A Little Bit About Grizzly Industrial
Founded in 1983, Grizzly Industrial is now one of the largest machinery companies in the United States and produces machines for large and small cabinet and machine shops alike. Grizzly produces woodworking machines of excellent quality and value and has won many awards based on those qualities.
What is a Jointer?
A jointer is a woodworking machine used to create a flat, level section on a board. Jointers can both edge joint, and face joint; meaning it can trim both the face of the board and the narrow side of the board.
The jointer’s primary function is to produce flat edges on solid material prior to joining them together (to produce wider boards) but also works to flatten the face of the material. If the material to be jointed needs to also be flattened, the face of the board must flattened prior to edge joining.
Parts of a Jointer
A jointer table consists of two long, narrow tables in a row with a cutter head recessed in between them. The two tables are referred to the infeed table and the outfeed table. The material to be joined is first placed on the infeed table. It is then pushed over the cutting head, where it is trimmed, and then passes over the outfeed.
There is a side guide on top of the table to help guide the wood over the cutter head, which is driven by an electric motor on newer machines and driven by a belt on older machines. A fence is set perpendicular to the tables, and sometimes can be set at different angles.
The cutter head contains at least two very sharp knives that protrude from the cutter head and can come into contact with the material as the cutter head is spinning. The cutter head is horizontal and placed perpendicular to the feed direction, with the knives cutting in the opposite direction of the feed direction.
Some jointers have a spiral, or helical cutting head. A helical cutting head has many individually mounted knives that have multiple cutting edges. When one edge of the knife dulls, that particular knife can be rotated so a new sharp edge is exposed for cutting.
Our Grizzly Jointer
Our Grizzly G0586 jointer was purchased only a few weeks ago and has been in use every day since. It is equipped with a helical cutting head and can trim materials up to eight inches wide and trims up to 1/8th inch per pass.
The helical head provides a much nicer finish with much less effort on the craftsman’s part. This particular jointer has one feature that is not found on other jointers: the fence position is controlled by a geared hand wheel that moves it back and forth 1/16th inch per revolution.
Contact us to get started on a custom woodworking project for your home, office, or retail space—or view our gallery for some inspiration.