How do I plane the top of a bench consisting of different boards and directions?

) July 7th, 2010

I am in the process of making a wooden bench. The top plane is comprised of multiple strips of wood glued together which I will then adhere to the rails and legs with hardware. The strips of wood aren’t flush and therefore need to be planed. Would you suggest sending it through an automatic planer or doing this sort of thing by hand given that he grains go in different directions in order to combat warppage? Thoughts?

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6 Answers

Planing by machine should work if you take very thin layers off. However, if the wood you’re using is prone to ripout from the plane blades, you might want to look into using a thickness sander (basically a planer, but uses sandpaper instead of blades).

grumpyfish (6657

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I would use a belt sander to bring all the pieces to nearly flush, then use a planer set for a very thin cut to finish the job. Plane in the direction that most of the grain is in.

stranger_in_a_strange_land (18360

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I would do what @stranger_in_a_strange_land says but I would use a random orbital sander, I like them so much better. Less chance of uneven or oversanding.

rooeytoo (26981

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