Shopsmith Forums

Hi all,

I have just gotten my hands on or am about to get my hands on another shopsmith unit putting me at a grand total of 3 shopsmith units.

However, I'll just be keeping two units. This unit was purchased so that I could get my hands on the shopsmith planer addition which the owner did not want to part out. I have been looking to find a good used one on both ebay and also craigslist for ages, but it has been a long haul as they rarely pop up and if they do, they are local pickup only or seem like they've been left to corrode in some humid corner of the garage or basement.

I am not sure if it is because no one sells them compared to the other additions or whether there are just far less out in the wild due to their expense. The truth may lie somewhere in the middle.

Anyways, I am a bit of anti-dust fanatic meaning I like to capture as much dust at the source of creation within reason. I have a 1hp rikon 60-100 650 cfm DC with thien baffle pre-separator and a wynn environmental 0.5 micron 35A NANO canister filter. I use 4" tubing in all areas except at the machine where I have a reducing adapter to fit the shopsmith dust collection ports. I use it to filter the air in my garage for about 10 minutes during cleanup and it helps with air quality. It is also far better at capturing dust and chips than my very old shopmate dust collector (basically a shopvac) that came with one of the other shopsmith units. Not sure how it would compare to the DC 3300, but purely based off of CFM numbers, I imagine the rikon probably 'sucks' more.

On to my primary question, is the planer dust chute addition worth it in terms of additional dust/chip collection at the source. I guess worth is in the eye of the beholder, but given the above description, does the planer dust chute addition significantly improve upon dust collection?

http://www.shopsmith.com/ownersite/item ... tem=300001

Also, how difficult are the planer blades to set without the planer knife setting guage tool?

I have also found a byrd shelix helical cutterhead that can replace the one in the shopsmith so am debating that as a nice addition vs. buying another set of planer knives to have on hand. The 4 sided carbide inserts might pay for itself over time with length of operation taken into consideration and also ease of replacement of the indexed carbide inserts. I think it might be a really nice upgrade especially when you factor in the variable speed feed motor, it might help drastically reduce tear-out in highly figured wood.

I posited many questions and I appreciate any constructive comments and information!

Cheers,
John

Sorry forgot to include link to the shopsmith 12" helical cutterhead.

https://mywoodcutters.com/index.php?rou ... =shopsmith

Cheers,
John

I did not know that this existed. I collect dust/chips by connecting the DC3300 hose to a hole in the top of the planer. That works - sorta. However, I still have a lot to clean up from in and around the planer when I get done with a planer task.

SHOPSMITH: Please consider a more action campaign of informing current users of these "tiny" changes that you are making. An email post or a thread here on the forum - "What is new at Shopsmith This Week" - would be really neat.

The dust chute for the planer is a fine example.

If anyone out there in the forum has one of these, would you please consider postiong some more revealing photo images - to supplement the one image you see when you search on the part number 300001.

This also looks interesting: https://mywoodcutters.com/index.php?rou ... =shopsmith

Then I found the price. $651 It is no longer of interest.

It does show the need for us to make products more findable.

The planer dust chute has been around a long time (a quick check shows it to be prior to 1999, records older than 1999 aren't as quickly available to me).

I am not clear on the dust chute. Is this an improvement over the existing dust collection port that is already on mine or did SS supply planers without the dust collection port ? Mine came with the gray cover with the dust port. Thanks for the helical cutter head link. I agree that is a little pricey Dusty but may be worth it. I had the Grizzly 15" helical in my shop for the last few years and it replaced the standard Grizzly planer that we used for many years and the difference was amazing in every way. The finished product was very superior and no more changing knives. Rotating the carbide cutters was a snap and we ran that thing forever on the original set of cutters. I will have to think about that one. At that same time we converted the 8" long bed jointer to the same style cutter head with the same results. Too bad the SS jointer has a fixed out feed table. That would be a huge improvement for the SS jointer.
Paul

I bought a Shopsmith just to get the planer, as well (though it had the belt sander, jig saw, and some other items I didn't own yet), but ended up keeping the SS. After all, why not? Anyway, my planer also does not have the dust chute, so I can't speak to its effectiveness there--I use the same method as Dusty (the hole-in-the-top) and it is imperfect. From looking at the chute, I would think it would be positioned to help significantly.

The knife setting tool is cheap for something coming from the MS ($8.49), and sometimes found on eBay as well. I personally wouldn't bother with the hassle of setting them without it, but I'm probably not as adventurous as you.

$651 for the helical is probably not overpriced for what it does, but like most things, it's more convenience to me. The beauty of the SS planer is the variable feed motor and cutterhead speeds should allow you to reduce tearout for your specific application (given sharp knives, of course) but represents probably a slower workflow, particularly in terms of keeping the knives honed. Also depends on what kind of wood you work frequently and what kind of volume you run through the planer, and how much time you want to spend cleaning up your surfaces post-planing. Always a time / money / need tradeoff, and I don't think $651 is out of the question on that front for some people. Though I won't be buying any time soon.

YES!!! The dust collection upgrade is a major improvement on the dust collection. It's not perfect, but the amount of chips on the floor are a small fraction of what was there before I added the dust collection.

And get the knife setting gauge, too.

The chip 'flow' essentially throws the debris on top of the workpiece.

The 'upgrade' places a catch pan between the 'flow' and the workpiece.

From there the existing dust collection port can exert influence on the direction of further 'flow'.

No I do not have it. Yes it is on my get asap* list.


* next time I place an order.

masonsailor2 wrote:I am not clear on the dust chute. Is this an improvement over the existing dust collection port that is already on mine or did SS supply planers without the dust collection port ? Mine came with the gray cover with the dust port. Thanks for the helical cutter head link. I agree that is a little pricey Dusty but may be worth it. I had the Grizzly 15" helical in my shop for the last few years and it replaced the standard Grizzly planer that we used for many years and the difference was amazing in every way. The finished product was very superior and no more changing knives. Rotating the carbide cutters was a snap and we ran that thing forever on the original set of cutters. I will have to think about that one. At that same time we converted the 8" long bed jointer to the same style cutter head with the same results. Too bad the SS jointer has a fixed out feed table. That would be a huge improvement for the SS jointer.
Paul

I did not mean to indicate that the cutter head was not a reasonable buy at $650. My thought was simply out of budget for me. Back when I was working and had a pay check coming every Friday afternoon, I would see this completely different. Now that I am on a fixed income that sort of expenditure is out of the question.

JPG wrote:The chip 'flow' essentially throws the debris on top of the workpiece.

The 'upgrade' places a catch pan between the 'flow' and the workpiece.

From there the existing dust collection port can exert influence on the direction of further 'flow'.

No I do not have it. Yes it is on my get asap* list.


* next time I place an order.

Does anyone have photo images of this. I have difficulty trying to envision a catch pan doing what is needed. The work piece rides on the table surface so nothing can go below the work piece and the cutter blades are above the work piece. The dust chute has to mount above all of this and somehow pull the dust and chips up and out.

The first comment in this post very accurately describes what happens within my planer. The debris is thrown onto and all around the work piece. A large part of it ends up on the floor. Don't take this wrong. I am not complaining about my planer. It has been a work horse for me for many years and has never faltered (except when I feed something in against the grain).