Planing Steps for Straight, Flat, Square timber

Woodworking tools used: Planner Thicknesser and Bench Saw or Band Saw

How to Plane the Good Pieces

1. Cheat, use your bench saw or band saw first.

Set your saw up accurately with a perpendicular blade and sturdy long fence. Rip the wood down to about 1.5mm oversize. On squarish sections e.g. 40 x 50mm this saves lots of passes through the planer thicknesser.

If the original rough cut is good you only need to cut off two sides.

TIP: Add a long flat piece of timber to the saw rip fence, this improves the accuracy.

Warning - a longer rip fence on a bench saw extending past the back of the blade increases the risk of Kickback.

2. Send it through the thicknesser to clean it up to the finished size.

There’s no need to use the planer with 90 degree guide on squarish pieces as the accurate saw set up gives you the square edge. You can just send it through the planer thicknesser.

With boards, saw cut the width to just oversize and use the planer on the edges using the accurately set guide guide.

Next - How to plane "diamond" pieces

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