Thread: Getting into box making, drum sander or thicknesser?

I am not a box maker, but the way I would think about it. A drum sander can sand to say 3 or 4 mm thick, a thicknesser needs more stock to work properly.

My understanding of box making means most boards would be between 8 - 15mm thick?

Worst case you could cut down with your bandsaw and 'thickness' with the sander to final size....I'd go the sander - but as I said, I'm not a box maker

are you using rough stock? or dressed?

If the stuff is dressed then go for the drum sander, otherwise go the thicky. Also consider getting a jointer while youre at it, but if your boxes are small you can definitely get away with hand planes.

Remember that a drum sander is not a thicknesser, so if you see yourself removing more then 3mm at a time go for the thicky otherwise plan to be there for a while/chewing through sand paper.

The thicknesser will rapidly cut material to the thickness that you need but then you have to hand sand it to get a usable surface.

Your jointer can be used to reduce the material thickness rapidly to approximate size. The sander will cut material down relatively slowly, requiring paper changes, course to fine, but the material will be ready for use.

From what you have said about the gear that you have I would go with sander.

Originally Posted by tcjbrown

So I'm getting into box making, and I have the budget for either a benchtop spiral head 13" thicknesser ($899) or a 400mm drum sander ($899). Already have everything else needed for box making (band-saw, jointer, table-saw, router table). What would be a smarter move?

IMO a drum sander, though I'm not confident about the quality and dust extraction of the $899 jobbies. I'm most familiar with the 16-32 Performax model, the current iteration of which Carbatec sells for more than $2000.

a drum sander will allow you to both thickness sand and sand to 180 or 240 grit prior to building a box -- and can handle highly figured timber.

Like all other woodworking machine questions, the answer is: DEPENDS!

Type of timber, thicknesses used, lots of things.

Having said that, since it is a spiral head thicky, I would go with that. It would handle tough grain etc and allow you to thickness faster than a sander and leave a good finish that may need a tiny bit of hand sanding. For really thin stock, you can make a sled to pass it through the thicknesser on.

Also, there are plenty of plans out there for making a drum sander yourself, so buy the thicky and do some research and you could make the drum sander fairly cheaply and then have both.

Cheers

Doug

Thanks for all the input everyone. Looking at my needs right now, I think that I'll go for the thicknesser. Thanks everybody!

I would be the opposite.

A drum sander is an incredible thing to have.

If you are doing boxes, then all the timbers can be cut to +2mm on the bandsaw using a good carbide blade, giving a smooth cut, then sanded with an 80 grit belt to thickness.

If you use a thicknesser, even a good one, tear out happens. On my precious gnarly timbers the thickie does a great job, but I'd rather trust a few passes in the sander.

Btw I am a box maker, perhaps a half decent one

I thought to add a bit more.

If you have larger panels, you can still resaw them effectively on the bandsaw by making a tall fence. It is quite effective.

Since your budget will limit you to a thicknesser of about 300mm, these can be done effectively on the bandsaw. On the forum are a few threads from people who do exactly this to make veneers, slicing off a thickness of 2mm so they can do marquetry or their own veneers.

In a way, slicing veneers off it the same as "thicknessing", but you get to keep a "remenant" veneer rather than turning it into chips. I do exactly this myself when machining timber for my kid chairs and tables. Rather than cut 5mm off a 90x45 on the table saw I cut it off on the bandsaw. I'm left with a million packers

My blade is a Lennox Woodmaster for everyday work, or a Resaw King for the Special Stuff. Both are carbide blades and both leave an excellent finish cut.

So, hopefully I've demonstrated that a thicknesser isn't essential, but very nice to have.

One last point, I've many friends who come to do table tops and lids on my thickness sander and every one of them say at the end they want one! Mine is a bog standard Carbatec model, so it's nothing special.

If your band saw is good then you do not need a drum sander. All i have ever used is a thickneser and 125mm orbital sander after re sawing on a table saw and now that i have a good band saw i don't need to thickness after re sawing so i would most certainly go the spiral head.

I'm with Woodpixel
it comes down to process. The OP

Originally Posted by tcjbrown

Already have everything else needed for box making (band-saw, jointer, table-saw, router table).

so my suggested process would be

1. pass timber over jointer to get one face / one edge
(depending on the project, you might pass the billet through the drum sander to get parallel top and bottom faces)
2. use bandsaw to resaw the billet into your box components -- saw about 1-2 mm oversize
3. pass box components through drum sander to remove saw marks -- much faster than a ROS and no risk of rounded edges.
4. if necessary pass the timber billet over the jointer or through the drum sander before cutting the next slice.


the other advantage of the drum sander is working with friable material like Silky Oak or burl veneers.

Hi tcjbrown,

For my two bobs worth, definitely the drum sander. I made my own drum sander, and I love it. Use it all the time, couldn't live without it. If you wanted to have a look, here it is on an old thread.

my Drum Sander

One of the many good points about this is, I can sand very small pieces of timber in this, using a push through stick, or even long very thin pieces. Not sure how you would go about doing this on the bought ones I have seen in shops. I thickness all my timber down on my De Walt table saw, can thickness down to 150mm in widths by doing two cuts. Then it goes through my drum sander. I cant remember the actual cost but it wasn't a lot. Motor I think was about $130 (2hp). It will sand thicknesses from about 40mm down to basically zero.

And it occupies about half the floor space of bought models, a big plus in my limited shed. As for a thicknesser, already having had one noise complaint from the Council, living in a residential area, I would never entertain the thought of a thicknesser. The person I believe who put the complaint in, has long moved away (not due to my noise,..ha ha ), they were in a rental and bought their own house. I am now very conscious of how much noise I make.

Paul

A drum sander is handy if you are close to size. I just bought the large dual drum sander so I have an older model Performax 16-32 that I could part with pretty cheap . Let me know if you are interested and I can send you some pics.
It might free up som cash for a heavier duty spiral head thicknesser.

Cheers

Just a little bit further down the box making road than you. I have a thicknesser (non spiral) and a drum sander. I have found that I cut the timber down on the bandsaw and a couple of passes through the drum sander and they are ready to use. I have used the drum sander to straighten small boards successfully as the drum sander (jenerick 16-32) does not exert as much pressure on the timber as the thicknesser. Even with a spiral head thicknesser there is the chance of tearout in very contorted grain - the best timber for box tops.
Summary - I have not used my thicknesser very often when making boxes but use the drum sander on every box.
Cheers
Mike

If you try and run short timber through the planer you're in for a unpleasant experience. Only longer timber should go through that machine. I have the Supermax 19-38 and love it and don't know how I ever would get along without it. Also have the Delta 735 but tha 19-38 gets used much more often.