Ridgid Planer helical cutterhead update

Alan Bienlein

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Well I figured I would post and update on this upgrade I just did in case others are thinking about the same thing. To me it was a no brainer as the surface planer cost me nothing except the aggravation of having to find replacement knives and tear out on figured woods. In the video I'm running some curly maple I got from the Ambassador from his "tour de wood" visit. I don't know if you remember Larry but it had quite a bit of tear out. I replaced all the 2 sided hss cutters with 4 sided carbide cutters. Also in the video I made sure to feed the board into the planer in the same direction as was originally surfaced by looking at the tear out.
 
The problems you mention are exactly what led me to trying a spiral head on my jointer. After that, there was no looking back when the planer choice was to be made. I didn't realize accu-head made heads with carbide cutters. Good to know. The math proves out the cost savings on these and you can look forward to a long term benefit in material savings as well. Congrats and enjoy not trashing parts and having to re-make :thumb:
 
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Hey Alan, you didn't happen to video the changing the head did you?? I have the same planer and am very interested in that change-over, I have a helical head jointer and love it.
 
Hey Alan, you didn't happen to video the changing the head did you?? I have the same planer and am very interested in that change-over, I have a helical head jointer and love it.

I have the installation instructions I can e-mail you. It took me an hour at the most. Unless you can tell me how to post a 1.19mb pdf here. If not just pm me
 
Alan...Looks like it did a good job on that curly maple. What cutter head did you use? I have the same planer.

I got it from this company.http://www.accu-head.com/#!products They make them for Ryobi, Delta, Dewalt and of course Steel City.
The one thing I did do was switch out the two sided hss cutters for the four sided carbide cutters. I got those here. They had the best pricing.http://www.carbideprocessors.com/4-sided-1-hole-insert-knife-t04f-grade-14mm-x-14mm-x-2mm-southeast-tool-si-141420-sp/

The quality of the cut of the two sided hss cutters is better than the straight knives but the four sided carbide cutters is what made the difference on this cutter head.
 
Hi Alan
Help me out with the cost. If I am reading this right the accu-head costs $249 and each carbide cutter costs $21.82 plus shipping. How many of the cutters did you have to purchase? I am about to do the same thing and am trying to see if it would be less expensive to just purchase the Byrd Shelix with the cutters already on the head.

Thanks
Alan Bacon
 
Well guys, here I am again. Accu-Head arrived and it was very well packaged for shipment. In a wooden box surrounded by peanuts in a larger heavy duty cardboard box. No damage at all. I removed the top and a question immediately jumped out....... How in the heck can you get the head out of the box with knocking the box apart?????

So, how did you guys with this head get it out of the box? I am going to mount it tomorrow, Saturday morning and if I have to I will just destroy the box :eek: but I don't want to.

Thanks

Al
 
Well guys, here I am again. Accu-Head arrived and it was very well packaged for shipment. In a wooden box surrounded by peanuts in a larger heavy duty cardboard box. No damage at all. I removed the top and a question immediately jumped out....... How in the heck can you get the head out of the box with knocking the box apart?????

So, how did you guys with this head get it out of the box? I am going to mount it tomorrow, Saturday morning and if I have to I will just destroy the box :eek: but I don't want to.
Thanks

Al

Allan,

Are you happy with the Accu-head?

Thanks
Jack
 
Hi Jack

Very happy with the Accu-Head. Not so much with the carbide inserts I recieved. They are just a little under sized and that allows them to rotate just a whisker. That in turn leaves many little groves in the boards. Accu-Head is currently testing carbide inserts for their heads and they should be available later this year. When they are they will be added to their web site.

The basic head itself was a very good upgrade.

Al
 
I got it from this company.http://www.accu-head.com/#!products They make them for Ryobi, Delta, Dewalt and of course Steel City.
The one thing I did do was switch out the two sided hss cutters for the four sided carbide cutters. I got those here. They had the best pricing.http://www.carbideprocessors.com/4-sided-1-hole-insert-knife-t04f-grade-14mm-x-14mm-x-2mm-southeast-tool-si-141420-sp/

The quality of the cut of the two sided hss cutters is better than the straight knives but the four sided carbide cutters is what made the difference on this cutter head.

Alan,

The accu-head website has been down for a few weeks. Any idea if they are still in business?

Thanks
Jackl
 
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