# BETTER THAN ANTICIPATED



## chem (Jan 2, 2014)

I have the 10 inch version and I am less enthusiastic. The tables are far too short. The guard was hard to adjust and ultimately failed. The motor is incredibly loud. I agree the switching to planning is pretty easy; however with 12-13 inch planers being so cheap I found little reason to use that feature. In the end I had an inadequate 10 inch jointer albeit for a very low price.


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## rodneyh (Feb 8, 2011)

I had the 8" version and found it to be useless. All table surfaces are way too small making control of anything but very small work error prone and dangerous. The fence and its adjustment are a joke. Terrible snipe. Factory blades dulled really quickly, and the thing is crazy loud. Sold it and bought an old Rigid jointer and Dewault planer on craigslist for not much more money. The pair are better than the Jet in every way.


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## steve421 (Feb 19, 2015)

I have used some industrial jointers and found this unit to be less loud than any others that I have used. Yes there will be noise, you are slicing up wood, but I do not find the sound ear piercing. Its about the level of my shop vac. Yes the fence is a little small, the table is small, but I have set up some rollers which work quite well. Eventually am going to build extensions into the cabinet that I made in order to extend the surface of the table. Like I said I take small bites at a time, but I have gotten the wood to be between 1/1000 and 1/100th of an inch difference I can see the blades dulling quickly possibly I can find some carbide blades for this unit. I need to call Jet and ask them few questions. For me I have limited space. I am working out of my garage and cant afford any more space for wood prep, maybe sometime down the road I will go with a better unit, but for now this unit is definitely worth the price. I know I have limitations with this, which is ok, I dont need to work with 8 ft boards at a time. I can cut them down to sizes that are more appropriate for my work. Usually under 2 ft. I used it yesterday on 8 inch wide boards, the past week I have worked with 6 inch boards, and yes I could tell it was a little harder on the motor, and yes it was a little louder, so I could see the 10 inch on 10 inch wide boards would be hard on the motor. Possibly under rated for that. I also do wish that you could adjust the fence in and out, and there should be a notch cut where the blade is also because in adjusting the blade there was a time that it was touching the fence underneath. I dont see any damage to the blade from it, but i am sure if I held it up under a magnifying glass I would see some. It has not affected the cut but I am hoping to get the new blades soon and throwing this first set out if there is any damage to them.

As long as people know its limitations, and you are not going to plane 100's of board feet a day, this unit does a pretty good job of what its intended to do. You just have to be patient and not take too big of bites at a time. It does take me some time to get rough lumber to be fit for further work. But with my budget right now, I will gladly put in an extra hour of prep verses paying almost twice as much for 2S2 lumber that isn't perfectly flat and straight anyways, Even with finished lumber the boards begin getting out of shape as it takes on or releases moisture from the atmosphere. I would not suggest this unit for a professional shop doing a lot of business, but for us hobbyist the unit is a fair price and I really love it.


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## mnguy (Feb 4, 2009)

This tool has a universal motor, which is much louder than an induction motor. Benchtop tools are generally louder than larger, heavier tools for this reason. But, universal motors pack a lot of power into a small, light package.


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## MikeThrockmorton (Nov 4, 2013)

Yeah, I bought this machine a few years back and it has been a stern teacher of technique, expectations and noise.

Once I figured out there was no real way to dial it in perfectly (if you get things lined up perfectly for the jointing surfaces, you may find yourself unlined up for the planing surfaces) and just learned how to use the tool as is, I got acceptable results. Is it ideal? Uh no.

One of my goals (goals are important to establish) in woodworking was to go from log to, well, something. Hopefully something that looks unlike firewood.

You can go the hand-tool route with that, which if you look at the investment there, is not negligible. There's also the consideration that if you're a person of yearage, your body may not tolerate taking wood from tree to trestle table by hand for long.

For the money, this device is a good entry point. 8" may be enough for most (hush, I'm being serious).

Once I figured out that getting the surface planing part set up pretty good, then treating the jointing bit as an upside down motorized handplane (that is, make a pass, mark your areas to resolve, make another, repeat til acceptible), I could get work done.

Eventually, once I proved that my commitment was worth further investment, I bought the Dewalt 735 for planing, set up the jointing surfaces of the Jet to be as precise as I could and worked with that. That's where I'm at now.

The noise is a huge issue, but I figure if there's a zombie apocalypse and the zombies come knocking at my garage door, I can fire up the Jet and the noise should cause them to reconsider.

"Jeeze, this guy is noisy" "Yeah, lets shamble over next door, that guy is not only chubby, well marbled and tender, but has the 8" Powermatic long bed heliical head jointer which is MUCH quieter"


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