This jig was submitted by Charger, one of our chat room regulars. Its a great way to flatten a board that is too wide for your jointer!

Well I am currently drying some White Oak for a Captains Canopy Bed for my daughter. The wood should be ready in about three weeks or so. The wood is 5/4″ x 11.5″ x 8′. It does show signs of twists and cupping. I don’t have a 12″ jointer so how do I flatten these? Answer: Build a planer sled that was showcased in Fine Woodworking. I had seen the video and was impressed with it’s simplicity. I decided to build it to flatten the boards.

The plans called for 1/2″ plywood for the top and bottom of the sled and then plastic laminate on the very bottom of the ply to make it have less friction for the planer. I made a few changes in mine. First I bought Melamine Shelving that is 12″ x 8′ for the bottom. With that surface there would be no reason to laminate = savings of some dollars for me. Second thing I did was to buy a particle board shelf for the top = less $ then a sheet of 1/2″ plywood. I then made the rest of it like the plans called for. The wedges slide in and out of the supports to make the board stop wobbling and then it can be planed. I really like the jig and look forward to using it a lot in the future. I’ll update you all on the way it performed for me and ad any changes that may be needed. Thanks for looking, Lance Chase aka: Charger

Check out this FWW Video to see the jig in action.

Hi Marc. I only have the money to buy one tool at a time with months in between purchases. If you were going to choose between a planer and jointer, which one would come first?

And here was my reply:
Hey Doug. Excellent question. If I had to pick only one, I would get the planer first. That way you can at least get your lumber pretty darn close to flat and parallel. Furthermore, you can resize your lumber when necessary. And for jointing tasks, you can always do a few tricks at the tablesaw, or use a router and a straight edge. Or just invest in a nice long jointer plane. I’ll tell ya, these days, I would be lost without both the jointer AND the planer. So sad.

But that’s just my opinion. I think Doug would be best served hearing everyone’s opinions about this question. So what would you find most useful on it’s own, the planer or the jointer?