Planing with a Dewalt DW 735 planer

The manual says not to plane material shorter the 12". I have some 10" material that I need to plane down to 1/8". I am thinking of attaching it to an MDF carrier with double sided tape and run that through the planer. Any thoughts?

 

That may not work well. The knife pushes down on the material and your tape will act like a cushion. I don't know how it will act but it will probably make a lot of snipe on each end, ruining the first couple inches.

You would probably be better off making a sled for it that has an 1/8" thick strip glued on each side to capture it. And you will probably still have some snipe.

You also usually want to rip material on a table saw to within 1/8 before planing it... so if you can, rip it to 1/4 first.

 

Plus the tape will gum up the blades.
What exactly is it your trying to do.The more info you give the better suggestions you will get.
What "material" are you trying to plane?

 

Joe, he is suggesting he lay the board on top of a larger board, on top of the tape... the tape would never touch the blade.

Regardless, you never want to plane material that is cut to exact length... you almost always need it to be several inches longer due to the waste... you have to cut off a couple inches of snipe on each side.

Plus, at less than 12", the feeding rollers won't be able to fully grip the top surface and pull it through. You would have to push the last 2" through which would likely make a rough cut... provided it doesn't catch on something on its way out. So I can't see how even that idea would work.

 

Sounds like it's time for a drum sander huh?

 

Here is my solution. I glued long pieces to each side of the short stock and planed down to 0.15".

 

Glad you got it.