Resin Tear Out on a Helical Style Planer

[Jasonfromhendo]

I'm pretty new to making charcuterie boards with an epoxy river running through the middle. I'm also pretty new to planing these things. I have a helical style planer and on the back it totally tore the epoxy up! I mean like three or four divots per square inch. There must be 150 divots on the back of the board, and some are probably a millimeter or two deep! Is this normal?? It seems like if so I will need to be exceedingly careful to only plane the wood and not touch the level where the resin starts. Is this still the case with a knife blade style of planer? I feel like I have seen a number of videos where things go fine with a knife blade planer and it's 60-80 grit sandpaper and you're off to the races. I don't even think I will try to sand down the back of this thing, it would take a day to get deep enough to remove all the divots..
And FWIW I was using the Wixey to dial in like 1/3 of a millimeter of depth on the passes.

 

[Echd]

The best way to handle epoxy resin is with a router sled IMO. They make bits with negative rake inserts (check out rip precision for an example) that will reduce tearout even further but I've never had issues with tearout using Carbide cutterheads and spiral bits. I use my cnc router but it's the same idea. Mind you, you'll still have to sand/polish.

With all those divots though, is there any chance you had issues with bubbles under the surface? I find for epoxy doing a "seal coat" is imperative unless you want to spend hours with a torch popping bubbles, and some woods will let out bubbles for a long time.

I find sanding epoxy to a mirror finish to be rather tedious, and as epoxy wears slower than wood if you aren't careful the epoxy can end up "proud" to the wood.

 

[Jasonfromhendo]

Thank you for the reply. Ok so you're talking about foregoing the planer totally, and using a router with a bit meant for making material flat. Yes I have seen those on youtube.
I don't think it was bubbles since this is a very wide area - 4" at least - so the wood was probably not emitting bubbles. I say this because I assume bubbles float toward the surface, and in this case the bubbles would have had to migrate laterally by 1-2" in order for this to be the case.

So when you say I've never had issues with tearout using Carbide cutterheads and spiral bits, that makes me wonder what the heck went wrong. Maybe did I need to wait one more day of curing before planing??

 

[tvrgeek]

Also, a reason for drum sanders. Taking too deep a cut maybe?

 

[Echd]

Thank you for the reply. Ok so you're talking about foregoing the planer totally, and using a router with a bit meant for making material flat. Yes I have seen those on youtube.
I don't think it was bubbles since this is a very wide area - 4" at least - so the wood was probably not emitting bubbles. I say this because I assume bubbles float toward the surface, and in this case the bubbles would have had to migrate laterally by 1-2" in order for this to be the case.

So when you say I've never had issues with tearout using Carbide cutterheads and spiral bits, that makes me wonder what the heck went wrong. Maybe did I need to wait one more day of curing before planing??

My reference was Carbide insert router bits and spiral router bits, not planer heads. I should have been clearer.

The only times I used a planer on epoxy projects I was hogging out a LOT of material and the finish wasn't in question so I'm afraid I'm not sure if your experience was unusual or not.

You're right that bubbles shouldn't have migrated over that distance so that shouldn't have been the issue unless it wasn't mixed thoroughly or bubbles formed during pouring.

 

[Jasonfromhendo]

Well I might have planed a day too early if the word around the campfire is that helical cutterheads do work decently on resin. But I have been wanting to try to make a router sled anyway so maybe now is a good chance to learn how to put one together.
BTW unless I am totally out to lunch, on my recently acquired Oliver planer, I'm doing 1/3 of a millimeter at a time. I suppose I could be reading the Wixey wrong--maybe it's more than one mm of depth per pass. Can a Wixey depth gauge dial in less than 1mm of cut depth?

 

[Jasonfromhendo]

Here is a picture. This is four days after pouring, so unless I made some serious mistake with my mixing, it is the helical planer. Part of my theory is the fact that I then planed it with a 15 year old, 2-knife planer and it cleaned all that $hit up and saved the day. Very disappointed so far with my new planer!

 

[Ricksmi]

For epoxy IMO I would not use anything except a router with a sled and flatting bit (1.5") or a drum sander. I found using a router and then running through the numbers with a good sander and your are good to go.

 

[Jasonfromhendo]

That's two votes for router sled so I guess that's the ideal way to go

 

[AllanD]

Luckily I now have a wide belt sander but previously I don't remember having any significant problems with my planer with regular straight knives. One hint with the bubbles: Do the pour at a time of day that the room will be colder over the next several hours. Usually in the evening, especially if in the winter, and turn the heat off for the night. Still flame it to start with but there should be less outgassing of air if the temperature is not rising.

 

[John Jimenez]

I’ve never had issue with my dewalt planer flat blades causing tear out like that on epoxy. I have however had some slight tear out with my router sled planning. I assume you used a 2:1 deep cast epoxy which usually requires 7 days to fully cure at appropriate temps. 1:1 isnt supposed to be used for anything over 1/4”. One of my favorite things about woodworking is that everything is a learning process even when frustrating. Thanks for posting a good discussion topic.

 

[Jasonfromhendo]

Thank you. Yes I was able to get a good plane from my other, 2-blade planer. So I think it's a helical blade issue. BUT I did only let it cure for 50-60 hours before planing it so many another few days would have made a difference.