Orbb Posted December 14, 2013 Report Share Posted December 14, 2013 I was planing some maple today and noticed that the surface was getting gouged. At first I thought that I had a knick in the blade. When I ran the piece through the next time I determined that the gouge was coming from the planer bed and not the cutter heads. I pulled the planer bed out and this is what I found: Today was the first time I used a planer sled, which is made of 3/4 MDF and a small piece of poplar on the end as the stop. I thought that the planer sled had done this, but it was smooth (and slightly gouged itself) and didn't have anything sticking up out of it. I double checked the screws I used to secure the stop, and they are not protruding through the MDF. The only other culprit is some knots in the maple, which seems odd. Anyway, I need to fix this, because the gouges in the metal have burrs which are causing the issues with the wood. I was thinking of 80 grit sandpaper to eliminate the burrs, then 220 grit wet/dry sandpaper to smooth out the finish, followed by multiple coats of wax to make it smooth. Any input on this plan? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trip Posted December 14, 2013 Report Share Posted December 14, 2013 No way wood (even knots) would do something like that... If pressed for a guess, I'd say something hard (screw, nail, staple, etc) was on the bed when the sled was laid down... whatever it was got trapped under the sled and gouged the bed as it passed through... You just want to knock-down the highs and not attempt to remove the gouges... Do you have a reference surface -- say a lapping plate, diamond waterstone, etc? I would not go hog-wild with a RoS or anything like that... 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Llama Posted December 14, 2013 Report Share Posted December 14, 2013 I'm with HHH on this one. Perhaps something was trapped underneath the sled or the last piece of wood what was passed through. Whatever it was has fallen to the floor and possible been swept up. How did the top side of the wood look? It is possible to put an auxiliary bed over the scratches for now until a more permanent solution is available if pressed for time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave H Posted December 14, 2013 Report Share Posted December 14, 2013 I had a similar thing happen I had made a sled for flattening twisted boards I made the sled out of a used cabinet I had disassembled one of the runners had a screw head I hadn't noticed in my hasted to straighten the board. I gouged up the bed of my plainer I used a flat file to knock the ridges down smoothed the file marks with some 220 sand paper than polished the bed up with some paste wax. worked as good as new. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dcustoms Posted December 14, 2013 Report Share Posted December 14, 2013 use an orbital sanding and knock it down start with 100 or similar and sand up to 220 youll be fine. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave H Posted December 15, 2013 Report Share Posted December 15, 2013 It seems to me if you where going to put scratches on your in-feed table you would want them in line. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
..Kev Posted December 15, 2013 Report Share Posted December 15, 2013 TripleH hit the right fix. Don't attempt to sand them out, just knock off the high spots. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bombarde16 Posted December 15, 2013 Report Share Posted December 15, 2013 Wolverine was here! +1 sand off anything sticking up and forget it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Orbb Posted December 15, 2013 Author Report Share Posted December 15, 2013 Thanks all. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mds2 Posted December 16, 2013 Report Share Posted December 16, 2013 I did this same exact thing. It was a screw just barely sticking through the bottom of a planer sled. I just bought a new bottom piece. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marco Divetta Posted December 16, 2013 Report Share Posted December 16, 2013 Similar thing happened to me, I put all the pieces that I was surfacing on the ground next to my planer and I didn't notice the small pebbles that had imbedded themselves into the bottom of the bottom plank which was carrying the weight a fall the others :-/ .... I was less than impressed !!!! Personally I'd be totally against sanding specially with an orbital sander, my fear would be sanding a hollow in the table, even a slight hollow would be a problem because the pieces would follow the surface of the bed in and out of that hollow. I took the handle off my smoothest flat file layed it on the bed and with very little pressure worked it left and right referencing of the whole table, I worked the whole length of the table but The pressure was so light I just knocked off the burrs. If all else fails or you just not happy with the results you can always use a sacrificial surface, a 3/4 inch piece of melamine ply the same with as the bed with a strip across the bottom edge on the I feed side so it's not pulled through with the piece BUT you must remember to allow for the thickness or your sacrificial strip when milling. Hope this helps Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trip Posted December 19, 2013 Report Share Posted December 19, 2013 @OP Don't know how long the gouges are or how deep... or how OCD you are... I has a situation like this some years ago... Gouges in a table top... I knew that once the high spots were knocked-down the machine would function just as well as before, but they still bothered me (certainly some OCD here)... Every time I looked at the gouges, I wanted to do something about it... I realized that spending the $$ for a new table would be a silly waste of money, but still... Now that I think about it, the issue wasn't OCD -- the issue was the gouges kept reminding me of how careless I'd been in the first place... So I did a bit of research... asked our local machine shop what they do... There response was obvious, lap the top... They offered to do it for me at cost... Nice gesture, but I didn't want to disassemble the machine... The next solution, metal-impregnated epoxy... Loctite has (had?) a formulation with an epoxy binder and iron dust as a filler... The stuff dries like concrete... You just mix & smooth into the gouges with a fine putty knife... After cure, lap the fill smooth with the table top... No edge tools here, you need some lapping paste... To make a long story short, it worked great and was an almost invisible repair -- From 3ft away, you couldn't see it at all... I don't know how OCD you are, but just wanted to throw that out... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Orbb Posted December 20, 2013 Author Report Share Posted December 20, 2013 @OP Don't know how long the gouges are or how deep... or how OCD you are... I has a situation like this some years ago... Gouges in a table top... I knew that once the high spots were knocked-down the machine would function just as well as before, but they still bothered me (certainly some OCD here)... Every time I looked at the gouges, I wanted to do something about it... I realized that spending the $$ for a new table would be a silly waste of money, but still... Now that I think about it, the issue wasn't OCD -- the issue was the gouges kept reminding me of how careless I'd been in the first place... So I did a bit of research... asked our local machine shop what they do... There response was obvious, lap the top... They offered to do it for me at cost... Nice gesture, but I didn't want to disassemble the machine... The next solution, metal-impregnated epoxy... Loctite has (had?) a formulation with an epoxy binder and iron dust as a filler... The stuff dries like concrete... You just mix & smooth into the gouges with a fine putty knife... After cure, lap the fill smooth with the table top... No edge tools here, you need some lapping paste... To make a long story short, it worked great and was an almost invisible repair -- From 3ft away, you couldn't see it at all... I don't know how OCD you are, but just wanted to throw that out... Thanks. I am really not that OCD; I am mainly interested in making sure the gouges don't add another variable to my process. I am not a perfectionist but I am trying to be "as perfect as possible", to paraphrase Roubo, and I just don't want one other thing added to my failure analysis when a project turns out differently than anticipated. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CessnaPilotBarry Posted December 20, 2013 Report Share Posted December 20, 2013 I've scratched my table saws over the years with screw or brad tips in jigs. I just lightly zipped a mill file over the raised ridges 'till it no longer caught on them. No worries... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jmoorecraftworks Posted December 21, 2013 Report Share Posted December 21, 2013 I have to agree that most likely foreign material was stuck to the bottom of your sled. Another possibility may have been the compression of the rollers causing your screws to protrude through the mdf. Do you see holes on the bottom even though the screws are not sticking out? This is highly unlikely due to mdf being so dense but I don't know how strong your planer is! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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