AD941: Getting outfeed table coplanar to cutterhead
开云体育Unfortunately, I have been right where you are. ?I have a couple of resources that will probably help diagnose this further. ?The first is a Jointer Survival Guide that goes through the process of making the adjustments you are attempting. ?You can find that document on my web site at the following link:Note that the hinge side of the outfield table is the reference surface to which all other table surfaces are adjusted coplanar. ? Just below that Survival Guide is another write-up titled "Felder jointer table design analysis” - read that. ?Once you have looked at both, read the attached - it goes through the behavior you describe, and the likely source of the problem. ?Feel free to DM me if you have specific questions, but I believe the attached document will describe the most likely source of this behavior. David Best DBestWorkshop@... https://www.flickr.com/photos/davidpbest/collections/ https://www.youtube.com/@David_Best
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Hello Andrew,
Happy New Year! I own the AD741, but I assume the AD941 to be very similar in design, requiring similar setup procedures. David Best's document is amazing and details every aspect of the process and I would recommend everyone to follow it - but there is one caveat - it assumes you have a decent outfeed table! I received my AD 741 a few weeks ago and I attempted to make adjustments because the outfeed table shipped way too high. It turned out that there was no further "down" adjustment possible because the machine was adjusted at the factory to be at the maximum "low" point. I had to lower both hinge and latch side by more than 1 mm (which even required me to adjust the latch bracket that locked the table in place). Most importantly, the outfeed table had such a twist in it that it was impossible to follow David Best's recommendation of not making any temple bolt adjustments while tightly latched. If I were to follow that recommendation, I would still be adjusting .... I did check the table with a straight edge (left to right, front to back, and diagonal), but the twist is not that obvious with feelers, however, it will not allow you to bring the outfeed table inline with the cutterhead and level front to back at the same time. It will take hours of tedious back and forth of adjusting the temple bolts - under tight pressure! Leaving the temple bolts loose will change everything once you crank it tight since the table has a twist. And you will have that same twist every time you lock it down in the future!! The tighter you crank, the more twist it will remove .... there is no way of following David's advice of adjusting only one of the temple bolts and then rising the second temple bolts to the same height. This only works with a perfect table - and as it seems, I am not the only one who received a sub-par table from Felder.? It took more than 8 hours adjusting to finally arrive at an acceptable tolerance (and one of my corners is still low). I now use the jointer and I manage to get decent results, but I am definitely not pleased and would not recommend a Felder jointer/planer combo to anyone. If you have an outfeed table that is perfectly flat, then follow David's method - otherwise, you do not need to start on the hinge side or follow any specific procedure since any temple bolt twist will affect the height of the table in relation to the cutterhead on the hinge-side .... it is a never ending process of tweaking and tightening both hinge and latch side since the latch adjustment will affect the hinge side and that will bring you too close to the cutterhead and then you need to raise the hinge side which again requires you to raise the temple bolt, but only the right temple bolt .... and if you only raise the right temple bolt then your twist will be back .... it is a nightmare!? The additional document David provides is an incredible discovery (the flat spot on the up/down mechanism), but unfortunately it was not related to my issue and I am not sure it is related to yours. I would suspect you suffer from a poor quality table, just as I am. Attached is a composite of my level readings (easier to understand than numbers of feeler gauges). When I started, my hinge side was level. Then I leveled my cutterhead. Have a look at my outfeed side and my latch side when both hinge and cutterhead are level .... keep in mind that my level is not super high precision and each line represents 0.1mm. There is no way to adjust this kind of table without hours of work and, unfortunately, it requires that you ignore David's advise .....? Wishing you the best of luck! Cornelius Schultze-Kraft Cyprus |
开云体育Normally, it’s easy to alter the elevation lever to provide a wider and certainly different position for the top and bottom range of the outfeed table. ?It requires repositioning the threaded shaft attached to the lever-arm by moving some limiting locknuts and threading the shaft to a different position while you have it apart. ?This is the gizmo that must be altered:You can see additional details on this at this link: ? Basically you just need to take the lever-arm assembly apart and reposition the threaded shaft that is turned by the height-adjustment knob to a higher or lower position on the shaft that it threads into. Twist in either the indeed or outfeed table can be overcome by staggering the relative heights of the two temple bolts on the latch side of the table. ?For instance, if the table on the latch side sags at the cutter end (relative to the hinge side), raise the temple bolt closest to the cutter, leaving the other temple bolt alone. ?That way when the table is fully latched down hard against the to temple bolts, it will be forces to twist to conform to the differing heights of the two temple bolts. David Best
DBestWorkshop@... https://www.flickr.com/photos/davidpbest/collections/ https://www.youtube.com/@David_Best
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开云体育Looking at your level readings, I would have no problem working out the twist in your table in less than 30 minutes by altering the relative heights of the two temple bolts. You should not have to resort to making adjustments to the hinge side of the outfeed table. ? If your table has dips and hollows even with the latch and hinge side adjusted coplanar, there is nothing you can do to correct the irregular surface of the table, but you can certainly bring the latch side into close conformance with the hinge side. ?With a table that has excessive dips and hollows, and if you are using a precision level to check surface alignment and conformance, ?it’s best to do all your level readings atop a known-good straight edge with parallel surfaces along the entire surface to average out the low spots. ?I dispute your claim that you ignore my advice, but instead do your best to average out the irregular surfaces of the table using a long straight edge or precision machined contractors level as your point of reference. ?And it will never be perfect, but you should be able to attain flat results with material run on either the hinge or latch side of the machine. ? I do agree that this set of adjustments is tiresome and frustrating, and it takes a lot of trial and error to get it dialed in. ?And it’s made even more aggravating when the machine from the factory is aligned to produce a spring joint result rather than flat surfaces. ?This sets the stage of the user to have go through the tedious process of realigning the tabes after delivery - unless all they do involving a jointer is make cutting boards. ?The source of this frustration is fully documented in my “analysis” write-up and the reason I routinely recommend potential buyers look for a parallelogram-type table elevation system when selecting a machine that has flip-up tables. ? If the Andrew’s outfeed table is latched down hard against the two temple bolts, there are only two potential circumstances where the latch and hinge side of the table elevate at different rates: ?A - the eccentric cam that elevates the table is physically different on one side from the other, or B - the pivot pin in the hinge mechanism is moving because the locking set screws at each end are not secured to the shaft thus allowing the hinge to flex when the table is moved up or down. David Best
DBestWorkshop@... https://www.flickr.com/photos/davidpbest/collections/ https://www.youtube.com/@David_Best
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David P. Best
