ONE Super Simple Secret to Prevent Planer Snipe

Here are two simple ways to prevent planer snipe from your thickness planer.
For woodworking projects, you need to mill lumber to get it straight, flat, and smooth, and a planer is the most common tool. Snipe will ruin your wood, but learning how to prevent this will save your wood.
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[@HORRUS29]

Could you adjust your out feed table to be slightly higher than the middle of the planner?

[@davidswitzer5743]

Thbaks for the tip on snipe! Let’s see how it goes

[@inspiringbuilds]

Good job of explaining snipe and my technique to use another board butted up to avoid it as well. Keep up the great work as the goal is for us to continue to inspire others to build something awesome! 👍🏼

[@SawsHub]

Thanks

[@leo150125]

Thanks for the tips!! Liked it

[@douglashouck6556]

Good advice. Thanks.

[@5325jslenk]

I understand how using a sacrificial board stops snipe on the first one but how can you use both boards to stop snipe on both boards as you will eventually use only one board to go through the planer causing snipe on that last board.

[@mnjikaning1]

Because after the second time through it's not really cutting any material so the cut surface is the same as the in/out feed roller. If you properly adjust your outfeed table it is the same as using your hand (or should be).

[@damianainscough]

What about snipe at the front of the board? I've seen two sacrificial boards used, front and back(?)

[@SouthPaw909]

Great job thank you sir !

[@SawsHub]

You are welcome!

[@newacct10]

holding the board off the table until it's under the second roller works for me as far as preventing snipe on the leading end. Holding the board up to maintain even level of feed prevents snipe on the back end. I don't feed a bunch of boards overlapping one another either. Wood is too expensive (for me) to be using sacrificial pieces, whether it's just one or two.

[@stevecullen4131]

Construction lumber works fine, no need to run anything expensive thru. Just need to keep those rollers leveled.

[@damianainscough]

I don't think it needs to be a full width, just a narrow offcut of the same width.

[@PeterEmery]

Known confusingly in this country as a thicknesser. Of course, it does the reverse of that...

[@frankrodriguez6424]

My snipe always happens in front, and I have a flat melamine board as a table on top of the aluminum

[@tazwhitefeather]

ear protection?

[@nominalvelocity]

Huh?

[@tazwhitefeather]

@@nominalvelocity can't form a cohesive sentence?

[@VS-16]

...he doesn't need it - he has turned down the sound... 🔊🔉🔈👍

[@copedog101]

If your boards are dead flat, vary seldom will you get snipe

[@brettbarager9101]

Ear protection!!

[@VS-16]

...he doesn't need it - he has turned down the sound... 🔊🔉🔈👍

[@blondin07]

While snipe can be partially caused by the free end of the board moving up or down, it is not the main cause. The fact that putting a scrap board through beside, or closely following, your work board prevents snipe should tell you that the main cause is 'rocking' or 'tilting' of the cutter head assembly. Using scrap boards to support the cutter head prevents it from lifting slightly, as the leading edge hits the outfeed roller or dropping slightly as the trailing edge leaves the infeed roller. If snipe was purely a result of the board or infeed/outfeed table support then putting a scrap board through with the work would make no difference.

[@rvdboston9568]

Your snipe explanation (lifting the end of the board when it passed one of the rollers) contradicts your sacrificial board snipe prevention trick (how could 2nd board prevent 1st board end from moving up and prevent the snipe?). In fact, there is a better explanation for snipe due to cutting head slight down movement on one end when board has passed its corresponding roller.

[@ryananthony4840]

Because when you have a sacrificial board behind it the feed roller won't drop and allow the carriage to rock.... it will happen at the end of your sacrificial board instead..... it makes total sense.

[@JB-NZ]

@@ryananthony4840 So is the front roller, knives and back roller all connected on a single carriage, to make this answer correct? Because I just watched this and had the exact same question, as I could not see how a 2nd board would stop the first board's end lifting up closer to the knives once it came off the back roller. If they do share a carriage, then it makes sense.

[@ryananthony4840]

@@JB-NZ yes, basically it's caused by just a slight twist....

[@patmiller359]

Need eye protection and a dust mask

[@copedog101]

Alot of those u tubers that offer diys barely even know what they're doing

[@tchevrier]

that's not quite how snipe is caused. If it were placing a sacrificial board at the end would not work.

[@SawsHub]

Why not?

[@tchevrier]

@@SawsHub you said that snipe is caused because when the first roller is no longer pushing the board down, the board lifts up a little bit. Well, if you run a sacrificial piece of wood behind your board, you board will still lift up a little bit after it loses contact with the roller. In reality what is happening is that there is a little bit of play in the cutter head. When the first roller loses contact with the board, the entire cutter head assembly tilts a little bit causing the snipe. That's why if you run a sacrificial piece of wood through it eliminates the snipe. The sacrificial piece keeps the cutting head level.

[@stevecullen4131]

@@tchevrierThis is my understanding as well. In these bench top models the rollers and the blade are interconnected so when the roller drops so does the blade. Explains why running a sacrificial board works every time.

[@C1schecter101]

Machine cost to much for this shit