Thread: Workzone thicknesser at Aldi

If you can stretch the additional dollars to purchase the T13S that is the best machine out of all the ones linked to by far. Don’t however be taken in by the claim of a “spiral head”; it isn’t. What it has is a segmented head with 26 staggered little cutters taking nibbles with each revolution rather than two dirty great long knives. A spiral head would have more than twice that number of cutters arranged in a spiral pattern, a helical head has then arranged in a helix that slices the wood rather than chops.

The T13S will give you a much cleaner finish than any of the cheap straight knife planers, and if you chip a cutter you can turn it round and get a fresh edge. SJE tools sells quality tungsten carbide cutters for much less than the standard OEM HSS replacements.

But back to the Workzone; that and the Ryobi are just as good (or crap) as each other. The only difference I can think of would be the knives, the Ryobi likely uses twin edged pinned blades that are thrown away after both edges have been used, the Aldi MIGHT instead use the older unpinned blades that are a PITA to set up correctly, but can be resharpened at least once. Quality control on both will be conspicuous by its absence; both will give snipe, both will scream like banshees and both will give a rippled surface and will tear out wood with cranky or reversing grain. The only reason I would go Ryobi is for the 4 year warranty if it is true. If all else is equal then I’d go Aldi; their warrenty is simpler: “Excuse me, after 364 days it broke. Here’s the receipt.” “Not a problem sir, here’s your refund”.

Just had a recheck of the Aldi and the Ryobi ones again, neither of them appear to have any provision for chip collection.

You. Need. A. Chip. Collector. End of story.

Without one you will be sweeping the shavings up after every single pass and filling your shed with a huge amount of dust. If you use it outside you’ll be spreading the dust and shavings all over your yard, and possibly the neighbours too. Even a cheap dusty is fine, so long as it has a 4” connection and you understand it’s sole purpose is to collect the gross chips and not provide any form of respiratory protection.

Originally Posted by Chief Tiff

... Don’t however be taken in by the claim of a “spiral head”; it isn’t. What it has is a segmented head with 26 staggered little cutters taking nibbles with each revolution rather than two dirty great long knives. A spiral head would have more than twice that number of cutters arranged in a spiral pattern, a helical head has then arranged in a helix that slices the wood rather than chops.

Yes, I saw that it is not a real "spiral head"...but nonetheless I guess that the result will be much nicer than the one I could get with a straight blade...

That being said...I think I am going with the T13S....I'm so close to hit the "buy" button...

I have the Carbatec version of the T13S, it weighs about 10kg more but has the exact same head. First thing I did was replace the HSS cutters with TC (never used the HSS once once!) and set it to work on Qld Red Gum.

That was a purchase I have absolutely no regret making.

Just bought it on line!

Thanks guys for all your advices!

Forum member Woodpixel has the same unit, send him a PM asking him how to set yours up perfectly with zero snipe. Although my unit is slightly different his advice was equally applicable and invaluable, and you only should have to do it once.

Originally Posted by Chief Tiff

Forum member Woodpixel has the same unit, send him a PM asking him how to set yours up perfectly with zero snipe. Although my unit is slightly different his advice was equally applicable and invaluable, and you only should have to do it once.

Hi chief.

Would you be willing to repost that advise here? It would save woodpixel being bombarded with requests, especially as it works across different machines.

Enjoy your new thicknesser! I would start to save up for a small dust extractor to go with it (second hand is fine) and then your planing will be much easier and cleaner.

Originally Posted by Chief Tiff

Just had a recheck of the Aldi and the Ryobi ones again, neither of them appear to have any provision for chip collection.

You. Need. A. Chip. Collector. End of story.

8112E5DB-3AD0-40C0-89F6-B159150E5718.jpg

Has a chip chute and hose connection

Originally Posted by taz01

Hi chief.

Would you be willing to repost that advise here? It would save woodpixel being bombarded with requests, especially as it works across different machines.

It took a bit of finding because it was written under his previous identity;

It's really, really important to ensure the snipe lock is sufficiently engaged. I have never wound the height with it on (the instructions are very clear on this warning) and secondly, I spent a fair chunk of time with the metre steel rule to ensure the tables were flat.

Placing the ruler sideways (ok, I also used my fatmaxx Stanley level as it has a big flat side and it's very long) to ensure the ruler was flat on the bed and the tables were raised and lowered (no lock nuts) until they were perfect, with just a HAIR of upward pressure once so. Then I locked all four nuts using two spanners, ensuring the bolts spanner didn't move an iota.

I pick up the thickie, drop it on the bench and just go for it. I've feet hundreds of metres of wood and I would say it has zero snipe. I have never re-checked it since setup, infact, I haven't even rotated a head unit yet.

The above was just from me buggerising around with the unit when I received it. I opened it wide and studied the guts to understand what it was doing and why...for when I received it the snipe was hideous. I was deeply disappointed, but after doing the above it was completely rectified.

Lastly, this model is very common in the US. I've seen articles where dudes would glue two long bits of stiff ply, one might have a melamine or phenolic top for slipperiness and make a long shoot for the material to slide through on. I'm guessing they were 6' long and were supported both ends from underneath. This kind of sled makes snipe impossible unless the rubber rollers are tipping the timber when entering/existing..... But this is fixed by ensuring the opposite end never leaves the shooting board.

I've been meaning to make one, but to be honest, I've feed through 3" hardwood 6' sleepers and received no snipe....being quite deliberate to give the poor machine a hand with weight on the right end of course.

HERE is the link to the full thread. Those who read it will spot my error; Woodpixel's machine is the same as mine; the Carbatec. Clearly I had a brain fart and confused the two.... However the above advice applies to pretty much any brand. The only thing I will add to his post is that I wound down the cutter head to gently hold the level flat on the plattern, thus giving me a solid reference to butt the tables up to. It's still a fiddly PITA, but do it right once and you'll never need to do it again.

Originally Posted by Chief Tiff

It took a bit of finding because it was written under his previous identity;

It's really, really important to ensure the snipe lock is sufficiently engaged. I have never wound the height with it on (the instructions are very clear on this warning) and secondly, I spent a fair chunk of time with the metre steel rule to ensure the tables were flat.

Placing the ruler sideways (ok, I also used my fatmaxx Stanley level as it has a big flat side and it's very long) to ensure the ruler was flat on the bed and the tables were raised and lowered (no lock nuts) until they were perfect, with just a HAIR of upward pressure once so. Then I locked all four nuts using two spanners, ensuring the bolts spanner didn't move an iota.

I pick up the thickie, drop it on the bench and just go for it. I've feet hundreds of metres of wood and I would say it has zero snipe. I have never re-checked it since setup, infact, I haven't even rotated a head unit yet.

The above was just from me buggerising around with the unit when I received it. I opened it wide and studied the guts to understand what it was doing and why...for when I received it the snipe was hideous. I was deeply disappointed, but after doing the above it was completely rectified.

Lastly, this model is very common in the US. I've seen articles where dudes would glue two long bits of stiff ply, one might have a melamine or phenolic top for slipperiness and make a long shoot for the material to slide through on. I'm guessing they were 6' long and were supported both ends from underneath. This kind of sled makes snipe impossible unless the rubber rollers are tipping the timber when entering/existing..... But this is fixed by ensuring the opposite end never leaves the shooting board.

I've been meaning to make one, but to be honest, I've feed through 3" hardwood 6' sleepers and received no snipe....being quite deliberate to give the poor machine a hand with weight on the right end of course.

HERE is the link to the full thread. Those who read it will spot my error; Woodpixel's machine is the same as mine; the Carbatec. Clearly I had a brain fart and confused the two.... However the above advice applies to pretty much any brand. The only thing I will add to his post is that I wound down the cutter head to gently hold the level flat on the plattern, thus giving me a solid reference to butt the tables up to. It's still a fiddly PITA, but do it right once and you'll never need to do it again.

Thanks chief,

I've also got the carbatec bench top so this is perfect. @poundy also had the same model so I'm sure he will be having a look.

Regards,

Adam

Is it possible to fit a spiral head to the Aldi one?

Originally Posted by Larkan

Is it possible to fit a spiral head to the Aldi one?

Why waste your cash?
Honestly, they are built to a (damn cheap) price, and from all reports they are not worth spending a cent beyond that on them. Nobody will invest R&D money to build an after-market head as they'd have nowhere near enough people interested in buying them to get back their investment. If you're going to spend a grand (or thereabouts) on a spiral head, you're better off spending that on one of the entry level ones from CTec/Hafco

I have the T 13S from Hare and Forbes. The setup to get everything just level was quite fiddly but not complicated. It explains how in the manual. It's just a lot of back and forth.
Fortunately I haven't had to adjust it again in a year with light use.

I did create a simple long sled put of form ply. This helps to reduce snipe anyway.

The other thing to remember is that sometimes snipe doesn't matter. For example I was dressing some pallet wood and so snipe was the least of my concerns.

All this is a minor detail is you don't have a machine to suck the chips away so my advise is focus on that first.

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