing that everything you say is true. Thank you for the info on belt sanding machines, good info. Let me just ask this - when you say a high polish are you talking 400 grit? I had hoped to finish this with rubio monocoat and their spec is around 150 grit. I guess I should sand the underside to 150, wet it out and see what I got.

Also you surprised me when saying after planing with a machine - you'd hand plane again? So a hand plane still leaves a better finish that a sharp machine? That's depressing, my Dewalt 735 delivered yesterday.

[Kevin Jenness]

I am fearing that everything you say is true. Thank you for the info on belt sanding machines, good info. Let me just ask this - when you say a high polish are you talking 400 grit? I had hoped to finish this with rubio monocoat and their spec is around 150 grit. I guess I should sand the underside to 150, wet it out and see what I got.

Also you surprised me when saying after planing with a machine - you'd hand plane again? So a hand plane still leaves a better finish that a sharp machine? That's depressing, my Dewalt 735 delivered yesterday.

The grit level required really is dependent on the wood, the sanding method and the finish. For instance with a film finish like lacquer on cherry one might see little difference after 180-220# while a thin oil finish might need 320-400# to avoid seeing scratches, whereas ebony would require even higher grit levels. Finish sanding with the grain is theoretically the best way to get a good finish with abrasives, but is not always practical, for instance in turned facegrain vessels where one needs to hand sand to a higher grit than if using a random orbit sander.

I agree that in the abstract a clean tooled surface is hard to improve on but practically it is not always suitable and definitely takes considerable skill. I do not consider a machine planed surface suitable for finishing except for commercial millwork and the like, and even there the planer must be set up properly and the knives in perfect shape to minimize the corrugations resulting from the machining process.

I have hand-planed a large tabletop for a client that wanted to see that texture under an oil finish, but my suggestion to you was to use a plane to get rid of the snipe rather than take the planks to yet another shop. If you were to do that you would have to do more work, whether planing, scraping or sanding, to get the entire surface to an even texture. In your shoes I would use a jack plane or a belt sander to eliminate the snipe and follow up wit a random orbit sander. Trying to get rid of snipe with a random orbit sander is a losing battle.

If you are satisfied with a machine planed surface for finishing you should allow extra length when roughing out your stock to allow cutting off the almost inevitable planer snipe, which even if minor will show up under a finish if not dealt with in some way.