**The Planer: A Shop Utility**

For me personally, I had two really big problems with this planer. It's way too heavy and the dust collector is just not great. But I think we actually made both of those things better.

One thing I did to address the weight issue was to add a mount to put the roller on the side of the case. Rather than buying a full sheet of melamine that's super hard to wrestle around, I was able to get just a shelf panel from the store and it's like nine bucks. It's a little bit too wide, but it's the perfect length. So I'm just going to rip it down and then I can mount it within the planer. Basically I want that to sit flat against this surface on some sort of a shelf. And then that shelf has to be deep enough for the feet of these things to sit on it as well. And then maybe some sort of a bungee cord or something to kind of hold them against the cabinet.

Another thing I did was to make a roller that's on a stand that you can fold up. This is basically just a tool and it's not very expensive to get. You can cut this aluminum on pretty much any woodworking tool. I did it on the miter saw. And just being able to dress up this little opening right here actually helps quite a bit. These things aren't glued or screwed in, they're just pressure fit. You could use the same stuff to cover these outside corners or edge band them or just paint the whole thing if you really care about what it looks like. But for me, this is a shop utility, it doesn't have to be pretty.

**Making the In Feed and Out Feed**

With that, I think the in feed and out feed is at least better. It may not be perfect, but it's gonna be better than just using these tables that are on there. We can use these things as a roller that's on a stand that you can fold up. This is a thing I've had for a long time and it's basically a roller that's on a stand that you can fold up. So you can use this roller as in-feed or out-feed from a tool. And in this case, we can either just set these out here to help us move a board through, or we can use them as a place to set the end of the melamine on, creating a longer surface that's going to stay flat.

**Muffling the Machine**

One big thing that was mentioned and I'm not really sure that we can do anything about it, but it's worth a shot. This thing is incredibly loud. Like it's really, really loud. We're gonna take a suggestion from Adam over at Maker Cube and see if we can just put some padding in between these two surfaces and see if that'll help cut down the decibel level. So we have four layers of foam, it's about two inches and this is an EVA foam, so it's not super dense. You could use a rubber pad here, you could use even less dense foam. This is just what I could find locally, so we're just gonna try this out, but there are other options for sure.

**Cutting Down the Decibel Level**

I mean, it didn't hurt. It's helping a little bit. Looked like the highest we had there was 94, but it was also sticking more around 90. So you know, it's not gonna hurt anything. I don't know that it's really gonna help that much. Still gonna have to wear ear muffs, but at least we tried.

**A Few Extra Things**

The only other thing I did here was to cut down some pieces of aluminum angle. And this is stuff I already had on hand, but it's not very expensive to get. You can cut this aluminum on pretty much any woodworking tool. I did it on the miter saw. And just being able to dress up this little opening right here actually helps quite a bit. These things aren't glued or screwed in, they're just pressure fit.

**Painting and Additional Features**

And then I realized that adding another piece of flexible hose on the inside would actually direct the chips and everything down into the can rather than just into the box. May help a little bit, probably won't make a huge difference, but now it's time to actually try this thing out.

**Testing the Planer**

For me personally, I had two really big problems with this planer. It's way too heavy and the dust collector is just not great. But I think we actually made both of those things better. And I think we actually made a bunch of the stuff better that you suggested on Instagram. Thanks for that, by the way.

**Bloopers**

This is my planer. And although it works, the... You should not open and close very often just when we need to empty. Empty? Got that filter in there. It's just a little something I found.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enThat was amazing and kind of terrible.Hey, I'm Bob at I Like To Make Stuff.This is my planer and it works pretty well, but it definitely has some problems.I asked you all on Instagram about what problems you've had with it so that we can come up with some solutions.So today, we're going to make this thing better.Let's give it a shot.A couple of weeks ago on Instagram, I asked people if they have this planer or one like it,what are the big problems?What are the things that make it difficult to use?What don't you like about it?There were a lot of great responses and we're going to try to deal with a bunch of them,but the two biggest ones I definitely felt myself.One, it's too heavy.It says right here, this thing weighs 92 pounds.It's a two person lift.And so it's just hard to pick up.I use it on the ground and that makes my back hurt.So the first thing we're going to do is get this thing off the groundso I don't have to lean down anymore.The other big problem is the dust collection.It's got this port that sticks out the back,and if you put a hose or a bag here,it lays over where the wood comes out.That's a big problem.So on top of picking this thing up off the ground,we're also going to improve the dust collection.That was amazing and kind of terrible.Okay, I did not turn on the dust collector,but the system, I have a system where they're all connected,and the blower that's inside this thing is powerful enough that it was blowing air back through here,into the table saw, and out where the table saw blade was sitting.And so the good thing is we can use the blower inside this to help evacuate.We don't have to add another dust collector to this thing, but man, that's pretty crazy.And also, if you don't connect the hose well, it does this.(upbeat rock music)Basically all I've done is cut down six pieces of plywoodto make a box.And this box is completely dependent on the sizeof a trash can that I got to put on the inside of it.I'll tell you about that in just a little bit.Basically it's really simple cuttingand I'm gonna use pocket holes to put this thing togetherbecause it doesn't need to do anythingexcept be tall and strong.Just like me!Ha ha!Here we have a basic box.Now the idea here is that we want this to be strong enough for the planer to sit on.Right now it's not, but it will be.We also want to have an area underneath it that's going to catch the sawdust and the chips that come out of this thing.So I bought a $17 trash can and it fits in there.We're going to cut a hole right here so that we can blow all of the chips and the sawdust into this area.Then we're going to cover this with a door.But as it stands right now, this is half inch plywood, the bottom is half inch plywood.And if we leave it as it is, the weight of the planer is going to end up bending this over time.So before we put the door on we need to cut a little section of it probably above this and then run a stringer along hereThat's going to support the fourth side to handle the weight. After that, we'll put the door on.It would leak like crazy(upbeat music)To be clear, I'm just using hingesthat I already had on hand.Simple construction, they're going into end grain,which is not great, but theoretically this thingshouldn't have to open and close very oftenjust when we have to empty the dust.(upbeat music)That's really heavy.I don't remember it being that heavy.It is very heavy.(bell dings)- Maybe you're getting weak.- No!Lift with your back, not with your knees, right?Oh my goodness.Okay, that thing actually is heavy.I forgot how heavy it is because I haven't had to pick it up in a long time.But it is up here, so immediately it's better than it was because I can use the planer withouthaving to bend over at all.So that's great, but it's also in the middle of the shop stuck on a big block of wood.We need to make a move around.Luckily, I've used these casters a whole bunch of times on a bunch of different cabinets.And they're basically the thing that you put on the side.So you can push down on this and it will lock the wheel down, which means it will lift this...(clanking)Basically, you can use this thing to push the wheel down and lift the entire cabinet off the ground.And then when you want it to sit down on the flat bottom, you can lift this thing up,the wheel comes off the ground, these things are awesome and inexpensive,and they can hold like 600 pounds.So I can put these on with it in place.(upbeat music)So these things are on.All you gotta do is step on them like thatand it engages the wheel.And now once you've got all four casters on there,this entire thing moves around very easily.Now one thing that people often recommendwhen we use these is that we run a barin between the two casters going from here to here.That way you could push down in the middleand engage them both at the same timeor lift up on the bar and disengage them at the same time.We may do that later on, it's definitely a suggestion,something you may want to do if you use these casters.And before we move on, I do want to make a way to close thisso that it will snap closed and stay closed.And then also just add a really simple handleto the outside of it so we can open it.For the kind of latch, the thing that's gonna keep itin place, I've got this little magnet and then a metal plate.Can you just mount those on the insideand they lock together, super easy.So there, we have a way to open and close this section.And the whole point of having the door hereis so that we can catch the dust down here,which means we need to connect it to the planer.So we need to connect from the output of the planerand make some sort of a hose that comes over hereand goes into a hole that we haven't drilled yetinto the box to fill up the trash can.This fitting that comes on this thingis a little bit strange.It has a larger outer diameter,a smaller inner diameter for two different hoses,and then it also has some pieces in thereto stop chips, big chips, from coming through.I thought about replacing this thing completelyI actually built a 3D model and 3D printed a little piece that replicates the fit onhere and then I realized that that's kind of unnecessary.What we need to do instead is actually just adapt it.So I've 3D printed a coupler that will fit in here pretty tightly and then this smallerpart will connect to a piece of PVC pipe.So we can get these things fit together, it will come off this direction and then we canroute it down.So from this connection, we'll probably put a flexible hose that's going to be able tocome over here to the side and then connect to another piece of PVC that's going to bepushed and glued into a hole right here so that will be kind of centered on the trash canAnd if we need to put something else on the inside to divert that air flow down into thecan, we can totally do that, but we're going to start by getting all these pieces fit up.I did not think about the fact that this is a four inch hose and these are three inchpieces I was just trying to match what was on there.So they don't quite fit together but if we use the bigger end of this, meaning we addanother coupler, then we should be able to fit that around.It's tight enough that we can put a hose clamp on there and it will hold it in place.But if you're going to do this for yourself, you can avoid all that by just getting a threeinch piece that has the full size ends.I just happened to get a street elbow,so it has one small end and that's not ideal here.(rock music)Cool.So, what we can do to actually let that rotate in the spaceis to cut a little piece of regular PVC pipethat fits over that.Oh, this one doesn't fit over it.I thought I had one that fit over it.So what we can do now that that fits in thereis actually use a coupling,which I didn't realize we had,put it on the inside of the box, glue it into placeso we leave this little slot where the wood isso it will be held in place, but it can still spinso that it's kind of free to move with the hose.(upbeat music)(upbeat music)Let's try it out.(vacuum whirring)So, that blew the door open, which is a good thingin that it's a lot of pressure in there,but what you should probably do is cut some holesin this bottom box and then put in like a filter.I've got some filters for my other air cleanerthat we can use.So if we cut a big area, embed a filter in that,then we have a way for air to escape.It totally works.I got the filter in there. It still may blow the door open, but we can latch it and at least we have an outlet.So let's give it a shot.We've solved a few problems already.It's off the ground, which helps all of these people, and we kind of fixed the dust collection.We made it at least cleaner and easier to use, and that's going to help all of these people.Now, there was another one that I can't quite fix. Somebody said that they kept getting theirarm caught in it. You're kind of on your own for that one. But a lot of other people,like all of these people, said that the in-feed and the out-feed were a problem.I totally agree with that. These tables are not great. And so what I want to do is try to figureout a way to have a more like planer surface that runs all the way from here all the way out to hereand can support longer in feed and out feed and we've got a really really simple way to do this.Let me talk specifically for just a second about what the problem is here. When you're running aboard through a planer you need it to be completely flat on the way in on the way out so that thecutter head is cutting parallel to this surface but on this planer these tables will not stayparallel to this surface because of all these adjustment screws because you have to take it up and down and it just causes it notto stay on the same plane. That's going to mess up your plane on the piece of wood.So all we need to do is take a solid piece of flat material like melamine, which is also really cheap by the way,and run it from out here all the way through all the way to the outside of the other end.But in addition to that, we can also use these things. This is a thing I've had for a long timeand it's basically a roller that's on a stand that you can fold up.So you can use this roller as in-feed or out-feed from a tool.And in this case, we can either just set these out here to help us move a board through,or we can use them as a place to set the end of the melamine on,creating a longer surface that's going to stay flat.And so one thing we need to do on top of getting another one of theseis make a mount to put these on the side.Rather than buying a full sheet of melamine that's super hard to wrestle around,And we were able to get just a shelf panel from the store and it's like nine bucks.It's a little bit too wide, but it's the perfect length.So we're just going to rip it down and then we can mount it within the planer.Basically I want that to sit flat against this surface on some sort of a shelf.And then that shelf has to be deep enough for the feet of these things to sit on itas well.And then maybe some sort of a bungee cord or something to kind of hold them againstthe cabinet.Now we have this and we can put this on the side of the case, screw it in on this face,glue it, put some glue and screws on the top and then mount the shelf on top of it so it'sgoing to be nice and strong and won't have to worry about it like folding down.(rock music)With that, I think the in feed and out feedis at least better.It may not be perfect, but it's gonna be betterthan just using these tables that are on there.Now we have one other big thing that was mentioned,and I'm not really sure that we can do anything about it,but it's worth a shot.This thing is incredibly loud.(machine whirring)Like it's really, really loud.We're gonna take a suggestion from Adamover at Maker Cube and see if we can just put some paddingin between these two surfaces and see if that'll helpcut down the decibel level.(grunts)So we have four layers of foam, it's about two inchesand this is an EVA foam, so it's not super dense.You could use a rubber pad here,you could use even less dense foam.This is just what I could find locally,so we're just gonna try this out,but there are other options for sure.(engine revving)I mean, it didn't hurt.It's helping a little bit.It looked like the highest we had there was 94,but it was also sticking more around 90.So, you know, it's not gonna hurt anything.I don't know that it's really gonna help that much.Still gonna have to wear ear muffs,but at least we tried.Now, the only other thing I did herewas to cut down some pieces of aluminum angle,and this is stuff I already had on hand,but it's not very expensive to get.You can cut this aluminum on pretty muchany woodworking tool.I did it on the miter saw.And just being able to dress upthis little opening right hereactually helps quite a bit.These things aren't glued or screwed in,they're just pressure fit.You could use the same stuff to cover these outside cornersor edge band them or just paint the whole thingif you really care about what it looks like.But for me, this is a shop utility,it doesn't have to be pretty.This thing's finally finished,but I did do a couple of extra things off camera.I added some paint to it just so it's not plywood.And I realized that adding another piece of flexible hoseon the inside would actually direct the chipsand everything down inside the canrather than just into the box.It may help a little bit,probably won't make a huge difference,but now it's time to actually try this thing out.(upbeat music)For me personally,I had two really big problems with this planer.It's way too heavy and the dust collector is just not great,but I think we actually made both of those things better.And I think we actually made a bunch of the stuff better that you suggested on Instagram.Thanks for that, by the way.That's it for this one.Thanks for watching.Now it's time for bloopers.This is my planer.And although it works, the...You should not open and close very often just when we need to hempty.Hempty?Got that filter in there.It still may bloor the...Bloor?...handledI think....cause it's a handle.Aaaah!\n"