A woodworker is ready to purchase a stationary planer. He was all set on a Powermatic 20" until a friend told him about the problems he'd had with the model. The friend recommended the 15" Hitachi, and the woodworker would like some advice from the forum.

A proponent of the Powermatic thought that the dissatisfied friend might simply not know how to use his planer and since, he acknowledged, it is complicated to adjust and set up. That said, he noted that a good combination would be a 12" jointer and a 16" planer, but the original poster should probably describe his intended use and future plans more thoroughly to get better advice.

An owner of a Delta 15" planer described it as solid and powerful with 3HP, 220v,and two speeds, and it cut a lot better than his old portable planer. When he can afford it, he'd upgrade to a 20" that would allow him to plane entire tabletops. Another poster suggested checking used tool shops. He'd found a SCMI S-63 planer for about $2,000 (plus a Unitronics 16" jointer for about $3,000). If he was buying new, however, he'd go with helical cutter heads.

An additional response suggested the issues to consider were cost, space, volume, width of material, and power. He'd gone with a 20" planer that was fairly cheap and handled fairly wide surfaces, but also provided the following scenarios:

• Running narrow stock in high volume? Go with a heavy-duty, but narrow, planer.
• Narrow stock at low volume with only occasional wide stock? Go with the 20" Grizzly.
• Frequently running wide stock in large volume? Go with a heavy-duty 24" planer.

The original poster returned to note that he was now considering the Powermatic 15" and based on its great reviews and the fact he'd realized he didn't actually have room for the 20".