shimming jointer cutterhead

[gilliu]

Hi All,

I purchased a used Grizzly 8" jointer -- 3 knives, levers instead of handwheels, colored green top to bottom.

It looks like I need to shim the cutterhead on the side closest to the fence about 0.025"

I was looking at the Grizzly site for replacing standard cutterheads with indexable spiral cutterheads and read this in an online manual pdf:

"Note: Use the shims from your old cutterhead if available. If not available, newspaper is approximately 0.003" thick and will work for shimming (we don't recommend shimming more than 0.004" on either side, as this may affect how the bearing block seats in the casting)."

So, here are my questions:

1.) Am I foolish to try and shim the existing cutterhead slightly more than 5-times the recommended maximum for replacement indexable spiral cutterheads?

2.) If you have shimmed your cutterhead, how big do you cut the shims, how many do you use, and where do you place them? I was going to use two thumbnail sized ones on each side of the bearing block stud.

3.) What shim material would you use? I read on the old woodworking machines forum that someone used feeler gauges and simply broke them off. The feeler gauge that is sized for the gap that I'm addressing seems too thick to bend to the curved shape of the casting that holds the cutter.

Thanks all for your help!

Gil

[Tarhead]

Gil,
Welcome to the group!
I would not shim the cutterhead first. Much better to shim the outfeed table first for gross adjustment. If you haven't already, call a helper and pull off the outfeed table, clean up and lube the base and table ways. Remove the cutterhead and pull out the knives, clean up the mounting surfaces, surface of the cutterhead, blade mounting area and reinstall the cutterhead minus the knives. Reinstall the outfeed table. Check the relationship between the outfeed table and the body of the cutterhead again. Shim the side that needs it at the top and bottom of the way with ~2"LX1"W shims. Aluminum soda can shims are ~.005" thick and they don't compress easily. Once you're close then fine tune the cutterhead mount. Don't know about newspaper???? Old feeler gauges are probably your best bet for the really fine shims. After you're good, reinstall the knives and adjust the outfeed table again.

[JimmyC]

Gil,

You should be able to find shim stock at Fastenal, there is one on Hillsborough St. in Durham. For exact location check out their website.

www.fastenal.com

Jimmy

[junquecol]

First, have you set the knives, using the out feed table as your reference? This will probably eliminate the need to shim cutter head. I strongly suggest that you obtain a copy of John White's book, "Care and Repair of Shop Machines." John is the manager for Fine Woodworking's shop. Has about the best directions for setting up jointer that I have seen.

[adowden]

Gil,

I have a six inch Grizzley jointer. When I jointed boards to make panels, they were touching on each end with a gap in the middle. I shimmed the outfeed table with a piece of folded sandpaper (grit folded on itself) and it worked great for years after that. I also didn't breathe too hard on it.
Good luck!

Amy

[gilliu]

Hi All,

Thank you, thank you for the advice!

I have requested John White's book at the public library -- you can also read it online for free at Google books which is really nice, but I don't have a computer down in the shop. As described in his book, I plan to make some "masterbars" out of MDF tomorrow, as I don't have a straightedge as long as the entire jointer-bed.

I went to Fastenal to look for brass shim-stock and was told that the variety pack was a special order and costs $47! Too rich for me. There is a cheaper sampler pack from Lee Valley tools, but I wanted more immediate gratification and went to Harbor Freight and found feeler gauges for $3. I bought four packs -- so now I have a variety of widths for each corner of the jointer

I'll try to post some pictures of the calibrating -- the video on this site for adjusting knives is excellent. I'm still struggling with how to approach my perceived situation of having the infeed and outfeed tables fairly parallel to each other, but not at all parallel with the cutterhead. I guess I'll end up shimming the outfeed table a fair bit, the cutter head a little, and hopefully not have to resort to having too much diagonal slant to the knives seating in the cutter.

Gil