When I first started buying bending Oak from Ben Deumling of Zena Forest Products there was no amount of money I could pay him to run this tough wet wood through his planer. The issue is that green white oak is just dripping with tannic acid which is pretty brutal on tools that would otherwise be used for finish work.
Fortunately, Ben and his brother Reuben are serious old tool fanatics and Reuben had just picked up this vintage 1940’s era direct-drive Parks planer that I was able to buy from him. The feed roller is close to shot and a few components in the gearbox are nearing the end of their lifespan, but after a day of cleanup I fitted this old boy with some carbide tipped straight-knife dentures, and parked it next to my bending oak stack under a barbecue grill cover.
This beast is a perfect dedicated bending oak planer and I swear my lunchbox planner doesn’t look at me with quite the same fear anymore.
(Yes I know I post basically this exact same post every two months, I can’t help it I just love watching this thing work.)
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