On Mar 15, 1:15 pm, wrote:
I'm looking for a thickness planer and plan on getting it from Home
Depot. They have Rigid, Ryobi, Delta, and Dewalt brands. The Ryobi is
fairly cheap $200 I think. I have a Rigid router that I am quite happy
with and have been leaning towards that model.

Any suggestions on features I should look for? I have never used one
and am not sure what to look for. The basic use is for rough saw oak
and other hardwoods. Most pieces will be less than 6 feet in length,
width around 8"-12" and thickness from 1/4" or so up to 3".

Thanks.

I bought a Ryobi planer from HD about four years ago or so. I also
have a Ridgid table saw, the 3650, and a Ridgid jointer from the Borg.
They have all served me well. I bought the Ryobi after some
woodworking mag gave it a good review and rated it a "Best Buy" or
"Good Value" or something like that. It's the only planer I've ever
used so I don't have anything to measure it against but it does a good
job as far as I know. I do get some snipe the last inch or two on a
board. I've just learned to leave my stock longer than what I need for
the final dimension and trim off the part with the snipe. HD even
carries the replacement knives for the Ryobi which are fairly
reasonably priced, especially since you can flip the knives around
once. I guess if I had a complaint about my Ridgid jointer it would be
that the three HD's within 30 minutes of me don't stock replacement
knives. I end up buying them at Sears or on Amazon. I've run 4/4
through 8/4 oak, maple and walnut, through the Ryobi with no trouble
at all. What I've learned is that you need to take several passes
removing a small amount of wood at a time. If you get greedy and try
to plane off too much on a single pass you run the risk of tearout
which depending on the species and the grain can get quite ugly.
Better to run it through, unlock the cutterhead, turn the crank a 1/2
turn or so and lock it down again for another pass, repeating the
procedure until you get down to the desired thickness. As far as order
of operations with rough lumber, AFAIK, you want to face joint one
face, then edge joint with the smooth face against the fence then
plane with the jointed face down to the bed and finally rip the rough
edge using the jointed edge against the table saw fence. This gives
you four square stock and Bob's your uncle. Oh yeah and make sure that
there isn't any metal, even an 18 gauge brad, in the stock you are
milling. It will take a divot out of your planer blade. Ask me how I
know. Well, the first day with the planer and wanting to set it up and
play I grabbed a piece of scrap stock and sent it through. Doh! The
metal on metal sound put a damper on the celebration. I got a quick
lesson on how to flip the blades around on the first day. Have fun.