Router or thickness planer... which should I get?

[heathicus]

I have three Shopsmiths now - two 10ERs (one dedicated as a drill press) and the Mark V (still restoring) with a bandsaw. I also have an old Craftsman 6" jointer and smaller hand power tools - a Dewalt random orbit sander, a finish sander, circular saw, etc. I have an old Craftsman router, but the Auto Height Adjust feature makes it pretty much unusable.

Most of the tax refund money is going to savings, but I might be able to take some of it out and spend on a good tool I might not normally be able to afford. If I'm able to do that, I'm kind of torn between a good router, or a thickness planer. There have been times when I could REALLY have used both. But it's going to be one or the other.

For a router, I'm thinking of something like a Porter Cable 893PKL. It has both a plunge and fixed base. I'd build a table for the fixed base and use the plunge base for hand use. Looking at it in Lowes, it looks like it has some nice features.

For a thickness planer, I was looking at the Dewalt DW734. A planer may not be as versatile as a router, but I really want to be able to mill my own lumber. My father-in-law knows a guy that picks up downed trees for people and brings them to his house. Mostly oak and hickory. My father-in-law and brother-in-law just cut them up for firewood and end up giving the firewood away. It kills me that I can't turn that into lumber instead. Between the bandsaw for resawing and the jointer and a planer, wouldn't I be able to work with some of the smaller pieces?

So any recommendations? I've seen jigs for using a router to thickness plane, but I question my ability to build such a thing accurately.

Of course, this is all pending approval by LOML/SWMBO and other factors.

[curiousgeorge]

Just my opinion, but I would go for the Dewalt planer. I have 6 routers and a DW735 planer and the planer gets way more use than the routers. Besides, with milling your own lumber, you might be able to save enough to buy a nice router down the road.

[reible]

Have to go with along with the planner based on the fact you have a source of free wood. Wood is expensive so you can start saving up for more and more tools.

BTW you might want to get a chain saw and a metal detector and I hope you have room to store the wood while it drying.

Boy that was hard to do, being a big router fan 99.99% of the time I would expect me to thumbs up the router purchase. Now I'm wondering if it really me answering this...

Ed

[inthegrove]

I have 3 routers and the Dewalt planer. I don't think that you would find planing with a router very practical. I do use my router for adding profiles to boards quite often. But a cheaper yard sale Craftsman router for around 20 bucks would do this, But, don't get anything but carbide tips router bits. The others will burn your wood and not last long. In fact, there are about 10of these in my shop garbage can as I write this. Have you thought about using the Shopsmith as a router? the book says yu can use it with the right arbor. There are several on eBay now. I am bidding on a 1/2 one.

[riot_nrrd]

In my eperience, the Shopsmith bandsaw is probably not going to be big enough to turn logs into lumber. You'll need a jig of some kind to hold the log, and when you add that, the biggest log you'll be able to process will be about 5 inches... assuming it is perfectly straight. If you exclude the pith, you're talking about some really small sticks of wood... and that's while its wet.

I learned this trying to figure out how to resaw some ~6.5 inch poplar. The bandsaw didn't have the capacity. I ended up taking the table off the bandsaw and replacing it with a hodgepodge of extension tables and wood scraps until I could just barely squeeze the lumber through.

Probably stupid and unsafe, but dang it, I didn't want to rip an inch off the board just so it would fit.

RiotNrrd

[charlese]

I'd go for the thickness planer first. You might be able to pick up a pretty good router at a yard sale of hock shop.

RiotNrrd has pointed out the SS bandsaw's re-saw capability is limited to 6". But a planer will yield boards that are uniform thickness and a lot easier to use than those with variances.

[billmayo]

While at the Shopsmith Owners Weekend, a chainsaw was used to cut nice wide slabs that could be planned from a big log that was outside the shop. It was a simple frame like the this one at: http://www.drpower.com/prdSell.aspx?p1N ... sawSawMill for $149.00. I am sure with patience and taking your time, you could quickly pay for the tools to do this type of work if you have the logs available.

[a1gutterman]

Hindsight experience here; between the two choices, I wood pick the planer first, for all of the reasons already given!

[heathicus]

I've investigated the various chainsaw mills... but I don't have a chainsaw!

I have plenty of attic space above the garage with walk in entrance from the 2nd floor. Is that a suitable place for storing lumber for drying?

[iclark]

Bill's suggestion of getting the chain saw mill first is a good one.

based on your stated purpose, you will not have any use for the planer for a year or more (~3 months drying time per quarter inch of thickness for the rough cut lumber for air dried).

the planer only gets used this year if you start buying dried rough-cut lumber.

don't forget to paint/coat the end grain of the logs as soon as possible when they come in.

you could allways try turning some green wood while you wait for the lumber to air dry.

Ivan