For the Carpenters.... How do I plane a rough 42" slab
 

I have a friend who has started to collect large slabs of logs from an arborist. up to 45" x 6' x 3" and he is trying to figure out how to plane them down to a relatively smooth finish.

He's interested in making or refurbishing a commercial style machine for the process. Are there other technologies for metal working that could be used to create a flat smooth surface.

Anyone got suggestions or solution? A $50,000.00 machine is not his kinda solution.

Thanks

Floor buffer with a sanding pad

Take the slabs to a cabinetry shop and pay to run the slabs through a panel sander.

A router with flat bit, on a long flat rail. Then use two parallel rails on either side of wood, slide router back and forth.

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1419964541.jpg

Disclaimer: Not my shop, pulled pic from web.

Some good ideas above. Like the router idea for quick cutting.

In my last project I used hand held sanders, some with the belt sander, some with a six inch disc, but mostly a four inch high speed sander. I' m very comfortable with this tool and it does cut the fastest of all.
I was not looking for a machined surface , but wanted to retain some impression of the character of the grain and knots etc. in the finish surface. It was fun but time consuming.
This pic shows some of the brush marks of the Finnish which sanded out with lots of hand sanding


http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1419967728.jpg

Have you kiln dried the slabs?

When my friend initially talked about this we discussed the router style approach and that would work fine for a single project or two but he would like to sell the slabs after a little "value added work" that he puts into the pieces.

This calls for a semi-industrial solution. He has a machinist who he has a UO me (as opposed to IOU....:) with so his thoughts are with a setup like the pictured router but more industrial and with automated tracking. The machinist would help to manufacture any specialized pieces or a whole unit.

He thought there are metal working machines like this. Anyone familiar with this type of automated table that could be converted to operate a "router like" head.

The pieces can be accessed before or after kiln drying.

Have him do a little math. He can buy a planer and do them himself. He can pay a shop to plane them for him.

One, or the other, will be cheaper.

JR

It won't do any good to level the planks until after they are dried as the surface will warp as the moisture level drops when dried (air or kiln.)

Way back when I was a kid , both an Uncle and my Grandfather had small saw mills.
Making mostly tobacco sticks and barn building materials etc. they had large heavy duty planers. Big ones about 4 feet wide. Not really Finnish surface but could handle the size. The Grandfathers was driven from a spinning shaft in the ceiling, with power take off wheels driving large leather belts. Just point of interest.
If there is a small sawmill in your area, you might check with them. They may like the work between other jobs.

When I owned my cabinet shop I got a fricken big Russian planer used for cheap, but you sure wouldn't have wanted to run it in a residential area. The thing weighed over 10K.
We did work bigger than that, but everything was laminated.

You have to kiln dry or it will split at the ends, look into building a solar kiln.

How about a 51"-wide belt sander?

Grizzly.com® --

a 48" planer isn't going to be cheap.

A wide belt sander isn't going to do the trick. Great for finish work, but not for what the op needs. My suggestion is to have a shop with a wide enough planer to do the hogging out work, then sent it out for semi-final sanding with the wide belt sander. Drying the slabs would be the first thing I do before doing anything else to them. Unless your friend has a forest of slabs, buying equip just to do a couple hundred pieces isn't worth do IMO. Again, do the math. Someone should have a CNC machine that can flatten it out for you. The router would be my third choice

Tell him to google 'diy cnc router'

What about a large older stroke sander?

If you took them to a shop with a wide belt sander you will likely strike out. You cannot plane with a sander and if you are paying shop rate, expect to pay a few hours worth and you will not clean it up in four passes!

When i'm working slabs I use a bigass Makita power plane to flatten one face. I use a 6' level for a straight edge and a pair of winding sticks as long as the board is wide. I can go remarkably fast using this method, but then I've been doing it for 30+ years. Anything less than 12" wide I joint in house, and anything 24" or less I have done.
Then I take it down to our local production millwork shop and run it through their 54" wide planer / sander. It has a spiral cutterhead followed by 2 belts. It's scary fast for surfacing. Cost is $100 per hour, but it can process at least a dozen slabs in an hour, so the cost is less than $10 each.
This is a walnut table top being sanded. As I recall it was in the 42" wide range.http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1420000550.jpg
http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1420000565.jpg

I've seen and used all the various router carriages and so on, but in my extensive experience you can not beat big guns when it comes to milling.
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charlesfreeborn.com

This is a most excellent idea

That looks awesome! I assume you were making a table? Was it to keep or sell?